Elaine Epstein’s ‘Arrest the Midwife’ Nabs Top Prize at Hot Docs Forum Awards

A Place in the Sun buyer was thrilled to secure her dream home in Spain on Wednesday's instalment of the popular Channel 4 property programme.

A Place in the Sun buyer has revealed how her dream home completely transformed her life after a night out. The Channel 4 show's host, Sara Damergi, was on hand to help Donna find her perfect holiday home abroad in Wednesday 15 May episode. Joined by her best friend Savannah, Donna was on the hunt for a two-bedroom apartment in Roquetas de Mar, Spain, with a budget of £70,000.

Megan Thee Stallion has officially launched her Hot Girl Summer Tour and the set list is now available!

Naman Ramachandran Disney’s “Kingdom of The Planet of the Apes” debuted atop the U.K. and Ireland box office with £3.8 million ($4.7 million), according to numbers from Comscore. Universal’s “The Fall Guy” dropped down to second place with £948,970 and now has a running total of £6.7 million.

The Gotham Film & Media Institute announced today the nominations in seven competitive award categories for its inaugural Gotham TV Awards, recognizing a range of series, including Baby Reindeer, Ripley, The Curse, Shōgun, Bodkin, Mr. & Mrs. Smith and Black Twitter: A People’s History as well as performances from Emma Stone and Nathan Fielder in The Curse, Andrew Scott in Ripley, Kristen Wiig in Palm Royale, Richard Gadd in Baby Reindeer, and Lily Gladstone in Under The Bridge, among others. The awards ceremony is set for June 4 in NYC.

The winners of the 2024 Scottish Baker of the Year Awards have been crowned, and a "lovely" bakery has taken home the top prize.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes” debuted on top of the mainland China box office with an opening weekend score of $11.4 million (RMB81.1 million). That was only the fourth weekend this year that a Hollywood film has topped the China charts and the third time in 2024 that a Hollywood title has opened on top. “Apes” was also the top film this weekend in North America and international markets. Data from consultancy firm Artisan Gateway showed that the film accounted for some 30% of the theatrical total on a weekend where theaters earned a combined $38.2 million.

UPDATED May 11: The recipients in the remaining 18 of this year’s 33 categories at the 35th Annual GLAAD Media Awards were announced May 11 at a New York ceremny hosted by Ross Matthews. They included ‘Red, White & Royal Blue’, ‘The Last Of Us, ‘Heartstopper, The Jennifer Hudson Show, Rustin and Las Culturistas.

Jack Dunn “The Jennifer Hudson Show,” “Rustin” and “Red White & Royal Blue” earned top prizes at the New York GLAAD Media Awards, which this year celebrates the 35th year of the annual awards show. Awards were presented Saturday night at the Hilton Midtown in New York City.

Madelaine Petsch and Froy Gutierrez step out for the premiere of their new movie The Strangers – Chapter 1 held at Regal LA Live on Wednesday (May 8) in Los Angeles.

Michael Schneider Variety Editor at Large “The Bear,” “Bluey,” “Reservation Dogs,” “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver,” “The Last of Us” and “Jury Duty” are among the series set to receive this year’s Peabody Award, the org was set to announce on Thursday morning. The Peabody Awards’ board of 32 jurors have selected 34 winners, all of which received unanimous vote from TV, podcast/radio and web/digital nominees in entertainment, news, documentary, arts, children’s/youth, public service, and interactive programming.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief The Jeonju International Film Festival, South Korea’s second most important generalist film festival, on Tuesday announced “The Major Tones” and “Time to Be Strong” as the Grand Prix winners of its two competition sections. The festival continues until Friday. Directed by Argentina’s Ingrid Pokropek, “The Major Tones” is a mystery film about a youngster with a metal plate in her arm which begins to receive peculiar messages in Morse Code. It premiered at the Mar del Plata festival and also played in Berlin’s Generation KPlus section.

Addie Morfoot Contributor Elaine Epstein says that winning Hot Docs Forum’s top First Look prize of Can $20,000 cash for her film “Arrest the Midwife” is a “game changer.” The project, which has been on a close to year-long hiatus, will now finally be able to resume due to the award. “The last money we raised was 10 months ago,” Epstein said. “So it’s been a while.

Jennie Punter Nishta Jain’s “Farming the Revolution” has won Hot Docs’ Best International Feature Documentary Award, it was announced Friday at the festival’s awards ceremony, held in Toronto at the Centre for Social Innovation–Annex. Produced by Jain (Raintree Films) and Valérie Montmartin (Little Big Story) and co-directed by cinematographer Akash Basumatari, the film follows the massive year-long gathering of Indian farmers protesting unjust new farm laws that they felt would impact their markets. The jury said, “‘Farming the Revolution’ spotlights the power of ordinary people with an enduring cinematic sophistication and an indomitable lyrical presence.” The award comes with a Cnd.

At the Far East Film Festival (FEFF) in Udine, Italy, Mitsuhiro Mihara’s Takano Tofu clinched the Golden Mulberry prize, the top honor at the festival’s audience awards.

Jennie Punter Spain’s push to position itself as a premier player in the world’s film and TV industries extends to the documentary zone, as both audiences and industry delegates discovered in the impressive display of the country’s finished and work-in-progress films and co-production know-how at Toronto’s Hot Docs Festival this week. According to the European Audiovisual Observatory’s Yearbook 2023/2024, Spain is the European leader in documentary production, with 153 films in 2022 (Italy was second with 137, Switzerland third with 83)—a sign that Spain’s €1.6 billion public investment in the strategic sector, intended to spur production growth for the 2021-2025 period, has taken root in the doc space.

Addie Morfoot Contributor Producer Ina Fichman, Oscar nominated for “Fire of Love,” was at the 25th edition of Hot Docs Forum on Tuesday to pitch her latest project “Ba’s Book.” Directed by Canadian filmmaker Ashley Da-Le Duong, the hybrid docu focuses on Duong’s father and his experiences living through both the Vietnam War and the Iranian Revolution. “Let me take you somewhere for a moment,” Duong told the Forum audience and participating distributors including Arte, A24 and Al Jazeera. “It’s 1968 and a young man stands in the middle of a rice paddy field and looks up and sees a helicopter.

Holly Jones Buenos Aires-based boutique sales outfit Compañía de Cine has acquired international rights to Mauro Colombo’s contemplative second feature, “Wild Gleaming Space,” (“Luminoso Espacio Salvaje”) ahead of its global bow on Wednesday at Toronto’s Hot Docs, which runs April 25 to May 5. Shot in Panama, Chile, Spain, the Netherlands, Italy and Belgium, the film weaves together intimate and resounding first-person accounts from its subjects and dynamic natural backdrops in an ambitious attempt to reach out and document the abstract confluence of life and death.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Hot Docs is to honor Canadian writer-producer-director Alison Duke with the Don Haig Award, which recognizes “creative vision and entrepreneurship,” as reflected in her work, as well as a track record of mentoring emerging Canadian filmmakers. The award is presented to a Canadian independent producer with a feature-length film at the festival, with the recipient being selected by a jury of filmmakers.

Steven J. Horowitz Senior Music Writer Taylor Swift has broken yet another record with her new album “The Tortured Poets Department,” as she becomes the first artist to claim the top 14 songs on the Billboard Hot 100. Swift breaks her previous record for most songs to claim the top spots on the chart, which she achieved with 10 tracks from 2022’s “Midnights” that dominated the tally.