News

Pascale Kann, Anna Friel, Connor Swindells, Clara Rugaard, Katherine Parkinson, and Golda Rosheuvel have been added to the cast of the BBC’s 6-part drama series ‘The Dream Land.’

The coming-of-age drama is based on Rosa Rankin-Gee’s enthralling novel Dreamland and is brought to life for TV by BAFTA award-winning writer Kayleigh Llewellyn, delivering a gripping and intense journey driven by love, hope, and an unyielding will to survive.

Set in a near-future Margate, against a backdrop of soaring inequality, The Dream Lands tells the story of Chance and her family, a young woman who discovers life and love, while being forced to fight for her family and friends’ survival in a world that’s crumbling around her.

It’s 2039 and temperatures are soaring, seas are rising, and the political climate is equally as menacing. Chance is living a life of crime just to get by, when her community...

Exclusive: Universal International Studios (Uis) has boarded The Dream Lands, the BBC and Sister’s apocalyptic climate change series.

Uis has joined the project as co-producer. NBCUniversal Global TV Distribution will handle international sales. Penned by BAFTA-winner Kayleigh Llewellyn and based on Rosa Rankin-Gee’s novel, The Dream Lands tells the story of Chance, a young woman who discovers life and love while being forced to fight for her family’s survival in a world that’s crumbling around her in 2039 due to climate change. Chance lives a life of crime just to get by when her community is singled out for a government rejuvenation scheme, promising to bring her coastal town back to life. But when Chance falls in love with Franky, a girl with ties to the establishment, she and those closest to her begin to realise that all may not be as it seems.

The novel attracted...

Greenlit is the international series showcase at Mia and a spot where juicy new titles are seen, often for the first time. The seven-strong lineup spans big-ticket sequels and prequels – step forward Italian giants Gomorrah and The Law According to Lidia Poët – new originals, adaptations and remakes. Paolo Ciccarelli, Head of Drama at Mia, manages the Greenlit program.

Each project is presented on Mia’s main stage by its producers, commissioners or talent. Gomorrah – The Origins is sure to grab attention. From Sky Studios and Cattleya and for Sky Italia, it was created by Leonardo Fasoli and Maddalena Ravagli, and tells the story of Pietro Savastano, from a boy the street who rises up the ranks to become the most important crime boss in Naples. Sandokan is a remake of the cult Italian pirate series produced by Lux Vide and Rai for the Italian pubcaster. Turkish star Can Yaman leads the cast,...

Kit Vincent’s debut ‘Red Herring’ also won best UK feature

US actor Michael Pitt was among the winners at the UK’s 31st Raindance Film Festival (October 25-November 4).

Pitt won best performance for his portrayal of a once-renowned boxer on a path to redemption in Jack Huston’s directorial debut Day Of The Fight. The UK drama premiered in Venice’s Horizons Extra strand earlier in September.

Best UK feature was won by Kit Vincent’s debut Red Herring, a documentary about his diagnosis with a terminal brain tumour. It is also one of the five films nominated for the Bifa Raindance Maverick award.

Kit Vincent’s debut ‘Red Herring’ also won best UK feature

US actor Michael Pitt was among the winners at the UK’s 31st Raindance Film Festival (October 25 – November 4).

Pitt won best performance for his portrayal of a once-renowned boxer on a path to redemption in Jack Hutson’s directorial debut Day Of The Fight. The UK drama premiered at Venice Horizons Extra earlier this year.

Best UK feature was won by Kit Vincent’s debut Red Herring, a documentary surrounding his diagnosis of a terminal brain tumour. It is also one of the five films nominated for the Bifa Raindance Maverick award.

Bangladeshi filmmaker Nuhash Humayun’s “Pett Kata Shaw” won best international feature at the 31st Raindance Film Festival’s jury awards. British documentary filmmaker Kit Vincent won best U.K. feature for his debut feature “Red Herring.”

Some 75% of this year’s features are debuts and debut features swept the board at the jury awards with all eight award-winning films being debuts.

Michael Pitt won best performance for British actor Jack Huston‘s directorial debut “Day of the Fight.” Fisnik Maxville was named best director for his debut feature “The Land Within,” which previously won awards at Tallinn Black Nights, Galway Film Fleadh and PriFest. Catalan directors Alejandro Rojas and Sebastián Vasquez won the discovery award for their debut feature “Upon Entry.”

Chelsea Greene, Rob Grobman and Edivan Guajajara’s “We Are Guardians” won best documentary while David Wyte won best cinematography for “All the Colours of the World Are Between Black and White.

