Frater Asia: Last News

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Supernatural crime series, “Detective Daji” is to be launched as a project at next week’s Asia TV Forum and Market (ATF) in Singapore. The U.S.-Taiwanese show involves a female police officer Detective Daji Su murdered in the line of duty. She is given a second chance at life when she is resurrected by an ancient Fox Demon who is hell-bent on revenge and reclaiming her own place in the demonic world.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Georgian drama film “April” took double honors on Saturday at the annual Asia Pacific Screen Awards, winning the best film prize and the best performance prize for Ia Sukhitashvili. Directed by Dea Kulumbegashvili, the film portrays the determination of an obstetrics and gynaecology provider in the face of accusations about the death of a newborn child. The film premiered at the Venice and Toronto festivals in September, earning a special jury prize in Venice and the best film prize in the Zabaltegi-Tabakalera competition.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Malaysian media, telecoms and oil mogul Ananda Krishnan has died at age 86, his companies reported on Thursday. No cause of death was disclosed. Krishnan founded Malaysia’s second-largest mobile operator, Maxis Bhd, and the dominant broadcasting and media company Astro Malaysia Holdings Bhd. He also held a substantial stake in oil field services provider Bumi Armada Bhd through Objektif Bersatu and investment firm Usaha Tegas. Earlier this year, Forbes calculated that his net worth amounted to some $5 billion, making him the third richest person in the country.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief New Zealand’s Black Mandala Films has acquired the sales rights to “Play Dead,” a chilling new horror film that kicks off with a woman waking up in a basement, surrounded by corpses, and fighting for her life. The grisly tale of survival and deception is directed by Carlos ‘Charly’ Goitia (“Nightmare Radio: The Night Stalker” and “The Game of 100 Candles: The Last Possession”). The film is produced by Nicolás Onetti, known for films such as “1978” and What the Waters Left Behind,” with a screenplay penned by Gonzalo Mellid and Camilo Zaffora. “Play Dead” follows the harrowing journey of Alison (portrayed by Paula Brasca), a woman who finds herself seriously injured and trapped in a dim, cryptic basement.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Double Oscar-winning composer A.R. Rahman has music projects in every corner of the world.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Phillip Noyce, the ace Australian director behind “The Quiet American” “Salt and “Rabbit Proof Fence,” is no ordinary storyteller. His genial, almost bumbling, demeanor belies a quick brain and an avid user of technology. Both were on display in Goa at the International Film Festival of India where he is the recipient of a lifetime achievement award, and where Monday he delivered a memorable masterclass. His method of explaining how to succeed (“survive” would be a better term, he says) in the new Hollywood, passes through a description of the dire state of film pre-sales through to on-stage trust games and extracts from an unsuccessful pilot. Noyce’s analysis of the U.S.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief John Seale, the Australian-born cinematographer who won an Oscar for “The English Patient” and has four other nominations for “Witness,” “Rain Man,” “Cold Mountain” and 2015’s “Mad Max: Fury Road,” was one of the highest-profile international guests at the ongoing International Film Festival of India. In a Saturday masterclass, he examined multiple angles of cinematography and the wider film industry. Topics ranged from working with actors, his preference for being a lighting-cameraman, through to the use of multiple cameras and making sure that he approaches every film as a new and different challenge. His descriptions of an early career in television, working on low-budgets and the breakout 1980s successes of Australian filmmakers were both a happy trip down memory lane and instructive for those people working outside the comfort zone of the Hollywood system. “In the early 1960s, the Australian film industry was zilch.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief “Wicked,” which was by far the highest grossing film in the world this weekend, failed to give the South Korea box office market a much-needed jolt. The Jon M. Chu-directed fantasy claimed a strong 45% share of the box office in Korea with $3.58 million earned from 501,000 admissions between Friday and Sunday. Over five days, it collected $4.64 million.Korean-produced “Hidden Face” earned $1.75 million, and a more than 21% market share, for second place.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief “Her Story,” a comedy-drama film told from a largely female perspective, topped the mainland China box office on its first weekend of release. “Gladiator II,” opening the same weekend, placed fourth. Data from consultancy firm Artisan Gateway showed “Her Story” earning RMB125 million ($17.5 million) between Friday and Sunday.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief “Kraven the Hunter” has been granted a theatrical release in mainland China that is closely coordinated with its North American and international rollouts. It will open in Chinese theaters on Dec. 14, a Saturday.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Recognizing the brilliance of British director Lucy Walker, both as a filmmaker and as an advocate for the documentary format, Shekhar Kapur hurriedly arranged an additional masterclass on Saturday at the International Film Festival of India, where he is festival director. And hosted the session himself. Their conversation ranged from technology and technique through to the filmmaker’s responsibility towards the subject. In particular, it dug deep into how and where to find a story. After an era of editing with film stock, Walker said that around the time she went to film school computer editing came in and changed the game.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief The vast expanse of opportunity that exists if India and Spain manage to increase and improve their film and TV industry co-operation was on display at a panel session on Sunday at Film Bazaar. “If you explained the incentives, people would be flocking [to Spain] to produce,” said leading Indian producer Nikhil Advani. He cited similar examples including Estonia and the Middle East where Indian films have been made with subsidies and location incentives.