Wednesday, March 7, 2012

Alexandre Aja Sinks Teeth Into Vampire Saga Undying Love

EXCLUSIVE: Piranha helmer Alexandre Aja is negotiating to direct Undying Love, an adaptation of the Image Comics title for Warner Bros. The film revolves around an ex-solider who falls for a vampire, though in order to be with her, he must take on her creator, who is protected by an army of monsters in the Hong Kong underworld. The pic is being produced by Michael De Luca, Stephen L’Heureux and Benderspink. The comic was created by Tomm Coker and Daniel Freedman, who’ve written the script. WME-repped Aja also directed The Hills Have Eyes.

Monday, March 5, 2012

Durkin joins Activision as CFO

DurkinActivision has attracted a extended-term senior Microsoft executive from Redmond being its new chief financial officer.Dennis Durkin, a classic corporate v . p . and chief operating and financial officer at Microsoft's Interactive Entertainment Business, has grew to become part of the developer of "CodInch and "WowInch -- departing Microsoft carrying out a 12-year stint.Thomas Tippl, Activision's COO remains filling the CFO role by having an interim cause for couple of years. (He formerly was CFO, but was promoted this season.)Durkin would be a hollywood face for Microsoft's Xbox 360 360 division, not only controlling finances, but becoming an evangelist in press conferences and conferences. He's also part of the team credited with turning the Xbox 360 360 division in to a moneymaking operation (with profits topping $1 billion every year), after a period of red-colored-colored ink."While using development of digital entertainment, it becomes an exciting time to partner while using company's senior leaders to continue to operate a vehicle future growth and increase investor value," mentioned Durkin.Mitchell Koch, the business v . p . of Microsoft's worldwide retail advertising and marketing group for your Entertainment and Items Division, will need over for Durkin becasue it is CFO for your Interactive Entertainment Business unit, beginning March 19. Contact the number newsroom at news@variety.com

Saturday, February 25, 2012

Ellen DeGeneres' J.C. Penney Advertisements to Debut Throughout Academy awards

David Morrissey David Morrissey just arrived the plum role from the Governor around the Walking Dead, AMC introduced Friday. The Governor, a personality from Robert Kirkman's graphic books, may be the vicious leader of Woodbury, a little settlement of children. The Governor becomes certainly one of Rick's finest enemies within the comic series. Exclusive: Observe How The Walking Dead's Most Nasty Moments Arrived at Existence Morrissey, who'll make his Walking Dead debut in Season 3, is well-noted for his roles in British series Condition of Play, Meadowlands and also the Deal. His film credits range from the Other Boleyn Girl, Water Equine and Nowhere Boy. The Walking Dead, that was lately restored for any 16-episode third season, dates back into production this spring.

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Pierre Juneau dies at 89

Pierre Juneau, who brought in key regulations supporting homegrown TV and music production in Canada, died on Tuesday. He was 89.The Montreal-born Juneau began his career at the National Film Board of Canada, where he played a significant role in the development of French-language production at the publicly funded film studio. While at the NFB from 1949-66, he held a number of management posts in the distribution and production sectors, including developing co-productions with France and Italy.When a separate French-language production unit was set up at the NFB in 1964, he was named the first head of the studio.In 1960, he co-founded Quebec's first film festival, the Montreal International Film Festival.In 1966, Juneau left the NFB and was named vice chairman of the Bureau of Broadcast Governors. Two years later that body became the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission, the country's broadcast regulator. He became the first-ever chairman of the CRTC in 1968 and it was during his tenure as CRTC topper that the regulator created the first-ever Canadian-content regulations for both television and radio. These rules are considered by many to be significant factors in the subsequent development of a healthy TV and music industries in the Great White North. The rules stipulated that the TV networks had to air 60% Canadian fare, and radio stations had to air 30% Canadian music.In recognition of his defining role in the music world in Canada, the Canadian music awards were named the Juno Awards in his honor. He also received a Juno Award as Canadian music industry man of the year in 1971.An old friend of Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, Juneau ankled the CRTC in 1975 to take the position as Minister of Communications in Trudeau's government. But he had to resign from the cabinet after he lost a by-election.Juneau became president of pubcaster CBC in 1982 and, while head of the network, he helped create the country's first all-news network, Newsworld. But while heading CBC, he had to grapple with major budget cuts brought in by Prime Minister Brian Mulroney's Progressive Conservative government."He was a great defender of Canadian content, a great defender of the public service and a great defender of the political independence of CBC vis-a-vis the government," said Sylvain Lafrance, the former senior VP of French-language services at CBC, in an interview with the Radio-Canada website.During his years as president of the CBC, he pushed to bring the Canadian content on the network up to 95%. He retired from CBC just as Newsworld was going to air.Following his time at CBC, he founded the World Radio and Television Council, a UNESCO-supported non-government organization. Contact the Variety newsroom at news@variety.com

Monday, February 20, 2012

Safe House tops the united states box office

Safe House has hit the top US box office through the narrowest of margins, compressing The Vow into second place with a mere $300,000 based on the latest estimations.The Denzel Washington starring thriller tallied up $23.9 million throughout President's Day weekend, edging the Vow on $23.six million. Both individuals films have been likely to be threatened by Ghost Driver: Spirit Of Vengeance, but even Nic Cage at his most unhinged could not put enough bums on seats, having a $22 million take departing it in third.Affable adventure follow up Journey 2 ongoing to do steadily having a $20 million weekend, although What This Means Is War made $17.5 million in fifth. The drop-off and away to sixth place was fairly severe using the re-launched The Exorcist: Episode One adding just $7.86 million towards the pot. Apparently even Jar-Jar's appeal wears off eventually...Chronicle arrived at the $50 million mark having a $7.5 million weekend, although Daniel Radcliffe chiller The Lady In Black required $6.six million in eighth place. The Key Realm Of Arrietty and also the Gray complete the very best ten with $6.3 and $3 million correspondingly.In a few days sees Amanda Seyfried's missing persons thriller Gone go face to face with Paul Rudd comedy Wanderlust. Can Safe House hold on for an additional week? We'll discover next Monday...

Thursday, February 16, 2012

Latino Market Trailer: El Lrax

Universal changes itsEl Lraxcampaign for that Latino market into high geartonight on Univision’s Premio Lo Nuestro Latin Music Honours. The animated Lorax character voiced in The spanish language by Danny DeVito will introduce a band and also the specifically produced 90-second preview below. It’s in British, with subtitles and voice-over announcement in The spanish language. Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax opens March 2.

Internet VOD challenges pay TV

The video-on-demand market for paid rentals is currently ruled by pay TV services, but the Internet-on-demand market is growing in strength, according to the NPD Group. Pay TV VOD services hit $1.3 billion in revenue for 2011, according to the market research company, while the iVOD market reached $204 million. The report found that 4 million fewer pay TV users paid additional fees to watch movies in August 2011 vs. a year earlier. Including the services of iTunes, Amazon, Vudu and others, iVOD reached 7 million users compared to 40 million for pay TV VOD. Internet VOD also poses a possible challenge for pay TV's non-movie services. "IVOD users reduced their time spent watching TV shows, news and sports via pay TV companies by 12% between August 2010 and August 2011," said Russ Crupnick, senior veep of industry analysis for the NPD Group. "Pay TV operators now must not only defend their movie VOD revenues but also counter an emerging threat to basic programming." According to NPD, users perceive iVOD as offering a better value and better movie title selection than pay TV. All findings are based on NPD's VideoWatch tracking service, which does not consider free or paid viewings of TV shows, subscription services such as Netflix streaming or free movies included in pay TV subscriptions. Contact the Variety newsroom at news@variety.com