The 31st edition of London’s Raindance Film Festival will open with the U.K. premiere of British actor Jack Huston’s directorial debut “Day of the Fight.”

The film comes to Raindance fresh off its Venice debut, where Huston was honored by Variety as a breakthrough director.

The story of a once-renowned boxer who takes a redemptive journey through his past and present on the day of his first fight since he left prison stars Michael Pitt alongside a cast including Ron Perlman, Joe Pesci, and a cameo from Steve Buscemi.

The U.K. premiere of Isabel Coixet’s “Un Amor” will close the festival after it bows at San Sebastian. Based on Sara Mesa’s bestselling novel, Laia Costa plays a young woman who escapes her stressful life in the city and relocates to rural Spain. When she accepts a disturbing sexual proposal, it gives rise to an all-consuming and obsessive passion.

Titles include Ivan Gergolet’s ‘The Man Without Guilt’ and Neil Maskell’s ’Klokkenluider’

Estonia’s Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival (November 11-27) has unveiled its first feature line-up which includes 10 world and 10 international premieres.

Scroll down for full line-up

Among the world premieres are Italian director Ivan Gergolet’s debut fiction feature The Man Without Guilt, a Slovenia-Italy-Croatia co-production that received €140,000 in Eurimages funding last year. Gergolet’s documentary feature Dancing With Maria screened at Venice’s Critics’ Week in 2014 and was nominated for a European Film Award.

Also premiering is Fisnik Maxville’s The Land Within, about the...

REinvent International Sales has clinched a banner sale to Gussi for Latin America on the Norwegian pic “Storm,” which is screening at Haugesund’s New Nordic Films market, running Aug. 23-26.

The Norwegian suspense drama, penned by Johan Fasting, is the feature debut of Erika Calmeyer, episodic director of Netflix’s hit teen show “Young Royals” and creator of Nrk’s anthology show “Nudes.”

Headlining the pic is Ane Dahl Torp, cast as single mum Elin, faced with a terrible dilemma, following the death of her son Ulrik (6). The boy was playing with his sister Storm (10) when he drowned, but classmates claim that Storm actually pushed her brother into the river. Elin’s unconditional love for her daughter is challenged, as she has to face the truth about what happened by the river.

“Elin is faced with an impossible dilemma where she both tries to defend her daughter against serious accusations,...

Haugesund’s New Nordic Films market runs August 23-26.

Haugesund’s New Nordic Films market has unveiled the works in progress presentations for its 2022 edition, running August 23-26.

The line-up includes new films from the likes of Pathfinder director Nils Gaup’s new drama The Riot (Sulis), sold by REinvent and set against a workers revolt in 1907 Lapland; The Worst Person In The World producer Thomas Robsahm, who presents Aurora Gossé’s Norwegian youth film Dancing Queen, sold by Level K; and Berlinale prize-winning director Selma Vilhunen’s new Finnish production, polyamory drama Four Little Adults.

Scroll down for full...

With a top prize of $44,000 it is one of the world’s most lucrative film awards.

Denmark won big with the two Dragon awards handed out in Goteborg on February 5, with Tea Lindeburg’s As In Heaven winning the prize for best Nordic film. With a prize of $44,000, it is one of the world’s most lucrative film awards.

The film, which previously won best director and best actress at San Sebastian, is about a girl in the 19thcentury who hopes to leave her family’s farm to be the first in her family to study. Her future prospects change...

The Eurimages Fund is supporting 28 features.

European support body Eurimages has selected 28 features for a total of €6.1m ($6.9m) funding, including new works by Robert Guédiguian and Jim Sheridan.

French filmmaker Guédiguian – who has directed 21 features since 1981 including his most recent, Venice 2019 selection Gloria Mundi – receives €470,000 for France-Canada co-production Bamako Twist.

Ireland’s Sheridan, who has been nominated for six Oscars across his career since his breakthrough debut feature My Left Foot, receives €280,000 for Ireland-uk-France documentary In Absentia, co-directed with Colm Quinn. The documentary looks into the murder of French producer Sophie Toscan Du Plantier in Ireland, in December 1996.

Other...