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Mainland Chinese director Lou Ye claimed the two top honors – best narrative feature film and best director – at the Golden Horse Film Awards on Saturday in Taiwan with his indie title “An Unfinished Film.”The prizes for Lou and others awarded on the night, represent a defiant gesture towards mainland Chinese authorities which operates a restrictive system of controls over its film industry.The long-running Golden Horse awards had for many years been regarded as the pinnacle awards event for Chinese-language cinema. But, after a speech advocating Taiwan’s independence was given from the stage by a 2018 awards winner, China sought to ban its filmmakers from attending and instead promoted its own prize race.The People’s Republic of China (mainland China) and the Republic of China (Taiwan) are at loggerheads over legitimacy in many international institutions.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Oscar-nominated documentary filmmaker Lucy Walker began a Saturday panel discussion on stories that travel by describing her own wanderlust backstory. “As a girl growing up in London, I didn’t have enough money to travel. And I didn’t think being on vacation was the most interesting way to see the world.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Sony Pictures Networks India (SPNI) has agreed a cricket rights broadcast deal stretching eight years with the Asian Cricket Council. The deal encompasses all editions of the Men’s and Women’s Asia Cups, Men’s and Women’s Under-19 Asia Cups, and the Men’s and Women’s Emerging Teams Asia Cups. The agreement was sealed after a bidding process and the winning bid represents a 70% increase in the rights value, the ACC said without sharing the bid price. Quoting anonymous sources, multiple Indian media sources reported the value of the contract at $170 million. The substantial increase in rights value “will enable the ACC to channel significant resources into grassroots programs, infrastructure development, and talent pathways, especially for associate nations,” the organization said. “Congratulations to the ACC for conducting a fair and transparent bidding process for the rights to the ACC tournaments! We are delighted to bring these action-packed tournaments, which will also include India and Pakistan matches, to our viewers for the next 8 years,” said SPNI’s MD & CEO, Gaurav Banerjee. Sony had been looking to expand its TV and streaming businesses in India through a merger deal with Zee Entertainment Enterprises.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Vidhu Vinod Chopra, who is both one of India’s most revered filmmaking veterans and a self-confessed angry man, took to the stage on Friday for a (mostly) good-natured introspective conversation punctuated with musical interludes. Though he scarcely needed prompting, Chopra, the dynamo behind “3 Idiots,” “Munna Bhai MBBS” and “12th Fail,” was pressed by friend and musician Shantanu Moitra, to examine the moments in his career when he doubted himself. They were speaking at the Kala Academy in Goa, hub of the International Film Festival of India, and were treated like rock stars by a 500-strong crowd of festival-goers and film students. An accomplished screenwriter, director and producer, Chopra said that one of his many “zero moments,’ or low points, was trying to break the news of his desire to be a filmmaker to his father who aspired for the young Vidhu to become a doctor. “The only dream I had was to assist Vijay [Goldie] Anand,” he explained. While Chopra earned an Oscar nomination for 1978 documentary short “An Encounter With Faces,” early setbacks included waiting in vain for a letter of introduction to Anand.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Ridham Janve, an already acclaimed director attending the Film Bazaar with his second film “Hunter’s Moon” (aka “Kaatti Ri Raatti”), likens the editing process to a game of long-distance chess that he played with star editor Amit Dutta. “I would send him bursts of files, notes and elements of the mood, but not the narrative. That meant he had some surprises, such as the introduction of an important character midway through the story, but it was fascinating to have him discover my film from a different angle,” Janve told Variety. The largely remote editing process was not a COVID-era necessity, but rather reflected the fact that both Janve and Dutta are men close to nature and who live in mountainous regions. Mountains were key to Janve’s previous film “The Gold-Laden Sheep and the Sacred Mountain,” and are again more than just a setting for his “Hunter’s Moon.” The film’s narrative follows a hunter who stashes the meat he had caught in a place he thought to be safe.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Chinese video streaming group iQiyi incurred setbacks in subscriptions and advertising, but was able to improve its content sales, leading to a July to September quarter that was down in revenue and profit terms. Total revenues were RMB7.2 billion ($1.0 billion), a decrease of 10% year over year in the third quarter of iQiyi’s current financial year. Net income attributable to iQiyi was RMB229 million ($32.7 million), compared to RMB476 million in the same period in 2023. The company no longer discloses subscriber numbers, only subscriber revenues.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Legendary Hollywood director and producer Charles ‘Chuck’ Russell says that the breakout film “The Mask” was originally conceived by New Line Cinema as a horror movie. Instead, the 1994 action comedy went on to be a career-defining picture for Jim Carrey and Cameron Diaz, a global box office hit and a defining moment for the use of VFX in comedy films. “I’d directed ‘A Nightmare on Elm Street 3’ and made friends at New Line. Then I did ‘The Blob’ and New Line wanted another shocking horror film.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief “Stree 2,” already Bollywood’s biggest hit film of the year, and India’s second highest grossing film of 2024, is poised to be joined by one or more sequels, its director Amar Kaushik said on Wednesday. Kaushik was speaking at a Knowledge Series seminar which is part of the Film Bazaar project market that sits alongside the International Film Festival of India (IFFI) in Goa. “We have stories in mind and will shoot soon, though there’s is no definite timetable. Of course, it will have to be done in Madhya Pradesh.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Female director Tribeny Rai once took on hard labor in her native Sikkim, India, in order to prove that women are not weak. But she found that even those drastic efforts did not solve the problems of patriarchy and long-standing traditions that favor male decision-making, male children and even how women view their own roles in society. Rai’s new film “The Shape of Momo” attempts to tackle the issue with a different, soft-power approach.The film tells the tale of a woman who resigns from her job and returns to her family that is apparently cursed by the death of several of its male members.