15/09/2011

This is looking to be a tremendously successful autumn for the Canal+ group (main source of financing for French cinema), which is clocking up a series of deals and announcements that are very significant in terms of French and international growth ambitions for the pay-TV network and its subsidiary StudioCanal. After announcing last week that it is set to buy a 60% stake in Direct 8 and Direct Star, two channels opening up access to free DTT, the Canal+ group is making its mark on international territory.

Indeed, at Toronto, StudioCanal is currently winding up the excellent sales of Tomas Alfredson’s Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (pictured), which was acclaimed in competition at Venice and was co-produced by the French company, which will launch it in French, German and UK theatres. StudioCanal has also just announced the arrival in its line-up of Spanish director Daniel Monzón’s El Niño (see news) and above all US directors Joel and Ethan Coen’s Inside Llewyn Davis. StudioCanal will generously finance these two films, which it will sell internationally and distribute directly in Germany, the UK and France via its unique brand (see news).

These new titles are added to a rich line-up that includes, among others, the Foenkinos brothers’ Delicacy (see news – starring Audrey Tautou and already successfully pre-sold worldwide); Brit film The Dinosaur Project; Stefan Ruzowitzky’s US thriller Blackbird; and the project The Last Photograph by Denmark’s Niels Arden Oplev (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo), starring Sean Penn and Christian Bale (see news).