London- and Paris-based Film Constellation has boarded sales on 2D family animated feature “Carmen,” a contemporary adaptation of the opera, to be directed by 2023 Annecy Film Festival winner Sébastien Laudenbach. Variety revealed first details of the project last year exclusively.
Laudenbach, who won the best film award at Annecy for “Chicken for Linda!,” is teaming up with renowned French animation studio Folivari on “Carmen.”
It’s 1840 in Seville, a pulsating town of sailors and small-time crooks. Salvador, a young assistant to the gifted knife grinder Antonio, meets a captivating gypsy girl named Carmen. Her rapturous beauty and independent spirit are the talk of the town, but Antonio’s ability to glimpse the future foretells a tragic fate. With unwavering resolve, Salvador will muster an eclectic band of misfit kids, led by the spirited Belén, to protect Carmen against the unyielding threads of destiny, igniting the ancient city’s alleyways in a symphony of emotions.
Laudenbach, who won the best film award at Annecy for “Chicken for Linda!,” is teaming up with renowned French animation studio Folivari on “Carmen.”
It’s 1840 in Seville, a pulsating town of sailors and small-time crooks. Salvador, a young assistant to the gifted knife grinder Antonio, meets a captivating gypsy girl named Carmen. Her rapturous beauty and independent spirit are the talk of the town, but Antonio’s ability to glimpse the future foretells a tragic fate. With unwavering resolve, Salvador will muster an eclectic band of misfit kids, led by the spirited Belén, to protect Carmen against the unyielding threads of destiny, igniting the ancient city’s alleyways in a symphony of emotions.
- 9/8/2023
- by Leo Barraclough
- Variety Film + TV
Australian Film Television and Radio School
Australia’s leading screen arts and broadcast school benefits from a beautiful Sydney campus and a deep pool of industry lecturers and close ties with the Australian film community. Notable alumni include multi-Oscar nominee Jane Campion (The Power of the Dog), Phillip Noyce (The Quiet American) and Black Widow filmmaker Cate Shortland, plus a slew of esteemed craftspeople like Margaret Sixel (editing on Mad Max: Fury Road), David White (sound editing for Mad Max: Fury Road), Andrew Lesnie (cinematography for The Lord of the Rings) and Tony McNamara (best original screenplay Oscar nominee for The Favourite).
Beijing Film Academy
The USC of the world’s second-largest film industry, China’s most prestigious film school offers its graduates a wealth of industry ties to some of the country’s most prominent working actors and directors. Bfa also now has an undergraduate film program taught in English.
Australia’s leading screen arts and broadcast school benefits from a beautiful Sydney campus and a deep pool of industry lecturers and close ties with the Australian film community. Notable alumni include multi-Oscar nominee Jane Campion (The Power of the Dog), Phillip Noyce (The Quiet American) and Black Widow filmmaker Cate Shortland, plus a slew of esteemed craftspeople like Margaret Sixel (editing on Mad Max: Fury Road), David White (sound editing for Mad Max: Fury Road), Andrew Lesnie (cinematography for The Lord of the Rings) and Tony McNamara (best original screenplay Oscar nominee for The Favourite).
Beijing Film Academy
The USC of the world’s second-largest film industry, China’s most prestigious film school offers its graduates a wealth of industry ties to some of the country’s most prominent working actors and directors. Bfa also now has an undergraduate film program taught in English.
- 8/11/2023
- by Patrick Brzeski, Alex Ritman, Scott Roxborough and Etan Vlessing
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
When “Summit of the Gods” director Patrick Imbert graduated from France’s Les Gobelins school of animation in the late 1990s, he entered an industry still looking for its right footing.
“The market and industry was not as developed as it is today,” Imbert tells Variety. “There were much fewer projects because there were much fewer screens. We did pre-production in Paris and sent most of the production work overseas. You couldn’t imagine becoming a film director or a character designer or anything so prestigious. You were happy enough to simply make your living by drawing, hoping to work on cool projects. That was our vision of animation.”
Suffice it to say, France’s animation ecosystem has grown by leaps and bounds over the following decades. Buoyed by advances in digital software that cut down production costs, staffed by a workforce from a growing number of training programs and...
