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VENICE 2007 Market

French sellers omnipresent

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With 26 films programmed in the various sidebar sections of the 64th Venice Film Festival, which kicked off yesterday, the 14 French international sales agents on the Lido are already leaving their mark on the Venetian event.

The sales outfits expect to do good business at the festival, with seven titles in official competition, before they head to the Toronto Film Festival (September 6-15).

Celluloid Dreams – who decided to continue business under its own name after the Dreamachine episode – has four big titles at Venice: I'm Not There by US director Todd Haynes and Sukiyaki Western Django by Japan’s Takashi Miike in competition, as well as Takeshi Kitano’s Kantoku Banzai! and Asif Kapadia’s Far North [+see also:
film review
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]
out of competition.

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Meanwhile, Wild Bunch is showcasing six titles from its Lido line-up: Woody Allen’s Cassandra’s Dream [+see also:
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]
; Claude Chabrol’s A Girl Cut in Two [+see also:
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]
and Beyond the Years by Korean director Im Kwon-taek (out of competition); Damien Odoul’s L'histoire de Richard O. and Arnaud Desplechin’s documentary L'aimée (Horizons); and, last but not least, Rodrigo Plà’s Spanish/Mexican co-production La zona [+see also:
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]
(Venice Days).

Rezo Films is betting on Eric Rohmer’s Les amours d'Astrée et de Céladon [+see also:
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]
(in competition) and Manuel de Oliveira’s Cristovão Colombo – O Enigma [+see also:
trailer
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]
(out of competition), while Films Distribution is selling Italian helmer Vincenzo Marra’s L’ora di punta [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
(in competition) and Pyramide International Heya Fawda by Egypt’s Youssef Chahine (also a Golden Lion contender).

Pathé Distribution is making the most of the competition to showcase Abdellatif Kechiche’s La graine et le mulet, as is Scalpel who picked up sales earlier this week on En la ciudad de Sylvia [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
by Spanish helmer Jose Luis Guerin, after it acquired Italian director Salvatore Maira’s Valzer [+see also:
film review
trailer
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]
(Venice Days).

StudioCanal is also at Venice with Amos Gitaï’s Disengagement [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
(out of competition), while TF1 International is selling Emmanuel Mouret’s Un baiser, s'il vous plaît! [+see also:
trailer
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]
(Venice Days).

Memento Films – who recruited Tanja Meissner (former Head of Sales at Celluloid) to head international sales and acquisitions – is presenting two films: Jia Zhangke’s documentary Useless (Horizons) and Philippe Aractingi’s Sous les bombes [+see also:
trailer
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]
(Venice Days).

Umedia is selling Tonino De Bernardi’s Médée Miracle [+see also:
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]
(Horizons) and Frédéric Fisbach’s La Pluie des prunes (Venice Days).

MK2’s catalogue features Jalil Lespert’s 24 Mesures [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
. Insomnia World Sales is selling Belgian film Small Gods [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
by Dimitri Karakatsanis, both selected in Critics’ Week.

Lastly, Colifilms is betting on Andalucia [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
by Alain Gomis (Venice Days).

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(Translated from French)

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