DA Y
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TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 15 2015
AT TORONTO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL www.ScreenDaily.com
Cary Joji Fukunaga
Beasts director eyed theatrical BY JEREMY KAY
Beasts Of No Nation director Cary Joji Fukunaga lobbied for a theatrical component to the release of Netflix’s first original feature. “I believe in the theatrical experience and it was part of the conversation,” Fukunaga said of his Africa-set childsoldier drama starring Idris Elba. Beasts Of No Nation, which screens again here tomorrow, will open via Bleecker Street in 19 Landmark Theatres in the US day-anddate with Netflix’s global streaming launch on October 16. Fukunaga paid tribute to Netflix for boarding the project. “It was far beyond our wildest dreams,” he said.
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TIFF market off pace after sluggish start BY JEREMY KAY
The arrival in Toronto of a hefty cluster of prestige titles with US distribution already in place presaged a sluggish buying scene, and so it proved to be over the first five days. The loud silence was punctuated by several mostly modest onsite deals as acquisitions teams continued to pack out screenings and trained their sights on promos and packages. Bleecker Street paid $2m-$3m for US rights to drone thriller Eye In The Sky, while Momentum Pictures (eOne’s revived standalone label) pounced on Lance Armstrong drama The Program and Western thriller Forsaken. Meanwhile, Lionsgate has made an offer for North American rights to Where To Invade Next, Michael Moore’s latest documentary, which
is also understood to have drawn a bid from Netflix. In an industry where big deals no longer require the impetus of a festival or market, buyers are generally unwilling to commit to MGs for what could be paltry box-office returns many months down the line. The emphasis has shifted away from the usual frenzy that surrounds festival selections, although Paramount swooped on Stephen Frears’ Florence Foster Jenkins starring Meryl Streep after a private buyer screening here. Meanwhile, EuropaCorp and FilmNation said they would partner on the political thriller Miss Sloane to star Jessica Chastain. Oculus director Mike Flanagan’s micro -budget horror Hush screened for buyers and has also won fans but no deal as yet.
Hubert Boesl
Netflix is one of several parties circling the troublesome Aretha Franklin documentary Amazing Grace following a secret buyer screening that reportedly provided another opportunity for the soul diva to express anger. CAA has been touting several packages including the spy thriller Unlocked and Rebel In The Rye, which Bloom sells internationally. A US deal on the latter may follow once a key piece of casting emerges in the coming weeks, but the value of Toronto is not lost on Bloom co-founder Alex Walton. “We came specifically to nurture our new material,” said Walton, adding: “We have the time to do that here as opposed to AFM.” More deals will trickle in over the coming days and weeks but all eyes inevitably turn to Santa Monica.
TORONTO BRIEFS
Asia hails Cab
Cruise controls cast
BY MICHAEL ROSSER
Emily Ratajkowski and Spencer Boldman have been cast in the 1980s-set drama Cruise. The project will kick off a slate arrangement between AG Capital and online investor platform Slated, which will handle syndicate financing on a portion of the slate.
Australian box-office hit Last Cab To Darwin has been picked up by buyers in Asia and Latin America. Following its first TIFF screening yesterday, Films Distribution has sold the road movie to Japan (Fine Films), Korea (T-Cast), Colombia and Venezuela (Cineplex) and Turkey (Fabula Films). The film, about a terminally ill taxi driver who undertakes a 3,000mile journey in his cab, has taken more than $3.2m since its August 6 release, putting it on a par with Disney’s Tomorrowland in Australia.
Comfortably Numb Paris Film, Zed Filmworks and Go Insane Films are to co-finance and produce Zak Hilditch’s Numbskull, about a former wild man who goes in search of his estranged daughter. Altitude Film Sales will handle international; Paradigm will take on North America.
Star Wars to stream Chinese internet giant Tencent has pacted with Disney and Fox to make the entire Star Wars saga available on its online platforms in the run-up to the release of Star Wars: Episode VII — The Force Awakens.
Spotlight stars Michael Keaton, Rachel McAdams and director Tom McCarthy at the film’s international premiere here in Toronto last night.
Cromo feature in the works BY PETER WHITE
Argentinian TV drama Cromo, playing here as part of TIFF’s first Primetime strand, is being developed into a feature film after Pyramide International acquired the sales rights.
The eco-thriller, produced by XXY film-maker Lucia Puenzo, was originally produced as a 12-part series — three of which are showing here. But Puenzo and her brother Nicolas Puenzo are now in talks to adapt Cromo into a feature
film after securing the deal with the Paris-based production and distribution house, which will also sell the TV series to international broadcasters. The drama, directed by Pablo Fendrik (El Ardor), is based on the real stories of a team of scientists that set out to expose environmental crimes in northern Argentina.
TODAY
High-Rise, page 4
NEWS TV guide TIFF to look east for expansion of Primetime television strand » Page 3
REVIEW High-Rise Ben Wheatley’s dystopian drama is wild and fearless » Page 4
Room A melancholy and moving tale of captivity and escape » Page 6
SCREENINGS
» Page 10
Final print daily This is Screen’s last print daily of Toronto 2015. For the rest of our festival news, check out ScreenDaily.com
No Escape directors bid for Freedom Marc Butan’s MadRiver Pictures and Laura Bickford Productions have partnered with Sesso Entertainment’s Samuel Franco on the action thriller Six Minutes To Freedom. John Erick Dowdle will direct from a screenplay he will co-write with Drew Dowdle based on the novel by Kurt Muse and John Gilstrap. The Dowdle brothers’ action film No Escape is currently on release in the US and has grossed more than $24m through The Weinstein Company. Six Minutes To Freedom centres on the true story of the rescue by US Delta Force of American Kurt Muse, who was imprisoned in Panama for operating a pirate radio station. Butan launched financierproducer MadRiver in Cannes, backed by investors that include a $30m revolving equity investment from Christopher Woodrow’s Vendian Entertainment. The early slate includes Harmony Korine’s The Trap, starring Idris Elba and Benicio Del Toro, and Mark Romanek’s Norco. Jeremy Kay