David Puttnam: Last News

K.J. Yossman Left Bank Pictures’ CEO Andy Harries will take over as the new chair of the Film London Executive Task Force this month.Harries, whose company produces “The Crown” among other high-end dramas, succeeds the inaugural chair, Lord David Puttnam, who has been in the role since 2004.Harries established Left Bank Pictures in 2007; Sony Pictures Television acquired the company in 2012.The Film London Executive Task Force is comprised of stakeholders from both the screen industry, including Netflix, Channel 4 and The Production Guild, and the public sector, such as the Metropoliton Police.

EXCLUSIVE: Ridley Scott unveils Napoleon today at a lavish world premiere in the 2,500-seat Salle Pleyel concert hall in Paris. He is 85 but seems ageless, and Scott is already plotting to quickly resume production on Gladiator, the second installment of his film that won five Oscars including Best Picture. He’s got 90 minutes of footage, fully edited, and needs that much more. He expects to be shooting within two weeks, and he’s already got his next movie slated for around March. Though he is keeping the details to himself, he acknowledged it’s period, with a script like perfectly distilled liquor, and two stars ready to join him in what he said is a bucket list project for him.

Naman Ramachandran In his last keynote address as U.K. Film Distributors’ Association president, veteran producer David Puttnam struck a sombre note highlighting a number of critical issues the country’s media industry is facing. Addressing a rapt audience at the BAFTA headquarters in London on Tuesday, Puttnam identified skills shortage and lack of investment in skills as a “major crisis” hanging over the industry. According to Puttnam’s calculations, a committed annual investment of £40 million ($50 million) in skills could result in production savings of well over £100 million ($125 million). New data commissioned by Puttnam from accountancy firm Saffery Champness shows that underinvestment, leading to scarcity of talent, has resulted in significant wage inflation for mid-level production roles, with spikes of between 7-15% above the cost of living.

Hugh Hudson has died at the age of 86, his family have announced. He was best known for his Academy-Award winning film Chariots Of Fire and passes away in hospital after a short illness.

Jane Alsobrook, a marketing and publicity specialist who coordinated the U.S. campaigns for numerous successful independent and foreign films in the 1970s and 1980s, has died. She was 78.

Even if you have trouble with the idea of God, says veteran producer David Puttnam in Ennio, Giuseppe Tornatore’s rapturous paean to his late collaborator Ennio Morricone, when you hear his music, “you can hear that there is something out there.” By the standards of Ennio, the suggestion that God dwells in Morricone’s music is nowhere near over the top. “He’s my favorite composer,” whoops Quentin Tarantino, in a torrent of enthusiasm ferocious even by his standards. “And I’m not talking movie composer! I’m talking Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert!”

LEGENDARY film directer SirAlan Parker has died aged 76. The Hollywood legend directed films including Bugsy Malone, Midnight Express and Evita.