Here is Playback‘s weekly roundup of short-but-essential industry news.

MIP slates

Peace Point Rights has unveiled highlights of its slate as part of the build-up to MIPTV 2013. The line up includes a new, 40-title film slate and various other titles, including Belle Du Seigneur (97-minute feature or 3 x 45 minute mini-series), Iron Sky (a 92-minute feature) and The DNA of GSP (90 minute documentary or 2 X one-hour mini-series; pictured).

At the market, Breakthrough Entertainment is launching internationally Kensington Communications’ Shameless Idealists (5×30′), a documentary five-part series which profiles the social-change work of such celebrities as Richard Branson, Magic Johnson, Nelly Furtado and Rick Hansen.

World premiere

Made In Canada, a p.o.v. documentary about the state of the Canadian film and TV industry directed by Scott Boyd and produced by Marva Ollivierre, will receive its world premiere in Toronto April 12. The premiere is part of the Reel World Film Festival, which runs April 10 to 14.

It will be followed by a panel discussion that includes Doug Simpson, founder/managing Director at NetGain Partners, Anne Marie Maduri, Principal Maduri Laird Partners, Don Gaudet, President Stratmedia Enterprises and VP Programming Stornoway Communications, Amar Wala, director, writer and producer, and Michael Hennessy, President and CEO of the Canadian Media Production Association. More information on it can be found here.

Indie cinema

Morgan White, the director and producer of The Rep, a documentary about the decline of repertory cinemas, says he’s on a mission to save indie theatres. He says he’s is making the film (pictured) which centres on the fight to operate Toronto’s The Underground Cinema available for independent cinemas for free–and says the film houses can keep the profits from the screening–as long as the cinema operators agree to keep showing indie and non-mainstream fare.

Awards

Regard, a short film festival held earlier this month in Saguenay, Que., has announced the winners of its various prizes. Here are the top awards: The $5,000 international grand prize went to On suffocation by Jenifer Malmqvist; the $1,000 national grand prize and the $1,000 best script prize both went to Edmond était un âne by Franck Dion; the $1,000 best director prize went to Faillir by Sophie Dupuis and the the $1,000 best documentary prize when to Story for the modlins by Sergio Oksman.

Meanwhile, Alexandre Rufin took the best of the fest prize for his film Ô divin bovin that included a $1,000 cash prize and $15,000 in services from Spirafilm.

Special presentations

One Night for One Drop, a one-night-only, live Cirque du Soleil event, is set for Friday night. The event, which involves all 1,700 Cirque employees and performers at its”O” Theatre at Bellagio in Las Vegas venues, is to benefit One Drop, a responsible water-use charity established by Cirque founder Guy Laliberté. A dozen cameras will tape the show, which will then be made into a 90-minute special download donation-per-view program that will only be available Mar. 25 to 31 at ONEDROP.org.

Numerous National Film Board documentaries and other films are being screened as part of the Arctic Film Festival: Voices of the North, which started Mar. 17 and runs until Sunday in Cambridge, U.K. As the name suggests, the festival focuses on northern aboriginal and Inuit culture and experience. The NFB-made documentaries include Vanishing Point by Stephen A. Smith and Julia Szucs, the audiovisual project Unikkausivut: Sharing Our Stories and If the Weather Permits by Elisapie Isaac.

New host

Tricon Films and TV and  YTV have announced that Canadian television personality Carlos Bustamante (pictured, of YTV’s The Zone, Big Fun Movies) is the new host for the sixth season of reality-talent program The Next Star. It’s broadcast is set to begin in July.