07/10/2005

The Union jack is floating high on UK screens today with two major UK co-productions competing for a big share of the market: Roman Polanski’s Oliver Twist [+see also:
trailer
film profile] and John Jarrold’s Kinky Boots (from the producers of Calendar Girls), and two other UK films Mary McGuckian’s Rag Tale and Richard Hawkins' Everything released on a much smaller scale. Also platformed on one London screen today is Ingmar Bergman’s Saraband.

Associated again to Pathé who had successfully released The Pianist in 2003 (over £3m (€ 4.5m) at the UK box office), Roman Polanski has good chances to make it big again in the UK with the new screen adaptation of Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist, thanks to the French group UK distribution arm’s strong marketing muscle and wide release pattern (349 prints). According to Pathe’s marketing executive Alisdair Nicholson, the distribution company has coordinated a major campaign with Film Education in the UK (charity funded by the UK film industry to promote film at UK schools, colleges and universities) which printed a study guide on the film distributed to over 400 schools and promoted it on their website. The UK/French/Czech/Italian co-production is also supported by very positive reviews and is the Critics choice Number 1 in the influential weekly entertainment guide Time Out.

Also hoping to reiterate with BVI UK the success of 2003 hit Calendar Girls (over £20m (€ 30m) box office), the producers Nick Barton and Suzanne Mackie from Harbour Pictures have put together another crowd-pleaser, the comedy Kinky Boots directed by TV veteran John Jarrold. Inspired by a true story, the film sees Charlies Price (Joel Edgerton) inheriting a shoe factory from his father. He teams up with cabaret artist Lola (Chiwetel Ejiofor from Dirty Pretty Things) and to try to save the company, they develop a new niche market of stylish boots for drag queens. The film is co-financed by Miramax Films who handles international sales.

Other UK offers are Rag Tale released in seven cinemas by Metrodome Distribution. The film is directed/written and produced by Mary McGukian from Pembridge Films whose previous credits include Words Under The Window Pane (1994) and This Is The Sea (1997). This new film starring Rupert Graves and Jennifer Jason Leigh centres on the world of tabloid media.
Everything is the directorial debut of Richard Hawkins, scriptwriter of The Theory Of Flight. The psychological thriller attracted good reviews in the UK press, thanks notably to a great performance from Ray Winstone. Soda Pictures is releasing the film at the ICA cinema in London. "Because of its HD format, we could only plan a small release for the film," explains Soda’s Kate Gerova.

Also on HD format, Ingmar Bergman’s final film Saraband, is being platformed by Tartan Distribution at London’s National Film Theatre (NFT). The company which owns the UK rights to most Ingmar Bergman’s films is going to cross promote the Swedish master’s last film with his back catalogue available on DVD. The film also benefiting from a strong publicity campaign with several interviews with Liv Ullmann published in leading UK newspapers and magazines.