28/05/2010

German seller Beta Cinema returned home after striking some successful deals at Cannes for both completed titles and ongoing projects in its catalogue.

In the first category, German hit Vincent Wants to Sea (almost 0.5m admissions in one month) continues to interest buyers, from the Orient to Spain. The same goes for Spanish romantic drama Bon Appetit [+see also:
trailer
film profile], which was a major winner at the Malaga Film Festival and has sold to Poland (Vivarto).

Electro Ghetto by Uli Edel (The Baader Meinhof Complex [+see also:
trailer
film profile]), a film about rap star Bushido produced by Bernd Eichinger, has been bought by Hollywood Classic Entertainment for the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Negotiations are underway with other Eastern European countries, as well as France and Spain.

Au Revoir Taipei, co-produced by Wim Wenders, is surfing the wave of its Berlin success and could well cross the Atlantic, as could My Words, My Lies, My Love (starring Daniel Bruehl), and the documentary Keep Surfing, which won acclaim at New York’s Tribeca Film Festival.

On the pre-sales side, Wolfgang Murnberger’s My Best Enemy, which is still in the screenplay stage, has found distributors in China, the United Kingdom (Metrodome), the Czech Republic and Slovakia (Hollywood Classic Entertainment) – these three distributors previously enjoyed the success of Oscar-winning Austrian film The Counterfeiters, by the same producer.

Polish director Agnieszka Holland’s project in development, Hidden, was pre-bought for China. Meanwhile, Jo Baier’s title in post-production, The End Is My Beginning, an adaptation of Tiziano Terzani’s best-selling book, starring Bruno Ganz and Cannes award-winning Italian actor Elio Germano, was pre-sold to Rai Cinema.

(Translated from French)