New projects by Tarik Saleh, Robert Guédiguian, Vaclav Kadrnka, Paco Plaza and Carla Simón, among the selection. At its 158th meeting held online due to the current health crisis, the Board of Management of the Council of Europe's Eurimages Fund agreed to support 19 fiction films, 2 animation films and 7 documentary projects for a total amount of €6,138,000. The share of eligible projects with female directors examined at this Eurimages Board of Management meeting was 34%; 37.5% of the projects supported were directed by women and € 2,078,000 was awarded to these projects, representing 34% of the total amount awarded. The projects selected: Sabattier Effect - Eleonora Veninova (North Macedonia/Serbia)Lucy goes Gangsta - Till Endemann (Germany/Netherlands)Sleep - Jan-Willem Van Ewijk (The Netherlands/Belgium)Pink Moon (ex Methusalem) - Floor van der Meulen (The Netherlands/Italy/Slovenia)Kerr - Tayfun Pirselimoglu (Turkey/Greece/France)Storm - Erika Calmeyer (Norway/Sweden)Three - Juanjo Giménez...

In today’s TV news roundup, Sesame Workshop announced a premiere date for “Sesame Street’s Historic 50th Anniversary Celebration” and “Brave New World” adds Sophie McIntosh.

Casting

New Zealand actress Sophie McIntosh has been cast in USA Network’s “Brave New World” series, Variety has learned exclusively. She will play the recurring role of Jane, and joins a cast which includes Alden Ehrenreich, Harry Lloyd and Jessica Brown Findlay. McIntosh is repped by Echo Lake Entertainment, Johnson and Laird Management in New Zealand, and Bloomfields Welch Management in the U.K.

Dates

Iliza Shlesinger’s fifth original Netflix comedy special will premiere Nov. 19 on the streaming platform. In the hour-long special, the newly married Shlesinger will pull back the veil on the dangers of having a zombie bachelorette army while also discussing wedding planning, garters and honeymooning.

Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit behind “Sesame Street,” announced the historic 50th season...

As Mipcom kicks off, Variety looks back at just a few very recent stories you – and Variety – may have missed in the buildup to the world’s biggest TV market. The BBC picks up a trio of Nordic series, Netflix backs its first Original in Iceland, exciting startup Toon2Tango announces its first IP, African animation makes a impact at MipJunior; and Eccho Rights sells “Invisible Heroes” in Spain.

BBC3 Acquires its First Non-English-Language Series in Nrk’s “Nudes”

Wild Bunch has closed a raft of sales deals for Nrk’s Norwegian Ya series “Nudes” including the BBC’s youth network BBC Three in the U.K. – the first non-English-language series for the network, AMC in Spain and Portugal, Sbs in Australia and Yandex in Russia. The series turns on three stories of teens in the midst of personal crisis stemming from leaked nude photos. Each must find their own...

Exclusive: Here’s a strong first English-language trailer for buzzed-about Scandi TV series Twin, which stars Game Of Thrones actor Kristofer Hivju (everyone’s favorite wildling Tormund Giantsbane).

The suspense-drama follows a young mother who persuades her dead husband’s identical twin to take on his brother’s identity after a tragic accident. Full synopsis is below. Co-starring is Rebekka Nystabakk. The show played earlier this year in Competition at Series Mania.

Local release in Norway will be autumn 2019 via Nrk. In a sign of the times, Scandi powerhouse TrustNordisk is putting on a market screening here in Cannes on May 18. Kristoffer Metcalfe and Erika Calmeyer direct the Norwegian-language series produced by Nordisk Film Production. Hivju was also a co-creator.

Here’s the full synopsis: “Erik and Adam are identical twin brothers, living completely different lives. Erik is a broke surfer bum. Adam a successful family and businessman. When Erik...

Vogt’s ‘The Innoncents’ is expected to shoot this year.

Eskil Vogt’s new film The Innocents (De Uskyldige) is one of the projects backed by the Norwegian Film Institute’s latest funding round yesterday.

Vogt writes and directs the story about four children (ages 6 to 12), away from their parents’ attention, whose innocent play turns into something else. The filmmaking team wrote, “Magic and creepy things start happening. The Innocents is a film for adults and a shocking journey in to the secret world of the children.”

Vogt made his directing debut with Sundance award-winner Blind and he has also...

Nordisk Panorama takes place on Sept 20-25 in Malmo, Sweden.

Nordisk Panorama has confirmed the films in its two juried competitions, for Best Nordic Documentary and Best Nordic Short Film, for its Sept 20-25 festival in Malmo, Sweden.

The Best Nordic Documentary prize comes with $12,900 sponsored by the Nordic public broadcasters Dr, Yle, Ruv, Nrk and Svt.

Those 15 films include The Raft, which already won the top prize at Cph:Dox; and The Distant Barking of Dogs, which has won a slew of awards at festivals including San Fransicso, Thessaloniki, Goteborg, Idfa, Dokfest Munich and Oslo.

The Best Nordic Short...