Author: SD

Lilo & Stitch and Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning are set to drive the North American box office to a huge Memorial Day holiday weekend, with the aggregate gross for all films over the four-day period expected to be as high as $300m.  The total will certainly beat last year’s Memorial Day weekend tally of $132m and could approach the record for the late May holiday span of $314m, set in 2013 when Fast & Furious 6 and The Hangover Part III were the weekend’s new releases.  Disney’s Lilo & Stitch is looking like a powerful draw after grossing…

UPDATE: Sinners held off the re-release of Revenge Of The Sith to stay atop North American box office as a confirmed $45.7m haul in the second weekend boosted the running total to $123.2m and ensure a Warner Bros film ruled the charts for the fourth consecutive weekend. A strong late-April session elevated box office and earned $146.5m, pushing the year to date to $2.28bn and approximately 11% ahead of 2024 by the same stage. Playing in 3,347 locations, Ryan Coogler’s period vampire tale starring Michael B. Jordan dropped an impressive 6% from last weekend. That was the lowest second-weekend drop for an…

Ratchapoom Boonbunchachoke’s comedy-drama A Useful Ghost has won the Grand Prix in the independent Critics’ Week sidebar in Cannes. The film was chosen by a jury led by president Rodrigo Sorogoyen, and fellow jurors Jihane Bougrine, Josée Deshaies, Yulina Evina Bhara and Daniel Kaluuya. Scroll down for the full list of prizes Set in Thailand, Boonbunchachoke’s debut feature centres on a man grieving the loss of his wife to dust pollution. He discovers that she has been reincarnated in a vacuum cleaner, which leads to their bond rekindling. Written by Boonbunchachoke, the film is produced by Cattleya Paosrijeroen and Soros…

The producers of Japanese film Brand New Landscape have called for a “swift investigation” after one of their team was injured by a falling palm tree during the Cannes Film Festival. The incident took place around 12noon on Saturday (May 17) while the filmmakers were walking to an event organised by Directorsʼ Fortnight, a parallel section of the festival for which the film had been selected. While walking on the Croisette, in front of the Mademoiselle Gray Plage Barriere beach, a 3m-high palm tree fell and a producer for Japanese company LesPros Entertainment who was escorting the cast was struck…

The third Global Production Awards (GPAs) was held tonight (May 19) at Mademoiselle Gray Plage Barrière, with 14 competitive awards and one special recognition prize handed out to the finalists. Scroll down for full list of winners The GPAs, presented by Screen International in association with sister brands Screen Global Production and Broadcast, celebrated outstanding, sustainable work and highlight the best global locations, outstanding studio facilities and creative crews and ideas, reflecting the value they bring to local and  international production teams. The winners included Focus Features and Universal Pictures’ Touch, which collected the award for Outstanding Use of Locations,…

In the first on-site acquisition of a Competition title in Cannes this year, Mubi has paid $24m for North America and multiple territories on Lynne Ramsay’s Palme d’Or contender Die, My Love starring Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson. Mubi has also acquired rights in UK & Ireland, Latin America, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Benelux, Turkey, India, and Australia & New Zealand – the territories where it distributes directly. Black Label Media, Excellent Cadaver, and Sikelia Productions produced the story of a new mother with postpartum depression in an isolated rural community. The cast includes LaKeith Stanfield, Nick Nolte, and Sissy Spacek. Mubi…

Toronto International Film Festival’s inaugural TIFF: The Market will take place from September 10-16, 2026. Eight members have been added to the global advisory committee. TIFF announced the market in Cannes last year and said it would run concurrently with the festival, sparking immediate speculation over whether it would push back the dates to afford sales agents more time to package projects after Cannes and the summer break. Screen understands TIFF brass gamed out pushing back the dates and stuck with the second-week slot after they decided a short delay would not have a material impact, and wanted the festival…

Ryan Werner, the marketing, publicity and awards season veteran, has joined Neon in the new role of president of global cinema. Werner will focus full-time on theatrical distribution and work closely with senior leadership to enhance marketing and release strategies as the company continues to expand into production and global distribution. Cinetic Marketing, the company he founded in 2014, will continue to operate independently under the leadership of Courtney Ott. It represented six of the last 10 Palme d’Or winners in Cannes, and worked on Oscar-winning campaigns for five best pictures, 10 best documentaries, seven best international features, and three…

Marvel leads the new releases in UK and Ireland cinemas this weekend as Disney’s Thunderbolts* launches in 668 locations. The 36th title in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) is in more sites than predecessor Captain America: Brave New World, which debuted in 616 sites back in February for a healthy £6.4m opening. Along with last summer’s mega-hit Deadpool & Wolverine, which debuted on £12.6m from over 700 sites, Marvel is hoping for an upward trend after what has been a bumpy few years for the franchise. In 2023, The Marvels scored the third-lowest MCU opening on £3.5m and followed Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania and Guardians Of The Galaxy…

Robert De Niro criticised president Donald Trump’s proposed tariffs on films made outside the US at the Cannes Film Festival’s opening night ceremony, which took place tonight (May 13). De Niro, receiving the honorary Palme d’Or, said: “In my country, we’re fighting like hell for the democracy we once took for granted. And that affects all of us here because the arts are democratic. Art is inclusive. It brings people together, like tonight. Art looks for truth, art embraces diversity and that’s why art is a threat — that’s why we are a threat — to autocrats and fascists.” Referencing…