Manitoba-based start-up production company Blye Brothers Entertainment has unveiled a $60m feature film slate that will see three to four features shot per year over the next three to four years.

A minimum of 12 films, all of them targeted for theatrical release, will be produced with an average production budget of $5m. Financing parties include Crocus Investment Fund, a Manitoban labour-sponsored venture capital fund which has investments in several local film and television service companies. Details on the productions and other partners have yet to be revealed but Garry Blye told Screendaily that titles and talent are being finalised on several and announcements would be made at the end of August. The first project will likely go before cameras as soon as October.

All the projects will be shot in the Canadian prairie province utilising federal and provincial tax credits. The sums are unprecedented in the region: Manitoba's film industry had an overall production budget of $48m in 1998-1999.

Blye Brothers is fronted by Garry, formerly a packager with the William Morris Agency and now a television producer, and brother Allan, a film and TV veteran whose producer credits include the seminal 1960s comedy programme The Smothers Brothers. Both lived in Winnipeg before moving to the US and establishing careers there.