21/05/2003

France Télévisions Distribution (FTD) offers its clients "à la Carte and not fixed menu services," said deputy VP, Jean-Paul Commin, when he met with journalists for a round up of this year's Market. FTD handles the international sales of films and audiovisual programmes, as well as home video, music and publishing.
"This year's edition was an intermediary market for us because so many of our titles are still to be completed. We will be ready for Venice or Toronto with either Clandestin by François Dupeyron, or So Far Away, a Cuban film by Juan Carlos Tabio."

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That said, FTD does have a number of interesting titles in its line up, and has already reported some excellent domestic results. One example, Le coeur des hommes ended up selling 1.5 million tickets after a quiet start. Results like this are bound to attract the increasingly cautious international buyers, who want as much upfront information about the films they are purchasing as possible. And box office results are always a guarantee of success. That was confirmed by FTD's placing Le Papillon (also 1.5 million tickets) in 25 territories and sales are still booming.
Films, especially animated ones, have a long life cycle and animation is a sector that FTD is particularly interested in "because," said Commin, "fables don't have a sell-by date. Kirikou and the Sorcerer is excellent example: although it came out four years ago in France, it has only now reached Japan."
FTD hopes to repeat this international success with L'enfant qui voulait être un ours, an animated feature co-produced by Denmark and France, or with Les Triplettes de Belleville [+see also:
trailer
film profile], which has created a stir in Cannes this year, and which it holds the video rights to. FTD is at Stand N1 on the Riviera .