Munich-based sales agent Beta Cinema has concluded around 40 deals at this year's Cannes market, including US pickups for the family entertainment film The Three Investigators And The Secret Of Skeleton Island, Veit Helmer's quirky comedy Absurdistan and Jo Baier's TV drama Stauffenberg.

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Florian Baxmeyer's first outing for The Three Investigators, which was released in Germany by Walt Disney Pictures, will be released in North American cinemas by First Look Studios, while Helmer's Golden Lola-winning Absurdistan has been acquired by First Run Features.

Meanwhile, The Weinstein Company has bought the US and English language theatrical, DVD and TV rights to Jo Baier's prestigious award-winning TV drama Stauffenberg, starring The Lives Of Others' Sebastian Koch in the title role. (The story of the officers' plot to assassinate Hitler also formed the basis for Bryan Singer's Valkyrie which features Tom Cruise as Stauffenberg).

In addition, Paolo Sorrentino's Cannes competition film Il Divo, which was awarded the Jury Prize, has been picked up by the UK's Artificial Eye and Greece's Odeon Film, with numerous other deals in the offing.

Moreover, Beta has put up the 'sold out' sign on this year's Oscar-winning The Counterfeiters after selling the Second World War drama to Shooting Stars for the Middle East, and concluded deals in 17 Asian and Latin American territories for Sergei Bodrov's Oscar-nominated Mongol with such distributors as Pyramid Saimara, Cineholic, Alfa, Solar Entertainment and Ablo.

Thomas Roth's biopic Falco - Quit Living On Dreams, starring Manuel Rubey as the internationally famous Austrian pop star, was sold to Atyp for the Czech Republic and Slovakia, with further territories under negotiation.

Deals were also signed on a number of films currently in postproduction: Poland's Monolith picked up on Hermine Huntgeburth's adaptation of the Theodor Fontane novella Effi Briest in Effi, starring Julia Jentsch and Sebastian Koch, while Max Faerberboeck's Second World War drama Anonyma - A Woman In Berlin with Nina Hoss went to Portugal's Multimedia and Robert Dornhelm's screen version of Puccini's opera La Boheme with Anna Netrebko and Rolando Villazon to Palace (Australia/New Zealand) and Hollywood Classic (Czech Republic/Slovakia). In addition, Philipp Stoelzl's Alpine drama North Face (Nordwand) was pre-sold to Poland (Monolith), Hungary (Best Hollywood), Czech Republic/Slovakia (Bonton) and Serbia/Montenegro (Pa-Dora).

Beta also announced that it will be handling international sales on two productions with involvement by the German production powerhouse Egoli Tossell Film.

First up is Kai Wessel's $ 15m (Euros 9.5m) Hilde with Heike Makatsch as the legendary diva Hildegard Knef to shoot in Germany this summer.

Egoli Tossell is also a co-producer with Morena Films, Orio Produkzioak and Zodiak Pictures on Spanish director David Pinillos's Bon Appetit about three cooks who make their passions come true in a Swiss restaurant.

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