Margaret Moth: Last News

Naman Ramachandran Disney’s “Moana 2” dominated the U.K. and Ireland box office with a £12 million ($15.2 million) debut, according to numbers from Comscore, marking a strong start for the animated sequel. The film led a robust weekend that saw Universal’s “Wicked” holding strong in its second frame with £8.3 million, bringing its cumulative total to £28.5 million.

K.J. Yossman Kaleidoscope Film Distribution has unveiled its Cannes slate, including George Michael documentary “Portrait of an Artist.” The company is also repping global sales rights for Lucy Lawless’ directorial debut “Never Look Away,” a documentary about photojournalist Margaret Moth, and “Forked,” a documentary about celebrity chef Susan Feniger. “George Michael: Portrait of an Artist” features copious archive footage as well as interviews with Michael’s close friends and colleagues including Stephen Fry and Stevie Wonder.

Joe Leydon Film Critic The thin line between cheating death and chasing it appears to have been smudged, repeatedly, by maverick video journalist Margaret Moth, the subject of first-time filmmaker Lucy Lawless’ fascinating documentary “Never Look Away.” At least, that’s the impression we’re left with at the end of this compact yet complex portrait of a singularly and aggressively unconventional war correspondent who inspired equal measures of admiration and anxiety among her friends, colleagues and lovers throughout her 20 years of assignments in the world’s trouble spots — Baghdad, Sarajevo, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Zaire, you name it, she was there — for CNN. Something of an enigma even to those closest to her — “I never fully understood what was ticking inside of her” is a comment typical of responses by interviewees questioned by an off-camera Lawless — Moth was fond of proudly proclaiming, “I live life to the fullest.” But it was a life she repeatedly risked by going places, doing things and recording wartime horrors with such little regard for her own safety that a CNN teammate warned her: “There’s only so much Russian Roulette you can play.” It was also a life that she more or less reinvented herself to portray.

EXCLUSIVE: Sundance documentary Never Look Away, the directorial debut of actress Lucy Lawless (Xena: Warrior Princess), has been sold by XYZ to Greenwich Entertainment for all rights in North America, and to Kaleidoscope for all rights in UK.

Gregg Goldstein When you’ve spent the most memorable years of your career battling gods and single-handedly defeating an army, what’s left for a warrior to do? For “Xena: Warrior Princess” star Lucy Lawless, the answer was making her directorial debut with a doc about a fellow New Zealand icon, daredevil CNN war camerawoman Margaret Moth. Her spellbinding feature, “Never Look Away,” which premieres Jan. 18 at Sundance, was selected for the fest’s World Cinema Documentary Competition.

Jill Biden will be introducing National Geographic’s latest series “America’s National Parks,” set to premiere Aug. 29. Narrated by Garth Brooks, the five-part docuseries celebrates the world-famous and lesser-known national parks across the U.S., from Yosemite to Big Bend National Park.The series will first be introduced by Dr.