Film Festivals: Festival favorite finds distributor -- Regent Releasing has nabbed North American rights to Yojiro Takita's drama "Departures." Pic follows an unemployed cellist who takes a job as a Japanese "nokanshi," preparing dead bodies for the afterlife.

Exclusives: New production co. to make 'Raven,' 'Bull Rush' -- FilmNation Entertainment, launched by Glen Basner as a foreign sales company, has established a production arm and set Aaron Ryder to run it.

Legal News: Lawyers cite judicial misconduct by courts -- Roman Polanski's lawyers want his case moved out of L.A.

Pilot Watch: Romano, McDermott wait for greenlight -- For TNT, the new year marks decision time for one of the most ambitious drama-development slates in the TV biz right now.

Palm Springs Film Festival: Film festival's lineup features more domestic fare -- The international festival year regularly kicks off in the Southern California desert, where Palm Springs has successfully rolled out the welcome mat to a wide array of global film for 20 years.

Film Festivals: Palm Springs Film Festival highlights

Pilot Watch: Universal to produce series with Mosaic TV -- NBC's in tune with scribe Jared Bush's music-themed drama project "Soundtrack."

Palm Springs Film Festival: Event's new programming director is a team player -- One of my favorite things to do at a festival is to feast on films," says Palm Springs' new program director, Helen du Toit, "so the way I look at programming a festival with over 200 titles is to start by asking, 'What would I go see if I were a film buff spending time and money at a festival?'"

Film Festivals: A look at the projects on their plates in 2009 -- New Year's resolutions: What P.S. honorees have on their plates for 2009.

Music for Screens: Despite waning sales, confab stays highbrow -- The economic downturn has meant serious reprioritizing for classical and jazz labels. According to the Recording Industry Assn. of America, classical's U.S. market share dropped to 1.9% from 3.2% between 2001 and 2006, while jazz plunged to 2% from 3.9% during the same period.

Music for Screens: Fest boasts healthy collection of rock docs -- Music matters at Sundance. Both the Sundance Institute and Sundance Film Festival have long supported the cross-pollination between music and film.

International News: Article claims studio is mulling massive restructuring -- Sony is refusing to comment on a report in the Times of London that alleges it is mulling massive restructuring, including shuttering entire divisions.

Film Festivals: Palm Springs Film Fest celebrates 20 years -- At the first few installments of the Palm Springs Film Fest, the coveted invite was to the Founders Party poolside at Sonny Bono's house, where Hollywood luminaries like Jimmy Stewart mingled with locals and filmmakers.

Film Festivals: Palm Springs Film Fest celebrates 20 years -- At the first few installments of the Palm Springs Film Fest, the coveted invite was to the Founders Party poolside at Sonny Bono's house, where Hollywood luminaries like Jimmy Stewart mingled with locals and filmmakers.

Weekly International: BBC comedy uses partly improvised script -- Following "The Office" and "Gavin and Stacey," the BBC may have another hit laffer on its hands with "Outnumbered," a meticulously observed, downbeat comedy focusing on middle-class, cash-strapped, contemporary family life in suburban London.

Music for Screens: Music, love and ambition in 'Rockville, Ca' -- Take a collection of twentysomethings, mix in love, lust, ambition and music from some of the hottest indie acts, and you've got "Rockville, CA," the new Web series from "Gossip Girl" and "The OC" creator Josh Schwartz.

Weekly International: SPTI gets behind telenovela, comedy series -- Sony Pictures Television Intl. is ramping up its fiction programming in Latin America with a telenovela co-production in Venezuela and a comedy skein for its pan-regional web, Sony Entertainment Television.

Music for Screens: Transcenders go indie for 'Gossip Girl' -- Transcenders members Mike Fratantuno, Brian Lapin and Terence Yoshiaki, are finding success as the band behind Lincoln Hawk, the fictional group led by Rufus Humphrey, father of Dam and Jenny, on the CW's "Gossip Girl."

Weekly International: Companies try to adapt to local interests -- Brazil's big three telcos are rushing to get into pay TV, once regarded as the ugly duckling of the local TV sector.

Legit News: Audiences reached 75% of capacity last year -- Broadway grossed $940,871,190 during the 2008 calendar year -- about on par with last year's $938 million, although that tally was hobbled by the 19-day stagehands' strike that in 2007 darkened the majority of Rialto shows during some of the Street's most profitable frames.