Author: SD

Jennifer Coolidge and Nicole Scherzinger have joined the cast of Rebel Wilson’s comedy Girl Group, now in production in the UK. The film follows a pop star, played by Wilson,  who has been kicked out of her own group’s reunion tour and sentenced to community service. She looks to stage a comeback by coaching a group of misfit teenage girls for a major record label audition. The ensemble cast also includes Randall Park, Sheridan Smith, Jamie Lee O’Donnell, Guz Khan, Jolene, and Loren Gray. Ashley Roberts – a Pussycat Dolls member alongside Scherzinger – Melanie Chisholm of the Spice Girls…

EXCLUSIVE: Mister Smith Entertainment has acquired world sales for David Turpin’s Irish-UK directorial debut Ancestors, as the feature wraps its Dublin shoot. Saipan’s Éanna Hardwicke, Shadow And Bone’s Jack Wolfe and Kneecap’s Jessica Reynolds star alongside Rupert Everett and Christina Hendricks in the love story, noir mystery and metaphysical fable. A charismatic but vulnerable man, Beau searches 1980s London for his missing friend. Dream, reality, memory and history entwine, bringing him face-to-face with life, death and the beyond. David Collins and Eamon Hughes produce through Ireland’s Samson Films with Miranda Ballesteros of the UK’s Lunatica. The project is financed by Screen…

Callum Turner, Adria Arjona and Amir El-Masry will lead the cast of Alone Together, from Limbo director Ben Sharrock. Written by Sharrock, it will shoot in the desert in Oman in March 2026. HanWay Films will launch international sales on the title at next month’s American Film Market (AFM, November 11-16). The film will follow two strangers – played by Turner and Arjona – whose lives collide during a rare storm in a desert city, sparking a brief but profound connection that leads to a journey of self-discovery. The film will be produced by The Father and The Son filmmaker…

EXCLUSIVE: Production is underway on Christmas comedy Merry Christmas Aubrey Flint, with John Bradley, Celia Imrie and Richard E. Grant among a cast of UK actors. WestEnd Films has boarded world sales on the title, which is directed by Jack Spring, and produced by Andy Brunskill for SUMS Film & Media with Spring’s Shush Films. Adjoa Andoh, Sophia Di Martino, Adrian Rawlins, Karl Pilkington, Kiell Smith-Bynoe, Nigel Planer, Ann Mitchell, Dave Johns, Dustin Demri-Burns, Harriet Webb and Beau Thompson round out the cast. Merry Christmas Aubrey Flint follows Aubrey Flint, a reclusive model soldier painter with a deep-seated disdain for…

A new installment in Sony’s Jumanji franchise and Michael Mann’s Heat 2 are among 52 feature projects included in the latest round of awards from California’s film and TV tax credit programme.  The awards allocation is the first for feature films since California’s 4.0 credit programme came into effect with massively expanded funding of $750m a year. According to the California Film Commission (CFC), applications for the awards round were nearly double those for the final feature round under the state’s 3.0 programme.  Between them, the 52 projects are expected to make $1bn of qualified expenditures in California and inject…

UK-Ireland top five, Oct 17-19  Rank Film (origin) Distributor Oct 17-19 Total Week 1 Gabby’s Dollhouse  (US)   Universal  £1.7m  £1.9m 1 2  Black Phone 2  (US)   Universal    £1.1m  £1.1m 1  3  I Swear  (UK)   Studiocanal  £866,877  £2.9m 2  4  Tron: Ares  (US)   Disney  £837,797  £3.3m 2  5  One Battle After Another  (US)  Warner Bros  £790,668  £9.7m 4  GBP to USD conversion rate: 1.34 Universal’s Gabby’s Dollhouse: The Movie saw off The Black Phone 2 at this weekend’s UK-Ireland box office, with a £1.7m opening for the family-friendly title. Playing in 606…

Lucrecia Martel’s documentary Landmarks has won the best film award in Official Competition at the 69th BFI London Film Festival. Landmarks reflects on the death and legacy of Indigenous Argentinian activist Javier Chocobar, who was murdered in 2009. Scroll down for the full list of winners “In foregrounding present-day voices and neglected histories, Martel emerges with a portrait of — and for — an Indigenous community, and grants them a measure of the justice the courts have long denied them,” said a statement from the jury, headed by Number 9 Films producer Elizabeth Karlsen. Landmarks debuted out of competition at…

Harris Dickinson’s Urchin, Laura Carreira’s On Falling and Harry Lighton’s Pillion are among the films longlisted in the new talent categories for the 2025 British Independent Film Awards. The new talent categories are the Douglas Hickox award for best debut director; the breakthrough producer award; the debut screenwriter award; and the best debut director – feature documentary award. Scroll down for the full lists Urchin is listed in best debut director for Dickinson, and breakthrough producer for Archie Pearch, who produced the film with Scott O’Donnell. Dickinson’s story of a young addict on the streets of London debuted in Un…

Universal is releasing the two biggest new titles this weekend as both Gabby’s Dollhouse: The Movie and Black Phone 2 launch into UK and Ireland cinemas. Gabby’s Dollhouse leads the way in 605 locations. The family-friendly feature is based on the animated Netflix series about a young girl and her feline friends. The live-action film counts Gloria Estefan and Kristen Wiig among the cast. Universal is also opening horror sequel Black Phone 2 in 560 cinemas. Ethan Hawke returns as the masked killer who begins stalking the sister of a previous victim. The original opened in the summer of 2022…

The 10th edition of Rome’s MIA film and TV market unfolded last week against the backdrop of the 17th-century Barberini Palace in the heart of the Italian capital. A co-production and sales market as well as a conference programme and content showcase, MIA attracted 2,800 executives from 64 countries for this year’s edition (October 6-10). Screen captures the key talking points among delegates and panelists, including the threats and opportunities presented by YouTube, the outlook for genre films, the challenges of the film sales market, and the rising popularity of international films. Festival reality check The inherent challenge of financing independent films –…