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Former Palme d’Or winner and past Cannes jury president Nanni Moretti returned to a familiar berth in the Cannes competition on Sunday with his Rome-set drama “Three Floors.” However, it’s safe to say the Italian director is unlikely to repeat his feat from 2001, when “The Son’s Room” earned him the highest art-house accolade. Sad to report, this latest is one of the worst efforts in a great career.

Based on a novel by Israeli writer Eshkol Novo and originally set in Tel Aviv, “Tre Piani” is now set mainly in a large, middle-class apartment building in the Roman suburb of Prati. It looks at the intertwined lives of three families who live in it, among them Lucio (Riccardo Scarmacio) who is worried about what happened to his seven-year-old daughter; Monica (Alba Rohrwacher) who is suffering from post-natal depression and loneliness; and, on the top floor, Dora (Margherita Buy...

Antoinette Jadaone’s Fan Girl, bowing in the Tokyo Film Festival, dives far deeper into the psyche of its titular teenage heroine than most films about obsessed fans, groupies and hangers-on. The rawness with which the story develops and its far from happy conclusions stand out in the career of Jadaone, who is one of the top romance film directors in the Philippines (Alone/Together, Never Not Love You). Here her view of reality may be too adult and graphic for her regular audiences, but it’s a film that could be well appreciated on the international festival circuit.

Also remarkable is the decisiveness with ...

Antoinette Jadaone’s Fan Girl, bowing in the Tokyo Film Festival, dives far deeper into the psyche of its titular teenage heroine than most films about obsessed fans, groupies and hangers-on. The rawness with which the story develops and its far from happy conclusions stand out in the career of Jadaone, who is one of the top romance film directors in the Philippines (Alone/Together, Never Not Love You). Here her view of reality may be too adult and graphic for her regular audiences, but it’s a film that could be well appreciated on the international festival circuit.

Also remarkable is the decisiveness with ...

After making a handful of award-winning shorts, Filipina filmmaker Antoinette Jadaone made her feature debut in 2011 with “Six Degrees of Separation from Lilia Cuntapay” that received considerable festival play, including at Busan in 2012.

Her 2014 film, “That Thing Called Tadhana” is one of the highest grossing independent films in the Philippines. In addition, Jadaone has directed several studio-backed mainstream romantic comedies and dramas. Her “Fan Girl” that was at the Busan international Film Festival’s 2018 Asian Project Market is in post-production now. She returns to the project market with “Boldstar”, a project that was conceptualized in 2016 and is being realized now.

“Around 20 years ago, the soft porn genre was all the rage in Philippine cinema,” Jadaone told Variety. “We had what we call ‘boldstars,’ the female protagonists in these usually low-budget, but high-grossing, ‘bold’ films. Then the rom-com genre began to rise to popularity, and the boldstars were replaced by the quirky leading ladies.

Lionsgate’s local-language film consortium GlobalGate Entertainment has added the Philippines’ Viva Communications to its worldwide consortium of 13 production and distribution partners.

Other Globalgate partners include Televisa, Gaumont, Nordisk, Tobis, Rai, Kadokawa, Lotte, Tme, Paris Filmes, CineColombia/Dynamo and Belga. Lionsgate launched GlobalGate three years ago to produce and distribute local-language films in markets around the world to capitalize on the fact that the market share of local-language films is expanding. GlobalGate is co-founded and headed by Paul Presburger, William Pfeiffer and Clifford Werber,

Since its launch in 1981, Viva Communications has been a multimedia distributor of Hollywood and local-language content in The Philippines with affiliated labels including Viva Films, Viva International Pictures, Viva Live, Viva Networks, Viva and Vicor Records, Viva Music Publishing and Viva Artists Agency. Local films released by Viva include “Kita Kita,” “Sid & Aya,” “Aurora,” “Miss Granny,” “Fantastika” and “Never Not Love You.”

Viva Communications chairman and CEO Vicente R.

Globalgate Entertainment, the local-language film and TV production and financing consortium closely aligned with Lionsgate, has added The Philippines’ Viva Communications to its worldwide network of 13 production and distribution companies.

Other Globalgate partners include Televisa, Gaumont, Nordisk, Tobis, Rai, Kadokawa, Lotte, Tme, Paris Filmes, CineColombia/Dynamo and Belga.

Since its launch in 1981, Viva Communications has been a leading distributor of Hollywood and local-language content in The Philippines with affiliated labels including Viva Films, Viva International Pictures, Viva Live, Viva Networks, Viva and Vicor Records, Viva Music Publishing and Viva Artists Agency. Local films released by Viva include top grossing films Kita Kita, Sid & Aya, Aurora, Miss Granny, Fantastika and Never Not Love You.

Commented Viva Communications Chairman & CEO Vicente R. del Rosario, Jr., “William Pfeiffer has been a great friend, both professionally and personally, and we look forward to working with him alongside the rest of the Globalgate leadership team,...

Movies from the Philippines are set to reach a wider audience in the Middle East following the launch of new distributor Gulf Asia Entertainment. The company aims to give theatrical releases to up to a dozen Filipino titles per year through an arrangement with Front Row Filmed Entertainment.

First out is “Never Not Love You, which will be released on 19 April. Starring Nadine Lustre and James Reid, the romantic drama released last week in The Philippines and enjoyed a $500,000 opening weekend. In May, Gulf Asia will release another romance “Sid & Aya,” starring Anne Curtis and Ding Dong Dantes.

Gulf Asia is a joint effort of a quintet of film industry veterans. They include former Evp of 20th Century Fox in the Asia-Pacific Sunder Kimatrai, and Anish Wadhwa, CEO of Home Screen Entertainment, a U.A.E.-based company releasing Indian films in the Middle East. Also involved are Sharavan Shroff,...

In a further sign of entertainment biz growth in the Middle East, a group of Asian industry vets are teaming up with leading local distributor Front Row Filmed Entertainment to launch a new distribution company aimed at serving the sizable Filipino and South East Asian populations in the region.

Gulf Asia Entertainment is the brainchild of Sunder Kimatrai, former Evp Asia Pacific at Twentieth Century Fox International, Filipino media mogul Vicente Del Rosario Jr, Front Row CEO Gianluca Chakra, and entrepreneurs Anish Wadhwa and Shravan Shroff.

Through Front Row Filmed Entertainment, the company will look to release between 10-12 theatrical Filipino titles a year starting off with romantic drama Never Not Love You on April 19, which grossed $500,000 in its first 4 days of release in the Philippines last Wednesday and is eyeing a $2M total. The outfit will follow that movie up with romance Sid & Aya at the end of May.

Consortium of industry veterans including former Fox exec will release 10-12 Filipino titles a year.

A consortium of industry veterans, including former Fox Asia executive Sunder Kimatrai and Front Row Filmed Entertainment’s Gianluca Chakra, are launching Gulf Asia Entertainment to distribute Filipino and Southeast Asian content in the Middle East.

Also partners in the consortium are Vicente Del Rosario Jr, CEO of the Philippines Viva Entertainment; Shravan Shroff, former managing director of Indian exhibitor Fame India; and Anish Wadhwa, CEO of UAE-based distributor Home Screen Entertainment, which specialises in South Indian content.

Kimatrai was formerly executive vice president,...