“The market and industry was not as developed as it is today,” Imbert tells Variety. “There were much fewer projects because there were much fewer screens. We did pre-production in Paris and sent most of the production work overseas. You couldn’t imagine becoming a film director or a character designer or anything so prestigious. You were happy enough to simply make your living by drawing, hoping to work on cool projects. That was our vision of animation.”
Suffice it to say, France’s animation ecosystem has grown by leaps and bounds over the following decades. Buoyed by advances in digital software that cut down production costs, staffed by a workforce from a growing number of training programs and...
- 12/3/2021
- by Ben Croll
- Variety Film + TV
By any measure, it’s been a great year for animation. From “Frozen 2” and “Toy Story 4” bringing in huge box-office numbers in the U.S. to “Ne Zha” becoming the top-grossing Chinese animated film with more than $700 million gross to 32 official entries in the best animated feature category for the 2020 Oscars, animated stories flexed their muscles.
But those animated films are also vehicles for filmmakers to tell diverse, challenging and unexpected stories of all kinds throughout the world. Whether their films are fantasy or even historical fiction, the storytellers are drawn to the medium.
“Animation makes it easier for the audience to believe in the world we created, they might think was a fantasy world but we show them that it is not,” writes Salvador Simo in an email with Variety about his film “Buñuel in the Labyrinth of the Turtles.”
The animated feature takes us through the...
But those animated films are also vehicles for filmmakers to tell diverse, challenging and unexpected stories of all kinds throughout the world. Whether their films are fantasy or even historical fiction, the storytellers are drawn to the medium.
“Animation makes it easier for the audience to believe in the world we created, they might think was a fantasy world but we show them that it is not,” writes Salvador Simo in an email with Variety about his film “Buñuel in the Labyrinth of the Turtles.”
The animated feature takes us through the...
- 2/1/2020
- by Karen Idelson
- Variety Film + TV
Guillaume Nicloux’s “To the Ends of the World,” Erwan Le Duc’s “The Bare Necessity” and Caroline Poggi & Jonathan Vinel’s “Jessica Forever” are among the ten French and French-language films set to compete at the 10th edition of MyFrenchFilmFestival, the online film showcase created by UniFrance.
Ira Sachs, the American director whose latest film “Frankie” competed at Cannes, will preside over the international jury which will comprise of the French actress Agathe Bonitzer (“Isadora’s Children”), Guatemaltec director Jayro Bustamante (“Ixcanul”), American actor-turned-director Brady Corbet (“Vox Lux”), Belgian director Judith Davis (“My Revolution”) and Czech director Michaela Pavlatova (“My Sunny Maad”). The other jury is made up of members of the international press.
“To the Ends of the World,” which world premiered at Cannes Directors’ Fortnight last year, stars Gaspard Ulliel (“Saint Laurent”) as a young French soldier in Indochina, in 1945, who survives a brutal massacre in which...
Ira Sachs, the American director whose latest film “Frankie” competed at Cannes, will preside over the international jury which will comprise of the French actress Agathe Bonitzer (“Isadora’s Children”), Guatemaltec director Jayro Bustamante (“Ixcanul”), American actor-turned-director Brady Corbet (“Vox Lux”), Belgian director Judith Davis (“My Revolution”) and Czech director Michaela Pavlatova (“My Sunny Maad”). The other jury is made up of members of the international press.
“To the Ends of the World,” which world premiered at Cannes Directors’ Fortnight last year, stars Gaspard Ulliel (“Saint Laurent”) as a young French soldier in Indochina, in 1945, who survives a brutal massacre in which...
- 1/7/2020
- by Elsa Keslassy
- Variety Film + TV
An acclaimed French director who has also been acting since age four, Zabou Breitman made her first animated feature with 2020 awards contender The Swallows of Kabul—a film that came about, and was crafted, in an unusual and unexpected way.
Set in a Taliban-occupied Kabul in the summer of 1998, the drama centers on young lovers Mohsen and Zunaira, who work to preserve their relationship amidst a backdrop of perpetual violence and misery, until a senseless act on the part of Mohsen changes their lives forever. Screening in the Un Certain Regard section of Cannes, the film is based on a novel by Algerian author Yasmina Khadra, though it wasn’t the book that brought Breitman to the project.
“A young producer had the script from the book made already and thought to make, I think, a real action movie, but then thought it would be better to have an animation film.
