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BERLINALE 2021 EFM

SND kick off pre-sales on Maigret

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- An adaptation of the book by Georges Simenon, Patrice Leconte’s new film starring Gérard Depardieu and currently being shot has arrived in the French vendor’s well-stocked line-up

SND kick off pre-sales on Maigret
Actor Gérard Depardieu and director Patrice Leconte

The international sales division of SND is setting a course for the 71st Berlinale's European Film Market (online 1-5 March), armed with a watertight line-up of 10 titles, which now includes a particularly interesting new work which began filming on 8 February: Maigret [+see also:
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by Patrice Leconte, an adaptation of the detective novel of the same name by the prolific Belgian writer Georges Simenon (who has had fifty or so of his works transposed to screen, recently including The Blue Room [+see also:
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interview: Mathieu Amalric
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and The Man From London [+see also:
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and, more distantly, The Hatter’s Ghost, The Clockmaker of St. Paul and Le chat).

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This will be the 30th feature film to come courtesy of the seasoned and eclectic director, who was well-received in competition in Cannes in 1989 and in 1996 via his works Monsieur Hire (also a Simenon adaptation) and Ridicule (nominated for the 1997 Best Foreign Language Film Oscar and the winner of four Césars, including Best Film and Best Director), in Berlin in 2001 and 2004 with Felix & Lola and Too Much Information, and in Venice in 2002 with The Man From the Train [+see also:
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. He also scooped the Louis-Delluc Prize for The Hairdresser’s Husband in 1990, as well as a Special Mention in Karlovy Vary for the 1999 movie La fille sur le pont.

Dazzling up front in the cast of Maigret is Gérard Depardieu (whom we’ll be seeing this year in Lost Illusions [+see also:
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interview: Xavier Giannoli
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]
and Robuste, among other works), who is joined by Jade Labeste, Mélanie Bernier, Bertrand Poncet, Aurore Clément and Clara Antoons.

Penned by the director together with Jérôme Tonnerre (forming a writing team for the 4th time in their careers), the story sees the famous Inspector Maigret investigating the death of a young woman. There’s nothing to identify the body and no-one seems to have known or even seen her. At which point, he encounters Betty, a young offender who bears an uncanny resemblance to the victim and who reminds him of an older and far more intimate passing...

Produced by Philippe Carcassonne on behalf of Ciné@ and by Jean-Louis Livi for F comme Film, Maigretis co-produced by Belgian group Scope Pictures and by SND (who will also distribute the film in French cinemas in autumn 2021). The feature film has been pre-purchased by Canal+ and Ciné+, and enjoys the support of the Ile-de-France region, where filming will proceed until 19 March.

The EFM will also see the SND sales team - headed up by Charlotte Bouconb – pursuing pre-sales on two additional titles in production, having kicked these sales off back in January at the Rendez-Vous with French Cinema event (read our news): Julia(s) by Olivier Treiner (starring Lou De Laâge, Grégory Gadebois and Denis Podalydès) and The Book of Wonders by Liza Azuelos (starring Alexandra Lamy, Muriel Robin and Olga Kurylenko). Added to these, in post-production, the group boasts the comedy Song Express by Fabrice Maruca, which includes Jérémy Lopez, Clovis Cornillac and Alice Pol in its cast and recounts the misadventures of a group of friends who create a company supplying others with songs (a film produced by Ciné Nominé and SND).

Stealing similar focus in the SND line-up is an animated film in the final stages of production Pil’s Adventures [+see also:
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, by Julien Fournet (pre-sold on the basis of a promo reel), and, in post-production, Jérôme Salle’s thriller Kompromat [+see also:
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 alongside Jérôme Commandeur’s Employee of the Month [+see also:
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(an adaptation of the Italian comedy Quo Vado? [+see also:
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starring Laetitia Dosch, Pascale Arbillot, Gérard Darmon, Christian Clavier and Valérie Lemercier).

Last but not least, in the category of (online) market screenings, the team will be touting Délicieux [+see also:
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by Éric Besnard (starring Grégory Gadebois, Isabelle Carré and Benjamin Lavernhe) and the documentary Good Morning Professor by Émilie Therond.

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(Translated from French)

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