News

Exclusive: Noah Media, producer of Netflix’s 14 Peaks and Sky’s Villeneuve Pironi, has restructured to focus on international docs and laid off a small number of staff.

The London outfit has in the past few months transitioned from a “UK sports-based production company into an international documentary producer,” according to a statement from CEO and co-founder John McKenna.

“This will see us transition from a staff-based to a more freelance-based model, in line with the norm across the factual production space,” said McKenna. “This has unfortunately meant some redundancies in the past few months for some employees we think are fantastic colleagues and people.”

For the year to March 31 2023, Noah had around 45 staff, according to its latest accounts. It will offer “freelance project-specific contracts” for employees who have lost jobs where possible, McKenna added, and he said this has already happened for some of those laid off.

“We firmly...

Born without legs in October 1987 and immediately abandoned at the hospital by her biological parents, Jen Bricker was adopted by a small-town Illinois couple — who already had three boys — and raised to believe she could do anything she put her mind to. Her parents, Gerald and Sharon, gently encouraged their daughter to remove the word “can’t” from her vocabulary, and so Bricker never thought twice about playing with or competing against the other kids at her school.

She excelled across a variety of different sports, but her greatest passion was reserved for gymnastics. Obsessed from the moment she first saw future gold medalist Dominique Moceanu perform one of her floor routines on TV, Bricker devoted herself to becoming a brilliant power tumbler, and when she was 11 she placed fourth in the Aau Junior Olympic Games despite being the only disabled athlete in competition.

Based on that remarkable saga of persistence and possibility,...

Paramount Combines Streamers Pluto & My5 In UK

Paramount is to combine its AVoD platform Pluto TV with BVoD My5 in the UK. In a move that could be the precursor to the breaking down of barriers between AVoD and BVoD, the new streamer will launch in the market in the second half of next year, with more details coming in the next few months. The platform will combine My5’s collection of Paramount UK network Channel 5’s content such as All Creatures Great and Small with Pluto, which carries numerous Fast Channels. Pluto has recently expanded annual revenue beyond $1B, according to Paramount, and is available in 35 markets. Fast once again dominated much of the chatter at Mipcom Cannes and Paramount Chief Strategy Officer and Chief Business Development Officer Jeff Shultz spoke at the confab’s now-annual Fast Summit. “As we look ahead to an IP-delivered future, this is...

Game Show Returns

The British version of the iconic reality TV series “Big Brother,” which first launched 23 years ago, is set to return to ITV screens on Oct. 8. The show is hosted by Aj Odudu and Will Best and produced by Initial, part of Banijay U.K. “Big Brother: The Launch” will air on ITV1, ITV2 and streamer Itvx, while the remainder of the series will be available nightly at 9pm on ITV2 and Itvx, except Saturdays.

“Big Brother” will be followed each night by “Big Brother: Late & Live,” hosted live by Odudu and Best from the site of the Big Brother house in front of a studio audience, where evictees will be interviewed. Following this, “Big Brother: Live Stream” will stream live footage seven nights a week on Itvx.

The Banijay format is popular globally with some 500 seasons of the show having aired around the world in 64 countries and regions.

Joshua Zeman’s latest feature documentary “Checkpoint Zoo,” an inspiring story that unfolds in a war-torn part of the world, has wrapped principal photography. The film tells the story of the daring rescue of over 5,000 animals that were trapped in a wildlife park behind enemy lines during the early days of the Russian-Ukrainian War.

“Checkpoint Zoo” was produced by Zeman and Zach Mortensen for Ghost Robot, with Ian Davies and Torquil Jones for Noah Media Group, which is also financing the project. UTA Independent Film Group has signed on to lead worldwide sales of the picture.

In the early days of the war, a beloved animal refuge known as Feldman Ecopark, located in Ukraine’s second largest city, was in a precarious position. On one side of the park was the invading Russian army; on the other sat the Ukrainian front line. With thousands of animals trapped with little food and water,...