Set in a Taliban-occupied Kabul in the summer of 1998, the drama centers on young lovers Mohsen and Zunaira, who work to preserve their relationship amidst a backdrop of perpetual violence and misery, until a senseless act on the part of Mohsen changes their lives forever. Screening in the Un Certain Regard section of Cannes, the film is based on a novel by Algerian author Yasmina Khadra, though it wasn’t the book that brought Breitman to the project.
“A young producer had the script from the book made already and thought to make, I think, a real action movie, but then thought it would be better to have an animation film.
- 12/4/2019
- by Matt Grobar
- Deadline Film + TV
Cannes Jury Prize winner is also France’s submission to the Oscars this year.
Ladj Ly’s debut feature and Cannes Jury Prize winner Les Misérables, revolving around social tensions in a tough Paris suburb, is the frontrunner in the 25th edition of France’s Lumière awards this year, with seven nominations.
The awards which are voted on by some 130 international correspondents hailing from 40 countries are France’s equivalent of the Golden Globes.
Les Misérables has been nominated for best film, director, screenplay, cinematography, first film and twice in the best new actor section for two of its cast members,...
Ladj Ly’s debut feature and Cannes Jury Prize winner Les Misérables, revolving around social tensions in a tough Paris suburb, is the frontrunner in the 25th edition of France’s Lumière awards this year, with seven nominations.
The awards which are voted on by some 130 international correspondents hailing from 40 countries are France’s equivalent of the Golden Globes.
Les Misérables has been nominated for best film, director, screenplay, cinematography, first film and twice in the best new actor section for two of its cast members,...
- 12/3/2019
- by 1100388¦Melanie Goodfellow¦0¦
- ScreenDaily
Marco Bellocchio’s “The Traitor,” Roman Polanski’s “An Officer and a Spy” and Pedro Almodóvar’s “Pain and Glory” lead the race for the 32nd European Film Awards with four nominations apiece in the major categories. The awards, voted on by more than 3,600 members of the European Film Academy, will be presented at the awards ceremony on Dec. 7 in Berlin.
Céline Sciamma’s “Portrait of a Lady on Fire” and Yorgos Lanthimos’ “The Favourite” followed with three nominations in the top categories each, while Ladj Ly’s “Les Misérables” and Nora Fingscheidt’s “System Crasher” were both short-listed in two major categories.
“The Favourite” picked up an additional nomination in the comedy category, while “Les Misérables” received a further nomination in the Discovery section for newcomers.
A single nomination each went to “A White, White Day,” “And Then We Danced,” “Beanpole,” “Gundermann” and “Queen of Hearts.”
Competing for best documentary are “For Sama,...
Céline Sciamma’s “Portrait of a Lady on Fire” and Yorgos Lanthimos’ “The Favourite” followed with three nominations in the top categories each, while Ladj Ly’s “Les Misérables” and Nora Fingscheidt’s “System Crasher” were both short-listed in two major categories.
“The Favourite” picked up an additional nomination in the comedy category, while “Les Misérables” received a further nomination in the Discovery section for newcomers.
A single nomination each went to “A White, White Day,” “And Then We Danced,” “Beanpole,” “Gundermann” and “Queen of Hearts.”
Competing for best documentary are “For Sama,...
- 11/9/2019
- by Leo Barraclough and Jamie Lang
- Variety Film + TV
“I Lost My Body,” the curious story of a disembodied hand searching to reunite with its body, won the grand prize at the Animation is Film Festival, held Oct. 18-20 in Los Angeles. The audience prize was split between two films, Makoto Shinkai’s “Weathering With You” and “The Swallows of Kabul” by Zabou Breitman and Elea Gobbe-Mevellec.
Netflix acquired the worldwide rights to “I Lost My Body,” directed by Jérémy Clapin, after the film premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in May. The French film — which bested its live-action competition to win the top prize in Critics’ Week at Cannes — screened in its original language at Animation Is Film. Netflix has also prepared an English dub featuring the voices of Dev Patel, Alia Shawkat and George Wendt, which will be available to Netflix subscribers on Nov. 29, two weeks after the French version receives its Oscar-qualifying run on Nov. 15.
“The...
Netflix acquired the worldwide rights to “I Lost My Body,” directed by Jérémy Clapin, after the film premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in May. The French film — which bested its live-action competition to win the top prize in Critics’ Week at Cannes — screened in its original language at Animation Is Film. Netflix has also prepared an English dub featuring the voices of Dev Patel, Alia Shawkat and George Wendt, which will be available to Netflix subscribers on Nov. 29, two weeks after the French version receives its Oscar-qualifying run on Nov. 15.
