French broadcaster TF1 has unveiled two big-budget television mini-series, to be produced by regular producing partner GMT, which are set to star big-screen talents, Alain Delon and Jean Paul Belmondo.

Delon will star as a Marseilles cop in La Trilogie De Marseilles, an adaptation of three best-selling French crime novels, Total Cheops, Solea and Chourmo. The first episode will go before the cameras before the end of the year with feature director Jose Pinheiro directing.

Belmondo will star in a remake of 1960s French classic, Magnet Of Doom (L'Aine Des Ferchaut), directed by Jean-Pierre Melville, which is scheduled for a 2001 shoot.

Gerard Depardieu has previously starred in big-budget TF1 dramas such as

The Count Of Monte Cristo, Balzac and Les Miserables, co-produced by GMT and Depardieu's own DD Productions with backing from Germany's Beta and Italy's Mediaset. The Delon and Belmondo projects are also likely to carry price tags in the $5m-$6m (FFr35m-FFr40m) per episode range and are also likely to involve foreign partners.

Meanwhile Depardieu is preparing to co-produce and star in two English-language mini-series for the same partners, The Three Musketeers and The Hunchback Of Notre Dame.