Spencer Matthews has opened up about his expedition to find his brother, Michael Matthews, who died after summiting Mount Everest in 1999 aged just 22.

The former Made In Chelsea star turned broadcaster, 34, stars in Disney Plus’s one-off documentary, Finding Michael, which tells the story of his brother’s disappearance and his family’s journey to recover Michael’s body 20 years later.

Michael Matthews was the youngest Briton to summit Everest, but just three hours after he reached the peak, he went missing. His brother, Spencer, who was aged 10 when Michael went missing and died, had always struggled to accept his death, in part because his family did not have a body to mourn.

Then, in 2017, Spencer’s family was sent a picture by a climber that showed what appeared to be a dead body buried in the snow, in a similar location on the mountain to where Michael went missing.

Bear Grylls has opened up about his concerns with Spencer Matthews leading an expedition to find his brother, Michael Matthews, who died after summiting Mount Everest in 1999, aged 22.

The former Made In Chelsea star turned broadcaster, 34, stars in Disney Plus’s one-off documentary, Finding Michael, which tells the story of his brother’s disappearance and his family’s journey to recover Michael’s body 20 years later.

Michael Matthews was the youngest Briton to summit Everest. Three hours after he reached the peak, however, he went missing. His brother, Spencer, who was aged 10 when Michael went missing and died, had always struggled to accept his death, in part because his family did not have a body to mourn.

In 2017, Spencer’s family was sent a picture by a climber that showed what appeared to be a dead body buried in the snow, in a similar location to where Michael went missing on the mountain.

Spencer Matthews has opened up about his expedition to find his brother, Michael Matthews, who died after summiting Mount Everest in 1999 aged just 22.

The former Made In Chelsea star turned broadcaster, 34, stars in Disney Plus’s one-off documentary, Finding Michael, which tells the story of his brother’s disappearance and his family’s journey to recover Michael’s body 20 years later.

Michael Matthews was the youngest Briton to summit Everest, but just three hours after he reached the peak, he went missing. His brother, Spencer, who was aged 10 when Michael went missing and died, had always struggled to accept his death, in part because his family did not have a body to mourn.

Then, in 2017, Spencer’s family was sent a picture by a climber that showed what appeared to be a dead body buried in the snow, in a similar location on the mountain to where Michael went missing.

‘Drive My Car’, ‘Everything Everywhere All At Once’ among nominees.

The World Soundtrack Awards (Wsa) has unveiled the second and final wave of nominees for its 22nd edition, which takes place on October 22 in Ghent, Belgium.

Composers nominated for the Discovery award include Eiko Ishibashi for Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s Oscar-winning Drive My Car and Isobel Waller-Bridge for spy thriller Munich: The Edge Of War.

Also nominated is post-rock electronica band Son Lux, which worked on the score for Everything Everywhere All At Once.

Scroll down for the full list of nominations

Nainita Desai’s score for 14 Peaks: Nothing Is Impossible...

BAFTA Launches Filmmaking Campaign With Digital Cinema Media & Big Zuu

BAFTA and Digital Cinema Media have launched a campaign titled ‘Behind every BAFTA’ based around a national cinema ad, highlighting the diverse range of skills that contribute to the production of award-winning films, games, and television with the aim to inspire the next generation of creative talent. Dcm’s creative arm Dcm Studio produced the ad, which is narrated by double BAFTA-winner Big Zuu and features rare behind-the-scenes content and clips from films including Skyfall, Get Out and 1917. The ad premieres on Friday August 19 across the UK and will run for seven weeks, appearing alongside films such as Jordan Peele’s latest Nope, Olivia Wilde’s Venice-bound Don’t Worry Darling, and the Brad Pitt-starrer Bullet Train.

Netflix’s ’14 Peaks’ Producer Noah Media Group Reshuffles Production & Development

Netflix’s 14 Peaks: Nothing is Impossible producer Noah Media Group...

The announcement of winners for the ASCAP Screen Music Awards, being held virtually again for 2022 and announced Monday morning, included revealing the top vote-getters for several Composers’ Choice Awards, including the scores for “Encanto” and “The White Lotus.”