“The...
- 10/22/2019
- by LaTesha Harris
- Variety Film + TV
The animated feature by Zabou Breitman and Eléa Gobbé-Mévellec has taken home the Award for Best Film, while Papicha scooped three prizes. The animated feature The Swallows of Kabul by France’s Zabou Breitman and Eléa Gobbé-Mévellec, which was unveiled in Un Certain Regard at Cannes, has come out on top at the 12th Angoulême Francophone Film Festival, taking home the Diamond Valois for Best Film handed out by the jury chaired by British actress Jacqueline Bisset. Also singled out in the Best Film Score category (thanks to the work of Alexis Rault), this production by Les Armateurs together with Arte France Cinéma, Luxembourg’s Melusine Productions, Switzerland’s Close Up Films and Rts, and Monaco-based outfit Knm, is being sold internationally by Celluloid Dreams and will be released in French theatres on 4 September by Memento Films Distribution.The winners’ list of the Charente-based festival also shone a lot of the limelight on.
Variety is teaming with Unifrance, an agency that promotes French cinema around the world, to focus attention on four emerging talents in the French movie industry as part of Unifrance’s “New Faces of French Cinema” program. Here Variety profiles the rising filmmakers: Justine Triet, Eléa Gobbé-Mévellec, Hafsia Herzi and Mati Diop.
Mati Diop
Born to a family of musicians and filmmakers, raised in France, and trained at the Le Fresnoy National Studio of Contemporary Arts, Diop has already built an impressive track record on the international circuit.
She’s taken her short- and medium-length films to festivals in Marseille, Venice and Montreal, collecting prizes left, right and center, and has starred in acclaimed works from directors including Claire Denis and Antonio Campos.
This year she’ll make history as the first black female filmmaker to compete for the Palme d’Or with her feature debut, “Atlantics.” She said she...
Mati Diop
Born to a family of musicians and filmmakers, raised in France, and trained at the Le Fresnoy National Studio of Contemporary Arts, Diop has already built an impressive track record on the international circuit.
She’s taken her short- and medium-length films to festivals in Marseille, Venice and Montreal, collecting prizes left, right and center, and has starred in acclaimed works from directors including Claire Denis and Antonio Campos.
This year she’ll make history as the first black female filmmaker to compete for the Palme d’Or with her feature debut, “Atlantics.” She said she...
- 5/19/2019
- by Ben Croll
- Variety Film + TV
The long-awaited, graphically rich, 2D watercolor-style animation “The Swallows Of Kabul” from French helmers Zabou Breitman and Eléa Gobbé-Mévellec provides an involving adaptation of Yasmina Khadra’s elegant literary fiction. The book, an international bestseller about life under Taliban control in the Afghan capital, highlighted a dangerous act of humanity during a grim and violent time via the stories of two couples whose fates become intertwined through death, imprisonment, and remarkable self-sacrifice. This supplies the core plot of the film, with the action condensed into a tight 81 minutes. Purists may object that the prestige production takes some liberties with novel, but on the whole, the inventions by screenplay writers Sébastien Tavel, Patricia Mortagne, and co-helmer Breitman feel dramatically and poetically right.
The action unfolds in 1998 (as opposed to the novel’s 2001), shortly after the fundamentalist Taliban have come to power. Historian Mohsen (voiced by Swann Arlaud) and artist Zunaira (Zita Hanrot...
The action unfolds in 1998 (as opposed to the novel’s 2001), shortly after the fundamentalist Taliban have come to power. Historian Mohsen (voiced by Swann Arlaud) and artist Zunaira (Zita Hanrot...
- 5/16/2019
- by Alissa Simon
- Variety Film + TV
Cannes — “The Swallows of Kabul” marks a new step forward for co-directors Zabou Breitman and Eléa Gobbé-Mévellec. A leading figure of French film and theatre, Breitman had never worked in animation before, so she teamed with up-and-coming talent Gobbé-Mévellec to bring this bittersweet tale of Taliban oppression and artistic resistance to life. Following its Un Certain Regard premiere, the film will play Annecy next month.
