Mihaileanu goes to The Source

by Stefan Dobroiu

08/07/2010 - Romanian-born French director Radu Mihaileanu is currently casting his new film, The Source (the original title is La Source des femmes), his follow-up to the popular The Concert [trailer, film focus].

Shooting is scheduled to start in October and the film is expected to be ready in April or May next year, just before the 2011 Cannes Film Festival.

Presented as a dramedy, The Source is set in an isolated village, where women threaten to withhold sex from their husbands if the men don’t bring water from a far away well, the region's sole source of drinking water.

Mihaileanu wrote the script with Alain-Michel Blanc, with whom he also collaborated on The Concert, and will co-produce the approximately €8.8m project.

Luc Besson’s EuropaCorp is producing with Paris-based Elzevir Films. Belgium's Panache Prods. and Italy's Indigo Film will co-produce. Cinéart will release the film in Belgium, while BIM Distribuzione will distribute in Italy, as it did The Concert. The EuropaCorp sales arm with handles international rights.

Born in Romania in 1958, Mihaileanu was forced to leave the country in 1980, during the communist regime. After he moved to France, he studied film and graduated from the Institute des Hautes Etudes Cinematographiques (IDHEC) in Paris. He is famous for the films Betrayal, Train of Life and Live and Become [trailer, film focus], which brought him numerous awards.

Most recently, The Concert turned two of its six César Awards nominations into wins last January. Released in France in November 2009, the film garnered over 1.8m admissions there.