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‘Yellowstone’ & More Packed in Paramount Volume For BeIN

Middle Eastern broadcast giant BeIN Media has secured the likes of Yellowstone, Frasier and Colin From Accounts through an exclusive multi-year agreement with Paramount Global Content Distribution. Also included in the deal are Yellowstone spin-offs 1883 and 1923, Billions, Frasier, Knuckles, Lawmen: Bass Reeves, Mayor of Kingston, Paw Patrol, Ray Donovan, Tulsa King and the upcoming NCIS: Tony & Ziva, along with feature films such as Bob Marley: One Love, Rob Peace, Self Reliance and the Transformers and Mission: Impossible franchises. Paramount has similar deals in place with Cosmote in Greece, Streamz in Belgium, MultiChoice in Africa, JioCinema in India, Blast TV in the Philippines and Mono in Thailand. “This agreement underscores beIN’s commitment to delivering the best in entertainment to our audiences in the Mena region,” said Esra Özaral Altop, Chief Entertainment Content Officer, at BeIN. “By expanding our relationship with Paramount...

The Critical Incident series introduced some really complex characters who went through a huge transformation during their journey in the series. Narratively, Critical Incident explored how we can often mistake a person’s true identity but as we get to know them better, we finally understand who they are and what they are trying to do in life. So without further ado, let’s break down all the important characters in the show and see how everyone, despite being in the wrong at some point, tries to make things right in the end.

Spoilers Ahead

Zil Ahmed

Alright, so let’s talk about Zil Ahmed, played by Akshay Khanna. From the very beginning of Critical Incident, it was obvious Ahmed was young, ambitious, and honestly, one of the best cops in his precinct. You could just tell he had that drive, you know? He was respected by everyone around him,...

Exclusive: Australian streamer Stan has today unveiled a 25-strong slate, adding scripted titles from Matchbox Pictures and the producers behind Colin From Accounts, acquisitions from the UK and U.S. and a new version of Drag Race to its ranks.

Content from the likes of All3Media, AMC, Banijay, the BBC, Fremantle, ITV, Lionsgate, Universal Internatational Studios, Paramount, Sony and Warner Bros Discovery is on the slate, which was showcased at the iconic Sydney Opera House as Stan’s latest salvo in Australia’s competitive streaming market.

Among the key scripted originals is Critical Incident, a psychological crime thriller from Matchbox, the Australian production subsidiary of Universal Studio Group-owned Universal International Studios. Written by Sarah Bassiuoni (The Secrets She Keeps), it recently completed production in Western Sydney, with major production investment from Screen Australia.

The six-part show depicts life in the Western suburbs of Sydney and delves into the complex...

A teenager in 70s New Zealand dreams of starting a band in Jonathan Ogilvie’s nostalgic comedy, which opens Rotterdam’s international film festival

Jonathan Ogilvie is the New Zealand film-maker who made the gangster drama The Tender Hook (2008) and also Lone Wolf (2021), a postmodern spin on Conrad’s The Secret Agent. Now he hits a lighter, gentler and much more personal note in this coming-of-age comedy, which opens the International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) – a nostalgiafest romance from the 70s post-punk era about a kid in New Zealand mooching around in his uncool school uniform, hanging out in the local record shop (which still has its prog-era name of Middle Earth Records) and dreaming of starting a punk band called the Daleks – though wondering if just Daleks sounds cooler — and obsessing about an unattainably sexy girl who sneers at him.

It will have all of us of a certain...

Joining a long line of filmmakers who’ve fictionalized their comings-of-age in one regional punk scene or another, veteran New Zealand writer-director Jonathan Ogilvie turns the clock back to 1979 Christchurch in “Head South.” Its protagonist is the classic shy but would-be rebellious teen boy dared into starting his own band, whose first gig naturally provides an underdogs-triumphant climax. Pleasant but awfully thin, feeling like a short insufficiently fleshed out to feature length, this modest nostalgic exercise provides a lightweight opener to this year’s Rotterdam fest.

Angus (Ed Oxenbould) is a high-schooler intrigued by new U.K. sounds as yet little-heard hereabouts —though he can barely summon the courage to enter Middle Earth Records, where proprietor Fraser (Jackson Bliss) is the obvious go-to source for such breaking intel. Even more intimidatingly cool is mysterious Holly (Roxie Mohebbi), a Debbie Harry-esque bottle-blonde bombshell who claims to be from London. Amongst his own,...

“Head South” director Jonathan Ogilvie is all about underdogs.

“It’s not a story about winners. It’s a story about also-rans, to use this racing term, because there is nothing to win,” he tells Variety about the International Film Festival Rotterdam opener, which sees schoolboy Angus (Ed Oxenbould) falling for a girl and for post-punk music in 1979’s New Zealand.

“There wasn’t a real music industry, so you couldn’t become a rock star. Back in those days, we often talked about ‘the tyranny of distance.’ We felt so removed from everything. But it was the triumph of distance, because it allowed people to interpret things in a new way. It’s a film about music, yes, but also about art and creative expression.”

Praising Oxenbould, he adds: “On the page, Angus could seem like a nasty little brat. But Ed was also in a band; his brother was also living in London.