AWN Headline News

With more summer blockbusters arriving in international theatres, the old guard is weaning. MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE 2, however, is still strong, finishing atop the charts in Italy, Sweden Japan and Spain. In its second week, M:I 2 grossed another US$700,928 in Italy, raising its cume to $6.82 million. GLADIATOR is losing its power, slipping a spot in Italy to finish at #4 with a gross of $103,693, bringing its Italian cume to $8.64 million. In Sweden, GLADITOR also finished in 4th place with a gross of $217,952, advancing its cume to $3.93 million.

Scaring the mutants out of #1, DreamWorks WHAT LIES BENEATH finished atop the U.S. box office charts. The haunted house horror flick, with primary visual effects by SPI, grossed US$29.7 million. Slipping to second, THE X-MEN, with primary visual effects by Cinesite, CORE Digital, Digital Domain, Hammerhead Productions, Kleiser-Walczak Co., Matte World and POP Film, dropped 56% from its opening weekend, but still racking up another $23.47 million.

Magna Entertainment Corp. has appointed Mark Feldman to the position of president and chief executive officer. Previously, Feldman was executive vice president of E! and was responsible for all of its core business operations, including all international ventures and sales, on-line operations, new business development and general administration.

Infogrames, Inc., announced that entertainment industry veterans Jason Bell and Alyssa Padia have joined Infogrames' North American management team. Bell will become senior vice president of publishing for Infogrames' North American operations, while Padia will become senior vice president of corporate evolution. Bell will head all publishing activities for Infogrames' labels in the U.S. For the past six years, Bell has worked at Electronic Arts and Kesmai. During that time, he held senior management roles focused on development of single player and multi-player games.

MR Kinowelt Merchandising has nabbed the German-language merchandising rights to the highly anticipated fantasy trilogy THE LORD OF THE RINGS. The financial stats on the deal with New Line Cinema were not released. MR Kinowelt is made up of a joint venture between German indie distributor Kinowelt and MR Merchandising & Retail. The deal marks the first RINGS merchandising deal outside the States. The first film in the trilogy is scheduled to arrive in movie houses December 2001. Kinowelt is handling the release of all three pictures in Germany.

* October 2000. World Wide Web.

Entry Deadline: September 30, 2000.

Diecks Group created the 15-second teaser for the Showtime television series, SOUL FOOD, based off the 1997 feature film by the same name. The challenge for creative director Brian Diecks and art director Michael Waldron was to form a smooth and effective teaser from stills because the series had not yet begun production.

Humongous Entertainment, a division of Infogrames, Inc., has named Andy Hieke as general manager and senior vice president. Hieke will oversee all aspects of the company's operations, which include maintaining their current franchises, such as PUTT-PUTT, FREDDI FISH, PAJAMA SAM and SPY FOX as well as introducing new products onto new platforms and into new markets. Just prior to joining Humongous, Hieke served as the senior vice president of product development for Nintendo Software Technology Corporation.

Tape House Toons, a New York-based full-service animation studio, has appointed award-winning storyboard artist and illustrator Richard Codor as design director. Codor will head and art direct for the growing animation department on all projects, as well as continue storyboarding duties. Codor started his work with Tape House when he supervised the layout work for a series of short animated inserts for THE REAL LIZZIE MCGUIRE, a Disney Channel television pilot.