DV8, the South African production and financing project, is planning to harness the football mania already descending on the country in advance of the 2010 World Cup.

The company is already in production on two projects that will be ready before the tournament’s kick off in June next year.

The company is in Cannes with Darrell Roodt project Ace – The Legend. The film tells the story of Patrick “Ace” Nltsoelengoe, the young cow herder from the townships who emerged during the Apartheid era as South Africa’s first superstar footballer. He went on to playin North America for the Minnesota Kicks and Toronto Blizzards and was the first African inducted into the American Hall Of Fame. Presley Chweneyagae, star of Oscar winner Tsotsi, has been recruited to play Ace. The film is fully financed and due to shoot later in the summer.

DV8’s Jeremy Nathan, who will produce alongside Michelle Wheatley, is trying to drum up international distributor interest in the project, which is being executive produced by Mbongeni Ngema.

“He [Ace] was a guy who chose football over politics. He was our first rock star footballer – girls, cars, money, clothes,” Nathan said.

DV8 is also pushing ahead with The African Game - a hugely ambitious multi-media project, includes a book, an exhibition, an eight-part TV series, mobile and internet content and a feature documentary – all on the subject of African football fans. “We will be following the fans and the mascots in Cameroon, Nigeria, Ivory Coast, Ghana,Angola and South Africa as they prepare for 2010,” Nathan explains.

French sales outfit Pyramide is in talks to board another DV8 film, Khalo Matabhane’s Violence, which has a French coproducer Diana Elbaum. The project has support from France Sud.

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