Rome mart verifies expansion

ROME -- The Rome Film Festival Business Street mart wrapped Sunday, trumpeting its future expansion in to the Eternal City's Maxxi art museum and announcing those who win of their New Cinema Network co-production component, as some deals appeared. Its now official that beginning in 2012 Rome's informal mart uses the city's new contempo art center, created by star architect Zaha Hadid, for tests, conferences and confabs, alongside its current Via Veneto locations. The Rome mart's dazzling new digs are 500 yards in the fest's primary hub, the Renzo Piano-designed Auditorium, in Rome's Flaminio hood. Riccardo Tozzi, prexy of Italy's film association, ANICA, praised the move as "very good news that can make both festival and also the market change gears," throughout a presser within the museum with Rome mayor Gianni Alemanno attending. 5-day largely Euro-centric mart this season was attended by 280 purchasers and 93 sales companies with 116 game titles unspooling, 32 which were market premieres. First deals to trickle through are buzzed black comedy "Hotel Lux," by Leander Haussmann, offered by Bavaria Film to Italy's Archibald, and "Noordzee Texas," by Belgium's Bavo Duferne, acquired by Italo niche label Atlantide from Wavelength Pictures. Meanwhile, NCN introduced its winning co-production projects with "Off Frame," a docu by Mohanad Yaqubi concerning the Palestinian Film Unit, which created photos championing the Palestinian cause within the seventies, using the Eurimages Co-production Development Award, worth Pounds 30,000 ($41,000). The NCN Focus Europe Award visited "Human Song" by Belgian helmers Benedicte Lienard and Mary Jimenez. Lienard's well-received first work, "A bit of Sky," unspooled in Not Certain Regard at Cannes. Contact Nick Vivarelli at nvivarelli@gmail.com