Sean Penn is “proud” about President Joe Biden’s most recent pardon. “Any father that didn’t do that would have been remiss,” Penn tells Variety, adding:  “I don’t know if I want to have a beer with somebody who wouldn’t have pardoned Hunter Biden, being their son.” As a close friend and confidant of the younger […]

Sean Penn blamed the Oscars for “limiting different cultural expressions” and voiced his support for Ali Abbasi’s Donald Trump movie “The Apprentice” while at Marrakech Film Festival, where he received a career tribute “The Academy have exercised really extraordinary cowardice when it comes to being part of the bigger world of expression, and in fact, […]

Reflecting on his trailblazing career, Canadian icon David Cronenberg felt particular pride for the one project that got away – or, more to the point, that he pushed away with full force: “Flashdance.” “You might be amazed [that producers Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer] were totally convinced that I was the right one to direct,” […]

Sean Penn has had it with people being politically correct. The Oscar-winning actor made an impassioned plea for people “to be as politically incorrect as their heart desires,” while being honored with an award on Saturday during a glitzy gala night at Morocco’s Marrakech Film Festival, where guests included Luca Guadagnino, Monica Bellucci, Tim Burton, Justin […]

The Match Factory will handle international sales for director Cherien Dabis’ decades spanning family saga “All That’s Left of You.” Currently in post-production and by all accounts among the most anticipated projects presented at this year’s Atlas Workshops, the film follows three generations of a Palestinian family, tracking cycles of trauma beginning with the 1948 […]

Hiam Abbass (“Succession”), Abderrahmane Sissako (“Black Tea”), Zar Amir Ebrahimi (“Holy Spider”), Adam Bessa (“Ghost Trail”), Yumna Marwan (“The Veil”) and “Anatomy of a Fall” producer Marie-Ange Luciani will join “The Bikeriders” director Jeff Nichols as mentors at this year’s Atlas Workshops. Running from Dec. 1 – 5 as part of the Marrakech Film Festival, […]

Everything old was new again at this year’s Cairo Film Festival. Filling out a super-sized 45th edition, the Egyptian event introduced a new section dedicated to heritage titles, showcasing 10 gems of world cinema, among them titles like “The Lonely Wife” and “The Color of Pomegranates” to mark the centenaries of film greats Satyajit Ray […]

Three documentary projects took top honors at this year’s Cairo Film Connection, with Ager Oueslati’s “You Don’t Die Two Times” winning the post-production prize as development laurels went to Khaled Al Swidan’s “Amal” and Eliane Raheb’s “The North Wind.” Marking his first year at the head of the Cairo Film Festival’s development and postproduction showcase, […]

Two weeks before the cameras were set to roll, everything fell apart. At that point, “Moondove” director Karim Kassem had spent two years developing his fourth feature and then painstakingly getting the project off the ground. The nonfiction film was supposed to follow a young woman who returns to a small village in Mount Lebanon […]

Egyptian locations will soon take the spotlight in three wildly different titles all set for release next year. While blockbusters “Wicked Part Two” and “Fountain of Youth,” from director Guy Ritchie, both make use of the country’s historical riches and otherworldly expanses, filmmaker Neil Burger will channel the breakneck pace of modern Cairo with his […]

Irish auteur Jim Sheridan will direct the equestrian epic “King of the Wind,” an historical drama about an 18th century Arabian colt that would go on to sire the modern thoroughbred bloodline.    Produced by Alan Moloney (“Small Things Like These”) and Gary Levinsohn (“Saving Private Ryan”) and adapted by Sheridan from Marguerite Henry’s eponymous […]

For the first time in more than a decade, the Cairo Film Festival will open for business. Now kicking off its 45th edition, the Egyptian event has remained a key cultural and artistic showcase for the region and for the wider Middle East and North Africa world – but Cairo has gone without a market […]

After going dark last year due to the war in Gaza, the Cairo Film Festival now returns with a super-sized program and a more humanist remit. Running Nov. 13 – 22, this bulked out edition aims for wider international visibility and greater attendance, all while keeping the projectors running longer than ever before. “We have […]