Germaine Franco prevailed for film score of the year for “Encanto.” Cristobal Tapia de Veer won two of these peer-voted awards, for television score of the year and television theme as well, for “The White Lotus. The video game score of the year honor went to Wataru Hokoyama for “Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart.” Triumphing in the documentary score of the year category was Amanda Jones for “Dreamland: The Burning of Black Wall Street.”

Those five Composers’ Choice Awards come on top of ASCAP’s traditional Screen Music Awards, which collect date to honor the most-consumed music of the year in the fields of TV, film and video games, with dozens of winners cited.

Nominees for this year’s ASCAP Composers’ Choice Awards have been announced, with scores for films like “Dune” and “The Power of the Dog,” TV series like “Loki” and “The White Lotus” and video games like “Call of Duty” among the contenders.

These competitive awards, voted on by members of ASCAP, will be given out during the week of May 2 as part of the 2022 ASCAP Screen Music Awards, alongside the non-voted honors that reward the composers of the most-performed scores and themes of the year.

Up for film score of the year are Hans Zimmer, for “Dune”; Germaine Franco, for “Encanto”; Daniel Hart, for “The Green Knight”; Dan Romer, for “Luca”; and Radiohead member-turned-maestro Jonny Greenwood for “The Power of the Dog.”

Zimmer, Franco and Greenwood have already been nominated for the Academy Awards this month for their work on those films.

Nods for television score went to Michael Abels,...

Sales

International media group Fremantle has picked up sales rights outside Asia to Korean format “DNA Singer.” The music gameshow was created by specialty firm FormatEast and Kyung Hwangbo for Sbs and has not yet gone to air. Family members who are genetically linked with celebrities such as singers and actors perform, while the judges must guess which celebrities they are genetically related to. “Fantastic Family – DNA Singer” launches in Korea next week as Lunar New Year specials on Sbs. “It is by no means easy to sell a paper format, before the initial proposal has aired. But recently the preference for Korean content has amplified interest in our shows. We are seeing a trend for major players in the global entertainment industry to acquire our formats in advance to stay ahead of the game,” said Kim Il-Joong, executive director of FormatEast. Fremantle has produced local versions of Korean global...

‘Nautilus’ Producer Moonriver TV Expands Exec Team

Moonriver TV, the producer behind Disney+’s upcoming Jules Verne adaptation Nautilus, has signed Around The World In 80 Days indie Slim Film + Television’s Head of Production Lincia Daniel, while promoting Casey Herbert. Daniel, who has also worked on Cbbc series Mystic, joins as Exec Producer, with Herbert promoted to Senior Executive Producer overseeing the creative team in London and working alongside CEO Xavier Marchand on a slate of premium British and International drama projects. Marchand is currently in Australia working on Moonriver’s Disney+ adaptation of Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea, titled Nautilus. Moonriver recently wrapped on Lesley Manville/Isabelle Huppert pic Mrs Harris Goes To Paris and is also developing Henry Fry’s First Time For Everything, William Boyd’s Notre Dame and Amor Towles’ Gentleman in Moscow. “This is a tremendous start to 2022 and absolutely the...

The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) has revealed its longlist of nominees across 24 categories for its upcoming film awards.

“No Time to Die,” “Belfast,” and “West Side Story| are among the leading films announced on Wednesday following the first round of votes.

As revealed on Monday, not included in the long-list is “Spider-Man: No Way Home” after “failing to meet eligibility criteria,” according to BAFTA. The film had originally sought consideration for the best picture and best special effects categories. Sony declined to comment.

Round Two voting, to determine the nominations in the member voted categories, will open between Feb. 14 and 27 2022. Nominations will be announced on Feb 3.

Round Three voting, to determine the winners, will open between Feb. 9 and March 8.

The BAFTA Awards are set to take place in central London on March 13.

Check out the full longlist below:

Best Film

15 films go through to the Round Two of voting,...

