WestEnd Films brings Gemma Arterton vampire thriller and John Malkovich crime-drama to the AFM.

WestEnd Films has taken international rights to Neil Jordan’s Byzantium and Gabriele Salvatores’ first English-language effort Siberian Education starring John Malkovich.

Byzantium sees long-time collaborators director Neil Jordan and producers Stephen Woolley and Elizabeth Karlsen of Number 9 Films re-team with Alan Moloney of Parallel Films.

Moira Buffini (Jane Eyre, Tamara Drewe) has written the story of a mother and daughter vampire duo who form a deadly pact.

Gemma Arterton, Saoirse Ronan, Sam Riley, Caleb Landry Jones and Danny Mays star in the feature being financed by WestEnd and the Irish Film Board. Shooting is set to begin Dec 1.

The UK-based sales company has also taken rights to Gabriele Salvatores’ drama Siberian Education about the Eastern European criminal underworld, starring John Malkovich.

Regular writing partners Stefano Rulli and Sandro Petraglia (My Brother Is An Only Child, Romanzo Criminale) teamed with Salvatores on the adaptation of Nicolai Lilin’s cult book about a gang of children growing up among a tightly knit group of criminals living by strict codes in a lawless region of the foremer Soviet Union. Riccardo Tozzi, Giovanni Stabilini and Marco Chimenz of Cattleya produce.

The Italy and Lithuania shoot wraps on Dec 21.

WestEnd is also selling Andy De Emmony’s comedy-horror Love Bite, Rodrigo Garcia’s Albert Nobbs, A Late Quartet starring Philip Seymour Hoffman, Christopher Walken and Catherine Keener and Israeli foreign Oscar contender Footnote.

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