Telefilm Canada is to back eleven new feature films, including the latest from Quebecois auteur Denys Arcand. With a combined budget of more than $16m, the projects include six French-language titles and five in English, including co-productions with the UK and Israel.

Arcand's Les Invasions Barbares (Barbarian Invasion), his first film since 2000's Stardom, sees him revisit the milieu of his greatest success, 1986's The Decline Of The American Empire, which was nominated for Best Foreign Language Oscar. The six stars of that film, including Remi Girard, are returning to star in the new film, a Canada-France co-production by Denise Robert of Cinemaginaire and Fabienne Vonnier of France's Pyramide. Alliance Atlantis Vivafilm is distributing in Canada.

Other titles include two projects to be produced by Montreal-based Max Films, one of which was unveiled at Cannes: Pere Et Fils, starring Philippe Noiret and Charles Berling, a co-production with France's Ariel Zeitoun. The second title is La Grande Seduction, to be directed by Jean-Francois Pouliot from a screenplay by Ken Scott. The French-language titles have budgets ranging from $1.9m (C$3m) to $5.2m (C$8m) for Les Invasions Barbares.

The English-language films include Bleeding, a Canada/UK co-production (70%/30%) to be directed by Canadian director Stephen Surjik (Wayne's World 2) from a screenplay by Angus Fraser.

The film is being produced by the Vancouver-based team of Harold Tichenor, Christine Haebler and Howard Dancyger of Crescent Entertainment and Michael Cowan of the UK's Spice Factory. Seville Pictures is handling Canadian distribution while Gary Hamilton's Arclight Films is handling world sales.

Other titles backed by Telefilm Canada in its latest funding round:

Goldirocks. Scr/dir: Paula Tiberius. Prod: Lisa Hayes.
Jack Paradise. Scr/dir: Gilles Noel. Prod: Nanouk Films, Verseau Int'l (Canada), Les Films a un dollar (France).
Metallic Blues, Dir: Danny Verete. Prod: Suzanne Girard (Canada) Verete (Israel)
Tiresia. Dir/scr: Bertrand Bonello. Prod: Luc Dery (Canada), Carole Scotta (France).
The Show. Scr/dir/prod: Kris Lefcoe. Prod: Jeff Rogers.
A Silent Love Dir: Federico Hidalgo. Prod: Pascal Maeder
Le Tunnel. Dir: Erik Canuel. Prod: Bloom Films. Dist: Christal Films.

Topics