HS Media, the parent company of Spitfire Pictures and Hammer Films formed by Dutch investment group Cyrte Investments that was announced in Cannes, has unveiled Exclusive Film Distribution as its in-house sales and distribution arm.

The London-based division led by head of sales Peter Naish will be tempting buyers at AFM with worldwide rights to Peter Weir's survival story The Way Back from Spitfire as well as a trio of titles from Hammer.

Weir, Joni Levin, Duncan Henderson and Spitfire's Nigel Sinclair will produce The Way Back and Keith Clarke, John Ptak, Spitfire's Guy East and Simon Oakes and Jonathan Schwartz will serve as executive producers on the project, based on Slavomir Rawicz's novel The Long Walk: The True Story Of A Trek To Freedom about prisoners who escape from a Russian gulag in 1940 and flee 8,000 miles across hostile countries. Principal photography is scheduled to begin in Bulgaria in March 2009.

The Hammer films are thriller The Quiet Ones to be directed by Jesse Dylan, horror The Resident to be directed by Antii Jokinen, and The Wake Wood that David Keating is currently shooting in Ireland and stars Aiden Gillen, Eva Birthistle and Timothy Spall.

Exclusive will handle worldwide sales and distribution for both Spitfire Pictures and Hammer Films, which operate as separate production entities under the HS Media umbrella.

Exclusive, named after the company that distributed the original Hammer films in the 1940s and 1950s, is actively looking to acquire negative pick-ups and third party productions for sales and distribution. Sales executive Jessica Malik recently joined the division.

'We believe that there is a gap in the market for a really well financed sales and distribution company run by experienced executives,' HS Media co-chairman and co-CEO Guy East said. 'We are announcing a slate of high quality commercial films and will also be presenting our buyers with a second slate of high calibre projects which we have in advanced development.'

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