02/05/2011

Ten new titles will be unveiled in Wild Bunch’s stellar 45-strong line-up at the Film Market at the 64th Cannes Film Festival (May 11-22, 2011 – see also news on Wild Bunch’s films in the Cannes selection) where the French company will notably start sales for Stephen Frears’s Lay the Favorite (photo). Currently shooting, this US/UK co-production looks at a rigging incident in the Las Vegas world of sports betting and stars Bruce Willis, Rebecca Hall and Catherine Zeta-Jones.

Another arrival in the line-up is Ken Loach’s UK/French/Belgian/Italian co-production Angel’s Share, which has just started production. It centres on an unfortunate man whose disastrous life takes a new turn with a whisky distillery project.

Another Brit director on Wild Bunch’s line-up isJames Marsh, whose UK/Irish Shadow Dancer, on a female IRA terrorist who becomes an MI5 informer, stars Clive Owen, Andrea Riseborough and Gillian Anderson

Wild Bunch is also representing Only God Forgives (sales rights shared with Gaumont), the forthcoming film by Nicolas Winding Refn (in competition this year at Cannes with Drive). This Danish production is currently being negotiated with a cast including Kristin Scott-Thomas and Luke Evans, for a storyline centred on an English criminal who takes refuge in Thailand.

Vincent Maraval’s team will also continue sales, which got off to a good start in Berlin, for Fernando Mereilles’s 360 (currently shooting). Scripted by Peter Morgan based on Arthur Schnitzler’s La Ronde, this UK/Austrian/French/Brazilian co-production stars Anthony Hopkins, Jude Law, Rachel Weisz, Ben Foster and Jamel Debbouze.

Promo-reels will be shown for Abel Ferrara’s 4:44 Last Day On Earth, starring William Dafoe (co-produced by Wild Bunch and Funny Balloons); and French/Spanish collective film 7 Days in Havana, directed by Benicio del Toro, Pablo Trapero, Elia Suleiman, Julio Medem, Gaspard Noé, Juan Carlos Tabio and Laurent Cantet.

Other highlights among Wild Bunch’s new titles are Jacques Maillot’s La Mer à Boire (“The Sea To Drink”, see news), featuring Daniel Auteuil; and Raymond Depardon and Claudine Nougaret’s Journal de France (“Diary of France”, currently shooting).

At Cannes, Wild Bunch will also sell 15 titles in post-production, including Sylvie Verheyde’s Confession of a Child of the Century (see news); Wong Kar-Waï’s The Grandmasters; Cédric Kahn’s A Better Life (see news); Philippe Garrel’s That Summer (see news); Kike Maillo’s Eva (see news); Virginie Despentes’s Bye Bye Blondie (see news); and Nacho Vigalondo’s Extraterrestrial (see news).

This extraordinary line-up also includes three other titles in production: Christophe Barratier’s War of the Buttons (see news); Laurent Tirard’s Asterix and Obelix: God Saves Britannia (see news); and Nick Cassevetes’s Yellow; as well as three major projects that are scheduled to shoot in 2012: Pancho Villa by Emir Kusturica, Terra by Walter Salles and Blonde by Andrew Dominik.

(Translated from French)