Director Sturla Gunnarsson’s Canada/U.K./Iceland copro Beowulf & Grendel has easily held the top spot in box office among Canadian films since its release on March 10.
The epic tale about the legendary hero Beowulf (Gerard Butler) and his clash with killer troll Grendel (Ingvar Eggert Sigurosson), did solid business from March 17-26, taking in $155,658 for a total of $346,852.

It’s estimated that approximately 60% of Hollywood’s gross domestic film revenue comes from home video, but Canadian producers and distributors have been relatively slow to author globally competitive DVD versions. However, recent video releases of Genie- and Oscar-nominated films with Cancon offer signs that this trend will change.

It’s been a little over a year since Wayne Clarkson took over the reins as executive director of Telefilm Canada, and it’s been a hectic introduction for the former head of the Canadian Film Centre, the OFDC, and the Toronto film festival.

London, ON-born Paul Haggis’ Crash may have claimed a major best picture upset over Brokeback Mountain at the 78th Annual Academy Awards, but Alberta is basking in the Oscar glow.

ThinkFilm’s Spymate may have slipped on critical banana peels (see Critical Mass, p. 10), but it sold enough tickets to claim the top of the box office among domestic films for the week starting March 3.

Despite a resurgence of Super 16 capture, the HD post revolution appears to be in full swing.

Do you cut differently in HD versus film?

Classic horror films conjure up famous scenes of creatures and psychos ­- from Lon Chaney’s Wolf Man to the girl in the well in The Ring. But without subtle (and not-so-subtle) sound design behind them, the images would lose their power to scare us with those memorable ‘jump’ moments.

David Cronenberg has added a second feature to his already crowded dance card, and will direct Eastern Promises, from an original script by Steve Knight (Dirty Pretty Things), after helming the satirical drama Maps to the Stars this fall.

While it was no surprise that the Canadian box office was a little flat through February, it was even less of a revelation that Christal Films releases claimed the top two box office spots.
Quebec-made ensemble thriller Que Dieu bénisse L’Amérique broke past the sagging drama Histoire de Famille for top spot with a total gross of $76,000 in 16 venues and a healthy per-screen average of $4,800 as of Feb. 28, after debuting Feb. 17.

With Adobe’s latest production software bundle, Adobe Production Studio, the creative software company based in San Jose, CA, can finally claim a powerful tool that reaches beyond the lower-end user and into the high-end digital post domain.

The Jigsaw Killer will be back in T.O. for the third installment of the successful Saw horror franchise, and most of the slicing and dicing will happen in the Deluxe|Post Production DI suite.