Beta Cinema will handle world sales for German film-maker Veit Helmer's third feature Absurdistan which will have its world premiere in January in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition at the Sundance Film Festival.

Absurdistan's screenplay, which was co-written by Helmer with Gordan Mihic and Zaza Buadze, was selected as one of the three finalists for the Sundance/NHK Award 2006 and was developed with support from the Mediterranean Film Institute and Sources 2.

The romantic comedy centres on two childhood sweethearts who are destined for one another. But when the women of their isolated village somewhere between Europe and Asia go on a sex strike, their first night of love is in danger. 'Stylistically, the humour is more in the direction of my short Surprise,' Helmer explains. ' Tuvalu was darker, while this is a much brighter film.'

Last year Helmer suggested that the film might be a candidate for the Guinness Book of Records before a single metre was shot since he had hired almost 30 casting directors - from Los Angeles through Casablanca and Budapest to Teheran - to organise casting calls to find the right actors.

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