The Edinburgh International Film Festival is the longest continuously running film festival in the world. After London, it is arguably the UK's most prestigious film festival.
Set in the historic capital of Scotland, the festival has run in mid-June since 2008, moving from its traditional fortnight long run during the August Edinburgh Festival.
A few nights ago I went with a couple of friends to see the new Narnia film in 3D. I found the film a bit disappointing, but overall it’s a pleasant enough way to pass a couple of hours. It’s better than the last effort, but is essentially undemanding entertainment with the dots joined up in predictable fashion and it has a couple of decent scenes.
Quebecois director Denis Villeneuve has picked up another laurel at VIFF. After Incendies was chosen as Canada's foreign film nomination for the Oscars, and winning best film at TIFF, he won the ET Canada Award for Best Canadian Feature Film, a juried award that comes with $20,000 prize-money.
I caught a couple of last-minute, random films this week at the Vancouver International Film Festival. On Wednesday evening, I saw a Serbian-Albanian co-production Honeymoons (Medeni Mesec) - another sardonic title although not as dark as Russian film My Joy (which I reviewed earlier). The action parallels two separate stories revolving around weddings in neighbouring countries where the main characters are trying to escape to the West.
One of the less cut-and-dry eco docs at the Vancouver International Film Festival this year, is Windfall (10, 13 October) a relentless attack on wind energy seen through the prism of a small town in upstate New York where industrial wind energy became a divisive local issue.
Today (Saturday 2nd) is the final day of the Vancouver Film and TV Forum, New Filmmakers Day.
The London-set Raindance Film Festival has been a regular event in the UK film festival calendar since 1993. It continues to make waves with its commitment to showing indie films, in particular by new filmmakers, and often edgier material.
This year's Raindance Film Festival is a challenging and innovative mix, showing some 77 features and 69 UK Premieres over a 12 day period from the comfortable surroundings of the Apollo Cinema in Piccadilly Circus.
Toronto-set Hot Docs is the largest documentary film festival in North America. Established in 1993, Hot Docs has flourished in recent years with increasing numbers of documentaries getting made. Hot Docs is also an important marketplace for film producers and buyers to do business.
Movie rental giant Blockbuster has filed for voluntary Chapter 11 bankruptcy in New York.
In a release the company said that business would continue as normal at its U.S. stores, although its recapitalization plan should reduce the Company's indebtedness from nearly $1 billion currently to an estimated $100 million or less when implemented.