Is your film hip, young and aggressive? Is it perhaps too risque for Miramax and Fine Line’s parent companies? Maybe you should talk to the revamped u.s.-based Artisan Entertainment.

One of the last true independents with serious clout, according to president Amir Malin, the newly monikered and restructured Artisan (formerly Live Entertainment) hits this year’s Toronto International Film Festival with three films to promote while looking to pick up at least one other title for either North American or worldwide rights.

‘We see ourselves as a service company, not a manufacturing company,’ says Malin, a former managing partner at October Films. ‘We’re here to provide a service to filmmakers – theatrical marketing, theatrical promotions, theatrical sales, and then on to home video, and then on to tv.’

With about 200 employees, and well over $200 million in revenues, ‘we’re not at a studio level,’ says Malin, ‘but we’re way beyond a lot of the smaller companies that are out there.’

‘We’re unique because we’re in the middle, unlike these big companies that have a big company and then a `classics’ division,’ he says. ‘We’re producing and/or distributing anything from very low-budget films to us$35-million and us$40 million productions.

Malin also cites Artisan’s non-studio affiliation as a catalyst to keep the company’s product cutting edge. ‘We don’t have to answer to a corporate parent who may have a different agenda than we do,’ he says. ‘Look at what’s happened in the past year with some of the divisions and their mommies and daddies.’

Artisan’s u.s. distribution arm has plans to release 12 to 14 films per year, says Malin, who heads up theatrical distribution, acquisitions, video, television and international operations. The release slate will be a 50/50 mix of in-house productions and acquisitions, with the focus on edgy, independent works and genre films.

But Artisan’s slate runs the gamut, and includes documentaries as well as foreign-language films.

This year’s tiff offering from Artisan aptly demonstrates the company’s diverse indie fare. The in-house production Permanent Midnight, starring Ben Stiller and Elizabeth Hurley, promises noteworthy acting, says Malin. ‘Ben is phenomenal, we’re going to be launching an Academy Award campaign for best actor,’ he says.

Also at Toronto is director Ken Loach’s My Name Is Joe along with the documentary The Cruise from nyu film grad Bennett Miller. Shot on video and transferred to 35mm film, The Cruise is a compelling doc that humorously chronicles the bizarre yet insightful reflections of a New York City bus tour guide.

‘There are two focuses for us in Toronto,’ says Malin, who will be attending his ‘favorite festival’ for the 17th time. ‘From a marketing and promotion point of view we’ll oversee our three films and present them to audiences, critics and feature writers. It’s always a great pleasure to come up to Toronto to see how people in love with film react to film, so we gauge audience response to these films as well as critical response.

‘We’re also looking for product in Toronto. It’s a great acquisitions festival,’ says Malin, who plans to pick up at least one if not two titles for release in ’99. There are roughly 15 titles that Malin says Artisan has identified as possible acquisitions.

‘The beauty of [tiff] is that you never know up front,’ says Malin. ‘There have been years where some films are being touted but you leave the screening disappointed. And then there are films that come out of left field that you fall in love with.

‘If you go back to the Toronto film festival through the ages, it is a great discovery festival,’ says Malin, citing Diva, Blood Simple and last year’s Spanish Prisoner as examples of films that were passed on by distributors until becoming festival favorites.

‘That’s the great thing that I love about the film festivalÉit has the ability to open your eyes.’

And if the stakes for rights to a film are high, Artisan has the backing to stay at the bidding table. Using the company’s production budgets as a scale, Malin says, ‘If you traditionally say that North America is worth 40% of a budget, then we’re potentially looking at up to us$10 million to us$12 million towards a domestic acquisition. Or on a worldwide basis we’re looking at us$30 million to us$35 million.’

Current Artisan in-house productions include director Roman Polanski’s Paris-based production The Ninth Gate, starring Johnny Depp and budgeted at us$30 million, Steven Soderberg’s (Out of Sight, Sex Lies and Videotape) us$12-million-budgeted The Limey, and screenwriter David Kep’s (Mission Impossible, The Lost World, Snake Eyes) directorial debut, A Stir of Echoes, starring Kevin Bacon and budgeted at us$14 million.

Artisan will also handle Felicia’s Journey, director Atom Egoyan’s adaptation of William Trevor’s story, for Mel Gibson’s Icon Productions.

A recent success for Artisan has been the summer release of ¹. The sci-fi thriller and Sundance Director’s Award winner from newcomer Darren Aronofsky was one of the season’s most successful indie releases in a summer brimming with blockbuster studio offerings.

The film opened to critical praise in exclusive engagements, and Malin says Artisan’s marketing team successfully translated that momentum into a profitable, long-running wide release.

Upcoming releases include the Nov. 4 wide release of video director Hype William’s urban feature Belly, starring a host of rappers including dmx, as well as Alejandro Amenabar’s Open Your Eyes, the highest grossing film in Spain’s history.

‘There are some companies out there that won’t even look at foreign-language films, but I’m a big fan,’ says Malin, who expects to have one or two foreign-language films in Artisan’s yearly release slate.

Aiming to be a one-stop shop for independent film, Artisan recently inked a deal with Canada’s Alliance Releasing to distribute Artisan releases here as well as its immense 2,600-title catalogue.

The company is also interested in acquiring worldwide rights to films now that a strategic alliance and equity investment has been done with international distribco and sales company Summit Entertainment. Summit will distribute Artisan’s films internationally, giving Artisan’s independent product a stronger presence and a foothold in the international marketplace.

The Summit deal has helped to attract new investors to Artisan, including investment bank Allen & Co., which will join Bain Capital as the company’s financial advisor.

A buyout last year of California’s Live Entertainment created what is now Artisan.

Malin is talking over the din of construction at Artisan’s Tribeca loft space offices in New York as workers are in the midst of constructing doors to access the loft’s two large balconies which overlook the Hudson River.

One hundred and eighty employees are stationed at Artisan’s Santa Monica offices, with 20 people in New York and a small staff at a southern satellite theatrical sales office in Dallas, Texas.

The Artisan management team consisting of president Malin, fellow president Bill Block (former head of West Coast operations at ic), who heads up production, and ceo Mark Curcio (former managing partner of Bain & Co.’s entertainment consulting practice) were put in place when Boston’s Bain Capital along with Chicago’s Richland, Gordon & Co. bought out Live and took the company private.

The new management team came in and laid off about 40 of the 165 Live employees. ‘It was a combination of people in investor relations – they were no longer needed – and the other people we felt weren’t up to the level of what we wanted to see in the new company,’ recalls Malin. ‘Any new regime that comes in makes those kinds of changes.’

Artisan will have a team of nine people in Toronto including the company principals as well as the former head of the now-defunct Canadian distribco Everest Entertainment, Paul Gardner. Gardner now works in acquisitions for Artisan.