Danish production outfit Zentropa has picked up the award for best European producer at the 40th edition of the Monte Carlo Television Festival (Feb 17-23).

The Monte Carlo jury cited Zentropa for the quality of programmes submitted - The Kingdom and TV movie Morten Korch ' and the volume of its co-productions and sales over the last two years.

The prolific company, which is headed by Peter Aalbaek-Jensen and Lars von Trier, produced von Trier's potential Cannes title Dancer In The Dark . It is currently involved with a raft of Dogme 95 titles including the first Dogme film by a female director, Lone Scherfig, which began shooting on Jan 26, and the still-untitled eighth Dogme title, the first to use special effects, which will be directed by Ake Sandgren and shoots this autumn.

Aalbaek-Jensen last week revealed that delivery on these and a raft of other Dogme projects could be delayed due to an ongoing funding dispute with the Danish Film Institute. He also announced that Zentropa is setting up an international division to oversee the group's growing raft of titles originating outside Denmark.

During Berlin Zentropa took a further step towards the major league, when its foreign sales arm Trust Film Sales picked up world rights, outside North America, to Don's Plum. The four-year-old film starring Leonardo DiCaprio has not been released due to a legal battle between DiCaprio and independent producer David Stutman.

The seven strong jury that voted for Zentropa at Monte Carlo included Caroline Huppert (France), Cinzia Torrini (Italy), Andy Allan (UK), Hisanori Isomura (Japan), Dieter Kosslick (Germany), Pedro Piqueras (Spain) and president Guy Fournier (Canada).