Montreal: Productions sda and Ellipse Fiction, a division of Ellipse Programme, France’s largest private producer and a subsidiary of Canal+, have announced a two-year, $23 million coproduction agreement.

More than $20 million in the French-language drama package will be shot on location in Quebec.

Production includes L’Enfant des Appalaches, the first of four $2.1 million mows; two comic-book-based mows, Blake & Mortimer and Bob Morane, slated to be shot next spring in Egypt and Montreal respectively; and xiii, a 13-hour action series to be shot on location in Quebec as early as next March, says Andre Picard, sda executive producer. The broadcasters on Blake & Mortimer and Bob Morane are Super Ecran and Canal+, France 2 and France 3.

Ellipse producer Takis Candilis, who announced the deal with Picard and Claude Joli-Coeur, Coscient Group vp legal and international affairs, says financing originates with Canadian, Swiss, Belgian and French partners and broadcasters.

Candilis says the historical lack of success for coproduced movies is based on the French preference for films d’auteurs, ‘but tv movies have taken off in France recently because they mirror current social issues.’

xiii will be the first French-track one-hour action series to be broadcast in France, says Candilis.

Both Bob Morane and Blake & Mortimer are budgeted at $4.5 million. xiii, a Super 16mm shoot, is also based on a popular European comic-book series and is budgeted at $1 million an hour.

Jean-Philippe Duval (La Vie a du charme) is directing L’Enfant des Appalaches, based on a Pierre Billon screenplay. Broadcasters are Super Ecran and Radio-Canada. The partners will shoot three addition mows in the Montagne Collection in Europe this year.

Ellipse produces 15 telefilms and four animation series annually, says Candilis.

Another Ellipse division, Spellbound, is negotiating a package of 12 family film features to be distributed by United Artists. Financing is from an as yet unnamed u.s. producer, as well as partners in Australia and Germany.

sda’s ’96 production slate includes Omerta 2, executive produced by president Francois Champagne and budgeted at $10 million, and three children’s tv series, Sur la piste, Carmen Sandiego and Max the Cat.

Cactus Animation, also a Coscient Group subsidiary, and Ellipse Animation recently announced a three-year, $90 million coproduction package. They intend to produce three full-length series a year.