When the producers bought the rights to the source text, they originally planned to develop the project for live action. What caused that idea to change
Zabou Breitman: There were practical reasons, in terms of locations and feasibility, but it also made sense for this specific narrative. It’s a very tough story, really close to tragedy, and animation could not only make the narrative more digestible, it could allow us to go further and be more expressive. You can express a lot with animation,...
When the producers bought the rights to the source text, they originally planned to develop the project for live action. What caused that idea to change
Zabou Breitman: There were practical reasons, in terms of locations and feasibility, but it also made sense for this specific narrative. It’s a very tough story, really close to tragedy, and animation could not only make the narrative more digestible, it could allow us to go further and be more expressive. You can express a lot with animation,...
- 5/16/2019
- by Ben Croll
- Variety Film + TV
Venice Film Market director Pascal Diot has confirmed that Chinese involvement in the event has decreased markedly since last year.
“Unfortunately, the Chinese are coming in fewer numbers to Venice this year,” said Diot.
The Chinese arrived in big numbers on the Lido in 2014. Their absence now, Diot suggested, is not just to do with recent troubles in the Chinese economy.
“I believe that right now in China, they (film industry representatives) are in a kind of transition,” he said.
“In the last two years, they wanted to be everywhere. They have been coming to all the big festivals, trying to invest, make parties and so on.
“Now, they have probably understood that it is not because you are making parties that you are considered as a real professional.”
Diot suggested the Chinese were now a “little more cautious” in their involvement in international festivals. Representatives from Chinese online giant iQiyi will be back on the Lido...
“Unfortunately, the Chinese are coming in fewer numbers to Venice this year,” said Diot.
The Chinese arrived in big numbers on the Lido in 2014. Their absence now, Diot suggested, is not just to do with recent troubles in the Chinese economy.
“I believe that right now in China, they (film industry representatives) are in a kind of transition,” he said.
“In the last two years, they wanted to be everywhere. They have been coming to all the big festivals, trying to invest, make parties and so on.
“Now, they have probably understood that it is not because you are making parties that you are considered as a real professional.”
Diot suggested the Chinese were now a “little more cautious” in their involvement in international festivals. Representatives from Chinese online giant iQiyi will be back on the Lido...
- 9/2/2015
- by geoffrey@macnab.demon.co.uk (Geoffrey Macnab)
- ScreenDaily
The Venice Film Market will showcase 15 projects seeking completion financing.
Now in its second year, the Venice Film Market’s European Gap-Financing Market, which runs September 4-5 in 2015, will highlight 15 film in search of completion funding.
To qualify, each film must already have secured 70% of its financing. They will have the opportunity to close their international funding by having one-on-one meetings with potential financiers, distributors, sales agents, post-production companies and film funds.
Last year, the Vfm welcomed 261 distributors and 66 sales agents to the market. A total of 1,500 film professionals from 57 countries attended.
Full list:
#flora63 by Stéphane Robelin (France/Belgium/Germany)
Bianco by Daniele Vicari (Italy/France)
Letters from War by Ivo Ferreira (Portugal)
Comic Sans by Nevio Marasovic (Croatia/ Slovenia)
Diamond Island by Davy Chou (France/ Cambodia)
The Eremites by Ronny Trocker (Germany)
Freaking by Julia Ducournau (France/ Belgium/ Switzerland)
Children of the Night by Andrea De Sica (Italy)
The Bank of Broken Hearts by [link...
Now in its second year, the Venice Film Market’s European Gap-Financing Market, which runs September 4-5 in 2015, will highlight 15 film in search of completion funding.
To qualify, each film must already have secured 70% of its financing. They will have the opportunity to close their international funding by having one-on-one meetings with potential financiers, distributors, sales agents, post-production companies and film funds.
Last year, the Vfm welcomed 261 distributors and 66 sales agents to the market. A total of 1,500 film professionals from 57 countries attended.
Full list:
#flora63 by Stéphane Robelin (France/Belgium/Germany)
Bianco by Daniele Vicari (Italy/France)
Letters from War by Ivo Ferreira (Portugal)
Comic Sans by Nevio Marasovic (Croatia/ Slovenia)
Diamond Island by Davy Chou (France/ Cambodia)
The Eremites by Ronny Trocker (Germany)
Freaking by Julia Ducournau (France/ Belgium/ Switzerland)
Children of the Night by Andrea De Sica (Italy)
The Bank of Broken Hearts by [link...
- 7/24/2015
- ScreenDaily
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