Author: SD

The new guard of YouTube horror creators dominates Hollywood as Kane Parson’s Backrooms delivered an $81.5m record A24 debut atop the North American charts while Curry Barker’s Obsession became Focus Features’ biggest domestic hit on $104.7m. Powered by Gen Z film-goers and a priceless in-built fanbase, Parsons’ feature version of his YouTube found footage shorts outpaced A24’s prior opening weekend record holder Civil War on $25.5m in 2024 by more than three times and set multiple records. A24 said Backrooms produced the biggest R-rated debut of 2026 so far; the biggest original horror debut and biggest opening weekend by a…

Canal+ CEO Maxime Saada said he stands by his controversial Cannes remarks saying the group would no longer finance films made by signatories of an open letter criticising its majority shareholder Vincent Bolloré’s influence over France’s media industry, but he denied the existence of any “blacklist”. Speaking at the group’s general assembly on Friday (May 29), Saada clarified: “I obviously never mentioned a blacklist. There is no question of us going after the crew members who signed the petition and refusing to fund the films they work on. That is out of the question, and always will be.” He added: “We…

Paramount Pictures and Studiocanal have confirmed a deal for David Ellison’s big-swinging Hollywood studio to acquire North America and select territories on the upcoming fantasy drama The Midnight Library with Florence Pugh attached to star. Studiocanal took the $70m marquee European project to Cannes where it sparked a “competitive bidding process”. While Studiocanal did not confirm the reported $36m price of the Paramount deal, it did say the amount “could be over the rumoured number…” The European giant will distribute directly in the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Benelux, Australia, New Zealand and through partners in Scandinavia and South Africa, while Paramount…

Germany has confirmed plans to nearly double its production incentive programmes for feature films and TV series. The Ministry of Finance is to increase the annual budget for the German Federal Film Fund (DFFF) and German Motion Picture Fund (GMPF) incentive schemes from €133m to €250m with immediate effect. Between them, the two funds provide grants that cover up to 30% of approved German production costs, subject to specific caps. Projects supported recently by the DFFF incentive include Riddick 4: Furya and Marie Kreutzer’s Gentle Monster, while the GMPF fund backed series like Apple TV’s Where’s Wanda? and Netflix’s The…

Filming is gearing up in the UK on Matt Reeves’s The Batman Part II for Warner Bros. Production is based at Warner Bros Leavesden with filming locations including London and Liverpool. Principal photography officially begins next month. Robert Pattinson returns to star in The Batman Part II as the titular superhero, while Andy Serkis, Jeffrey Wright and Colin Farrell also return. Additions to the cast include Scarlett Johansson, Sebastian Stan, Brian Tyree Henry and Charles Dance. Plot details are currently under wraps. The film is produced by Warner Bros alongside DC Entertainment and Reeves’s production company 6th & Idaho Productions.…

UK-Ireland top five, May 22-24 Rank Film (origin) Distributor  May 22-24 Total Week 1 Star Wars: The Mandalorian And Grogu (US) Disney £5.3m  £6.4m 1 2  Michael (US) Universal £1.8m £44.8m 5 3  Obsession (US) Universal £1.3m £4.3m 2 4  The Devil Wears Prada (US) Disney £1.1m £30.5m 4 5  The Sheep Detectives (US) Sony £536,326 £6.8m 3 GBP to USD conversion rate: 1.35 Star Wars: The Mandalorian And Grogu topped the UK-Ireland box office in its opening weekend as cinemas took a hit over the Bank Holiday heatwave.  Jon Favreau’s…

Worldwide box office: May 22-24 RankFilm (distributor)3-day (world)3-day (int’l)Cume (world)Cume (int’l) Territories 1 Star Wars: The Mandalorian And Grogu (Disney) $144.9m $63m $144.9m $63m 52 2 Michael (Lionsgate/Universal) $48.5m $28.5m $782.3m $468.1m 84 3 Dear You (Damai) $39.5m $39.5m $151.5m $151.5m 1 4 The Devil Wears Prada 2 (Disney) $33.7m $21.2m $604.1m $408m 53 5 Obsession (Universal) $31.3m $8.9m $73.9m $21.2m 46 6 The Sheep Detectives (various) $14.5m $5.6m $82.2m $38.7m 58 7 Passenger (Paramount) $13.5m $4.8m $13.5m $4.8m 50 8 Colony…

The Mandalorian And Grogu, Lucasfilm-Disney’s first Star Wars universe feature in seven years, dominated the Memorial Day holiday weekend with an estimated $102m four-day take at the North American box office.  Jon Favreau’s sci-fi adventure earned an estimated $82m from 4,300 locations over the Friday-Sunday marking the official start of summer blockbuster season – and stepped up on Saturday, when walk-in traffic defied prior, lower forecasts that were predicated on Friday’s $33m haul. And while this is the lowest opening weekend by any Star Wars film since Disney acquired Lucasfilm in 2012 – lower even than the maligned Solo: A Star…

Cristian Mungiu’s Fjord has won the Palme d’Or at the 2026 Cannes Film Festival. Other winners on the night included Andrey Zvyagintsev’s Minotaur, taking the Grand Prix, and a Best Director prize shared between Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi’s The Black Ball, and Pawel Pawlikowski’s Fatherland. Scroll down for the full list of winners The ceremony washosted by French actress Eye Haidara, who also hosted the opening ceremony on May 12. The nine-person jury was headed by South Korean filmmaker Park Chan-wook, alongside directors Chloe Zhao, Laura Wandel and Diego Cespedes, screenwriter Paul Laverty, and actors Demi Moore, Isaach de Bankole, Stellan Skarsgard and…

US sales firm 193 has sealed deals on four key titles on its slate at the Cannes market, including The Brigands Of Rattlecreek, directed by Cannes Competition jury president Park Chan-wook. Brigands has sold to select Latin American territories (Sun Distribution) and Italy (Leone Film Group). Park’s film will star Matthew McConaughey, Austin Butler, Pedro Pascal and Tang Wei, in a western about a sheriff and a doctor who seek revenge against a group of bandits who use the cover of a torrential thunderstorm to rob and terrorise the occupants of a small town. Fernando Meirelles’ satire Art starring Ralph…