The inaugural Rome Film Festhas announced the 12 participants for its New Cinema Network, a co-productionforum along the lines of Rotterdam'sCineMart.

The 12 participants, who allhave made their debut feature film already, are:

Santiago Amigorena, France

Dave McKean, UK

Matthias Luthardt, Germany

Santiago Tabernero, Spain

Inaki Arteta, Spain

Luciano Melchionna, Italy

Giorgio Diritti, Italy

Arni Oli Asgeirsson, Iceland

Anna Jadowska,Poland

Joachim Heden,Sweden

Marc De Cloe,The Netherlands

Sergej Stanojkoski, Macedonia

That group includes filmmakerswith new projects such as Stanojkoski and Asgeirsson as well as film-makers whose projects have beenseen at past events, such as Luthardt's Pingpong and McKean's Mirrormask.

The directors will have thechance to meet with the 40 producers, distributors and investors that Rome invited to the New Cinema Network to potentiallyfund the group's second features. Also, participants will attend sessions withexperts on cinema trends, financing, marketing and budgeting.

The Network is allied withthe Hong Kong Film Financing Forum, the UnideaFoundation for African directors and the Cannes Atelier duFestival.

Producers Cedomir Kolar, Simon de Santiagoand Rosanna Seregni will serve on the jury.Film-maker Gabriele Salvatores, who directed I'm Not Scared and Mediterraneo, will be a specialguest of the New Cinema Network.