UK-based sales company Protagonist Pictures has closed a slew of sales on Nicolas Winding Refn's Bronson.

Deals have been done with Canada (Alliance), France (Wildside), Australia (Madman), Scandinavia (Scanbox), Portugal (Lusomundo), and Middle East (Front Row). Vertigo Films produces with 4DH in association with St8jacket Creations, EM Media and Aramid. Vertigo will also handle the UK release.

Tom Hardy (RockNRolla, Layer Cake) stars as Britain's most violent prisoner Charles Bronson. The film made a low-key world premiere at the London Film Festival in October.

Also, Protagonist has closed a US deal, to be announced imminently, for Vito Rocco's MySpace-developed romantic comedy Faintheart.

Protagonist is in talks with several North American distributors for Tom Shankland's horror film The Children. That film, previously titled The Day, has added an additional AFM screening on Monday at 3 pm at the AMC. Several territories have been sold and the North American deal is expected to close here at AFM.

The Children, starring Eva Birthistle and Stephen Campbell-Moore, is about a group of children who fall ill and turn against their parents. Shankland's last film was WAZ.

Protagonist CEO Ben Roberts also noted there was strong interest in Nick Love's next film, The Firm, about 1980s football hooligans.

Protagonist officially launched at Cannes 2008; the company is a joint venture between UK powerhouses Film4, Ingenious Media and Vertigo Films.

Its sales slate also includes Debbie Isitt's Nativity; Samantha Morton's directorial debut The Unloved; Eran Creevy's Shifty; Simon Ellis' Dogging: A Love Story; Armando Iannucci's In The Loop; and Alexis Dos Santos' Unmade Beds.