MONTREAL: The year is far from over, but it’s already been nothing short of remarkable for film and TV producer Denise Robert and her colleagues at Montreal’s Cinemaginaire.

So, appropriately, Robert will be the subject of a World Film Festival tribute this year. The program includes screenings of three films she has produced: Lea Pool’s A corps perdu, the first Canada/Swiss copro, Robert Lepage’s suspense drama Le Confessionnal and Denys Arcand’s double Cannes winner Les Invasions barbares.

As a producer, Robert most closely identifies with the creative instincts of her filmmakers. She’s fought many a battle against excessive rules and regulations and is known for her savvy political skills and tough-minded business acumen.

‘Good films are not made because of this rule or that rule,’ says Robert. ‘Talent makes movies.’

Robert has volunteered a lot of time on behalf of the industry as a past chair of the APFTQ producers association over two consecutive terms.

Of course, the big stories for Robert in 2003 are Invasions, to open the Toronto International Film Festival Sept. 4, and director Emile Goudreault’s Mambo Italiano, a hit at home in Quebec and slated for major releases in Europe, English Canada and the U.S. this fall.

Box office for the Alliance Atlantis Vivafilm-released Invasions has been amazing in Quebec. The film opened May 14 and had receipts of approximately $5.5 million (taxes included) by the end of July.

Mambo, distributed by Equinoxe Films, has receipts of approximately $3 million since its opening June 6.

Miramax will release Invasions in New York and L.A. on Nov. 21, with a wider rollout in major cities on Dec. 19. Miramax was reported to have paid $1.5 million for the U.S. guarantee. Odeon Films is slated to release Invasions in English Canada on Nov. 21.

Robert, Arcand and 300 others attended a test screening of Invasions organized by Miramax in New York in early July.

‘[Denys and I] attended incognito and were very nervous [about] the reaction to the film, especially with an American audience,’ says Robert. ‘We were very pleased that people laughed, and we could hear the [sobs] at the end.’

Invasions, which won the best screenplay prize at Cannes for Arcand and best actress for Marie-Josee Croze, will screen at the Telluride Film Festival (Aug. 28 to Sept 1) and will also be part of the entertainment at a Paris charity fundraiser organized by Claude Pompidou, wife of the deceased French president. The event, slated for Sept. 9, will be attended by ‘la creme de la creme’ of French society, in politics, business and the arts, adds Robert. The French release of the film, through Pyramide, is set for Sept. 24.

Meanwhile, Mambo Italiano’s gala Toronto fest screening is set for Sept. 6. Equinoxe anticipates a 150-screen release in English Canada on Sept. 19.

Yves Dion, VP distribution with Equinoxe, says Mambo’s fall release in the U.S. through the Samuel Goldwyn Company is likely to be at the upper reaches, at least for a foreign film, with as many as 1,500 screens. The film has been test-screened in suburban New York and in L.A.

Robert and her Cinemaginaire partner Daniel Louis have produced three other top-ranked Quebec releases in the past five years, pulling in over $2 million (net of taxes) each: Denise Filiatrault’s C’t’a ton tour Laura Cadieux (1998/AAV) and L’Odyssee d’Alice Tremblay (2002/AAV), as well as Emile Goudreault’s Golden Reel-winning nuptial comedy Nuit de noces (2001/Seville Pictures).

Robert’s feature copro credits include the big-budget historical drama La Veuve de Saint-Pierre by director Patrice Leconte, Catherine Corsini’s La Repetition, and Claude Miller’s La Petite Lili, all with France.

Feature film projects on the horizon at Cinemaginaire include a Maurice Richard biopic from director Charles Biname (Seraphin), a new project from writer/director Filiatrault on the life of music-hall legend Alys Robi, slated to shoot this fall, and a version of the turn-of-the-century true child abuse story Aurore. The screenplay for Aurore is by Luc Dionne, and Robert notes that it will not be a remake of the 1952 film Aurore, l’enfant martyre.