September 19, 2020

Fall Festival 2020 Deals: The Complete List of Venice/TIFF/NYFF Purchases So Far

Though Telluride was canceled, and Venice, TIFF, and NYFF have set slimmer and/or virtual offerings this year, acquisitions activity out of the fall’s biggest festivals is off to a productive start.

The earliest deals were huge, with streamers snapping up worldwide rights for two Black Oscar-winning actresses’ directorial debuts. Netflix is reportedly close to closing a near-$20-million deal for Halle Berry’s MMA drama “Bruised,” ahead of its online and drive-in TIFF premiere as a “work in progress” Saturday. The streamer also picked up Venice winner “Pieces of a Woman,” and Sam Levinson’s secretly shot quarantine film “Malcolm and Marie” starring Zendaya and John David Washington out of the TIFF marketplace for a whopping $30 million.

Amazon, meanwhile, made the first eight-figure deal of the season when it bought Regina King’s “One Night in Miami” more than a month ahead of its Venice premiere.

It’s unlikely festival acquisitions will get much more headline-grabbing. Amid so much uncertainty and a TIFF lineup just one-fifth the size of last year’s, sales activity during the pandemic has been spread out over the last six months, with still-announced deals and un-produced projects waiting in the wings.

“Even though most films are exhibited virtually right now, being at a festival is still a huge badge of honor. It helps brand a movie, gives it laurels. That said, for producers and financiers seeking distribution, the process is not as reliant on festivals as it once was,” UTA independent film group sales agent Mikey Schwartz-Wright told IndieWire at the beginning of the month.

Meantime, sidebars at Venice and TIFF, in addition to other market activity around the festivals, means acquisitions won’t be limited to official selections.

Buyers and agents are expecting this year’s fall festival sales environment as a “wait-and-see” market, one where streamers are likely to set the agenda. But Netflix, Amazon, and Apple’s appetite for commercial fare has increased during the pandemic, and with few star-driven English-language titles of the “Brusied” ilk available in the festivals’ smaller lineups, acquisitions of smaller films and international titles are set to define the season.

Expect more activity like Neon’s early September pickup of Philippe Lacôte’s “Night of the Kings,” which premiered at the Venice Horizons sidebar and will screen at TIFF and NYFF. But the jury’s still out on whether streamers’ interest will expand to include the types of films usually reserved for theatrical distributors.

Here’s everything that’s been picked up, with more to unfold in the coming weeks.

Title: “Good Joe Bell”
Festival: TIFF
Buyer: Solstice Studios

Solstice Studios picked up Reinaldo Marcus Green’s tearjerking drama “Good Joe Bell” for a reported $20 million. Based on a true story, the film stars Mark Wahlberg as a father reckoning with the suicide of his gay son, who was bullied by his classmates. It’s written by the Oscar-winning “Brokeback Mountain” team of Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana.

Title: “Shadow in the Cloud”
Festival: TIFF (Midnight Madness)
Buyer: Vertical Entertainment and Redbox Entertainment

Roseanne Liang combines action, horror, and historical drama for “Shadow in the Cloud.” Chloë Grace Moretz stars in the World War II-set film, which centers around an Allied all-male crew confronted by a female officer who boards their plane carrying a suspicious package. Strange happenings and holes in her backstory lead to paranoia surrounding her true mission, while an evil presence lurks aboard the flight. The distributors are planning a multi-platform release, including theatrical next summer.

Title: “The World to Come”
Festival: Venice
Buyer: Bleecker Street

Mona Fastvold’s period drama stars Katherine Waterston and Vanessa Kirby as two disaffected farm wives who share an intense love in the mid-19th century American frontier.

Title: “MLK/FBI”
Festival: Telluride selection, TIFF (Docs), NYFF (Main Slate)
Buyer: IFC Films

Based on newly declassified files, prolific documentarian and Spike Lee-collaborator Sam Pollard’s latest film examines FBI director J. Edgar Hoover’s campaign of surveillance and harassment against Martin Luther King, Jr. Celebrated as a hero today, King’s past as a target of US government intervention is less known, making Pollard’s work a welcome addition to today’s discourse around racism and anti-racist activism. IFC Films will release the documentary on January 15, ahead of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Holiday, timing that sets it up for an awards run.

Title: “Malcolm and Marie”
Festival: TIFF Market
Buyer: Netflix

The “Marriage Story”-like drama was filmed in California between June 17 and July 2. Netflix reportedly scooped it out of the marketplace based on a promo.

Title: “Pieces of a Woman”
Festival: Venice, TIFF
Buyer: Netflix

Vanessa Kirby won the Best Actress prize at the Venice Film Festival for her turn opposite Shia LaBeouf as one half of a Boston couple in crisis after the death of their child during a home birth gone wrong.

Title: “Shiva Baby”
Festival: TIFF (Discovery, Next Wave)
Buyer: Utopia Media

Emma Seligman’s debut feature forces star Rachel Sennott to navigate hilariously uncomfortable social situations during a post-funeral gathering. Utopia Media landed worldwide rights ahead of the premiere.

“Night of the Kings”

Courtesy TIFF

Title: “Night of the Kings”
Festival: Venice Horizons, TIFF (Contemporary World Cinema), NYFF (Main Slate)
Buyer: Neon

Côte d’Ivoire director Philippe Lacôte’s visual stunner follows an incarcerated young man who is forced to spend a whole night recounting a story if he hopes to survive. Neon bought U.S. rights after its Italian premiere.

Title: “The Boy from Medellín”
Festival: TIFF (Special Events)
Buyer: Amazon

Latin Grammy-winner J Balvin, the “Prince of Reggaeton,” is the subject of Matthew Heineman’s latest documentary, which saw worldwide rights acquired by Amazon a few weeks ahead of its TIFF premiere.

“Salvatore: Shoemaker of Dreams”

Title: “Salvatore: Shoemaker of Dreams”
Festival: Venice (out of competition)
Buyer: Sony Pictures Classics

Director Luca Guadagnino tapped his “Call Me By Your Name” standout Michael Stuhlbarg to narrate the documentary about the life of fashion designer Salvatore Ferragamo. Sony Classics bought worldwide rights, excluding Italy.

Title: “One Night in Miami”
Festival: Venice (out of competition), TIFF (Gala)
Buyer: Amazon

Regina King’s directorial debut, based on the play Kemp Powers, who also wrote the story for the screen, explores the Civil Rights movement and Black celebrity through a fictionalized story of Cassius Clay (Eli Goree), Malcolm X (Kingsley Ben-Adir), Jim Brown (Aldis Hodge), and Sam Cooke (Leslie Odom Jr.) gathering to celebrate Clay’s victory against Sonny Liston. Amazon bought worldwide rights after a bidding war this summer.

Source: IndieWire film