As the awards-season buzz builds for Netflix’s The Power of the Dog, the western starring Benedict Cumberbatch led all films on the streamer this past week.

Also starring Jesse Plemons, Kodi Smit-McPhee and Kirsten Dunst, the film from writer-director Jane Campion was streamed for 27.2 million hours during the week of November 29-December 5. The Power of the Dog hit the platform Friday.

Holdovers snagged the next four slots on the chart, led by recent chart-topper Red Notice. They’re followed by the first-week films Single All the Way, 14 Peaks: Nothing Is Impossible, The Christmas Chronicles and The Christmas Chronicles: Part Two.

Over on the TV side, Season 3 of Netflix’s Lost in Space reboot topped the weekly TV by a mile, with nearly 47.4 million hours streamed during the week. The new episodes arrived December 1. The series’ first season ranked No. 4 with 20.9 million hours. Also notable is the limited series Maid,...

This film was screened as part of the 2021 Doc NYC Film Festival. If you ask someone to name a famous Nepali person, they might be able to recall Tenzing Norgay. He was one of two mountain climbers (the other was New Zealander Sir Edmund Hillary) to be the first ever to reach the summit of Mount Everest in 1953. But ever since then, Nepalis have mostly remained in the shadow, as other climbers from around the world have marched their way into the Himalayas to make their mark and set new records. This all changes with 14 Peaks and the climber known as Nimsdai. 14 Peaks: Nothing Is Impossible is an extraordinary, jaw-dropping, awe-inspiring documentary experience about Nimsdai's remarkable achievement - climbing the 14 highest mountains in the world within 7 months. It's not about whether he could do this, it's all about the journey, as it always is, and how momentous this achievement is.

Exclusive: A feature doc on one of Formula 1’s most dramatic moments, the row between Ferrari drivers Gilles Villeneuve and Didier Pironi, is the first project to emerge from Finding Jack Charlton producer Noah Media and Sky Studios’ multi-year partnership, with F1 driver Mark Webber set to exec produce.

Villeneuve & Pironi will focus on an intense two-week period in the early 1980s that became known as ‘The Betrayal.’ The film will feature interviews with those closest to the two men, with premiere date set for late next year.

The teammates were both aiming to win the 1982 F1 World Title but, during the final laps of that year’s San Marino Grand Prix, Pironi passed Villeneuve to win the race while Villeneuve believed the two had been instructed to slow down. This was an unexpected act that went completely against the team orders Villeneuve thought they were obeying and they never spoke again.

Best original song Oscar contenders Beyoncé and Van Morrison are among those who received nominations in the visual media categories at the Hollywood Music in Media Awards (Hmma). Composers Hans Zimmer and Nicholas Britell were included among the familiar names picking up nods in the score categories.

The awards will be presented Nov. 17. The HMMAs honor composers, songwriters, and music supervisors for their work in music for film, television, and videogames.

Nominations here have historically been a harbinger or guide for what nominees and winners will pop up in the Golden Globes, Oscars, Grammys and Emmys that occur later in awards season, although there is a much wider field in the HMMAs, since there are separate divisions for sci-fi, animation, documentary and independent films in the score categories. The Hollywood Music in Media Awards will feature music performances, celebrity presenters, tributes to music industry icons, awards for composers, songwriters and...

"If I can stay alive, I can do this in seven months..." "You are on the edge of life and death." Netflix has revealed a trailer for a mountain climbing documentary film called 14 Peaks: Nothing Is Impossible, one of the first ever to profile a Nepalese climber. Fearless Nepali Mountaineer Nimsdai Purja embarks on a seemingly impossible quest to summit all 14 of the worlds 8000-meter peaks in seven months. This is a daunting, near impossible feat for any human, even for a Nepalese person born in the Himalayas. "14 Peaks is a thrilling, action-packed story about courage, perseverance, and pushing the limits of human endurance. Written, directed and produced by Torquil Jones, an executive produced by Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi. I am a big fan of mountain climbing films (also see this year's The Summit of the Gods) and I'm very excited to watch this documentary soon. Nimsdai...