The European Film Market kicks off Feb. 16 with a wide assortment of films from sellers around the world. Below is a healthy selection of what’s on offer for buyers.
The Adults
Director: Alex Winter
Key cast: Evan Rachel Wood, Josh Gad, Anthony Carrigan
Synopsis: A sister and brother, Megan and Nathan are barely hanging on and their lives are completely upended when they discover a dead body, long buried in their parent’s basement, sending them down a rabbit hole of crime and murder.
Producers: Alex Winter, Scott Kroopf, Russell Hollander
Sales: Rocket Science (international); CAA Media Finance (domestic)
The Astronaut
Director: Jess Varley
Key cast: Emma Roberts, Laurence Fishburne
Producers: Brad Fuller, Eric B. Fleischman, Cameron Fuller
Synopsis: When astronaut Sam Walker (Roberts) returns from her first space mission, she’s found miraculously alive in a punctured capsule floating deep off the coast of the Atlantic Ocean. General William Harris (Fishburne) arranges for her to be placed under intense NASA surveillance in a high security house for rehabilitation and medical testing. However, when disturbing occurrences begin happening around the property, she fears that something extraterrestrial has followed her back to Earth.
Sales: Highland Film Group (international); CAA Media Finance and UTA Independent Film Group (domestic)
Azrael
Director: E.L. Katz
Producers: Dan Kagan, Dave Caplan, Simon Barrett
Key cast: Samara Weaving
Synopsis: In a world in which no one speaks, a devout female-led community hunts down a young woman who has escaped her imprisonment.
Sales: Mossbank (international); UTA Independent Film Group and CAA Media Finance (domestic)
Ballerina Overdrive
Director: Vicky Jewson
Producers: Kelly McCormick, David Leitch, Annie Marter
Key cast: Lena Headey, Yara Shahidi, Isabela Merced, Lana Condor, Millicent Simmonds, Iris Apatow
Synopsis: Drama follows a troupe of ballerinas who find themselves fighting for survival as they attempt to escape from a remote inn after their bus breaks down on the way to a dance competition.
Sales: The Veterans (international); CAA Media Finance (domestic)
Clicquot
Director: Thomas Napper
Producers: Christina Weiss Lurie, Haley Bennett, Joe Wright
Key cast: Haley Bennett, Tom Sturridge, Sam Riley, Leo Suter, Anson Boon
Synopsis: After her husband’s death, Barbe-Nicole Clicquot Ponsardin defied convention by assuming the reins of the fledgling wine business they had nurtured together. Steering the company through dizzying political and financial reversals, she became one of the world’s first great businesswomen and one of the richest women of her time.
Sales: WME Independent
Daniela Forever
Director: Nacho Vigalondo
Producers: Sayaka Producciones, Wrong Men, Señor y Señora and XYZ Films
Key cast: Henry Golding
Synopsis: A man signs up for a sleep trial that allows him to reconstruct his life with a dead partner through the use of dreams.
Sales: XYZ Films
Fairyland
Key cast: Scoot McNairy, Emilia Jones, Geena Davis, Adam Lambert, Maria Bakalova, Cody Fern
Director: Andrew Durham
Producers: Sofia Coppola, Andrew Durham, Greg Laurantino, Megan Carlson, Siena Oberman, Laure Sudreau
Synopsis: Drama debuted to acclaim at Sundance and follows a widower and his daughter in 1970s; as he develops his poetic and personal writing and begins to openly date men, his bohemian lifestyle clashes with the expectations of parenthood.
Sales: Arclight Films (international); UTA Independent Film Group, Gersh (domestic)
The Fisherwoman
Director: Brian Kirk
Producers: Greg Silverman, Jon Berg, Jonas Katzenstein, Maximilian Leo
Key cast: Emma Thompson
Synopsis: Thompson plays a widowed fisherwoman, isolated in a blizzard in northern Minnesota, who stumbles across a kidnapping in progress and becomes the teenage victim’s last resort
Sales: Mossbank (international); Mossbank, CAA Media Finance, Augenschein (domestic)
Four Letters of Love
Director: Polly Steele
Stars: Pierce Brosnan, Helena Bonham Carter, Gabriel Byrne, Fionn O’Shea, Ann Skelly
Synopsis: Romantic Irish story based on Niall Williams international bestselling novel.
Sales: Cornerstone (international)
Producers: Debbie Gray, Douglas Cummins
Giant
Director: Rowan Athale
Producers: AGC Studios, Tea Shop Prods., White Star Prods., Balboa Prods.
Key cast: Paddy Considine, Mena Massoud
Synopsis: Giant tells the exhilarating yet heart-breaking true story of the meteoric rise of British-Yemeni boxer Prince Naseem Hamed (Massoud), and his relationship with Irish boxing trainer Brendan Ingle (Considine).
Sales: AGC Studios
Girl From the North Country
Director: Conor McPherson
Producers: Graham Broadbent, Pete Czernin
Key cast: Olivia Colman, Woody Harrelson, Chlöe Bailey, Tosin Cole
Synopsis: Based in 1934 in Duluth, Minnesota during the Great Depression, a group of wayward travellers’ lives intersect in a guesthouse filled with music, life and hope. Adaptation of the Tony Award-winning musical with music by Bob Dylan, written and directed by Conor McPherson.
Sales: Rocket Science (international); CAA Media Finance (domestic)
God’s Country
Director: Egor Abramenko
Producers: Matt Reeves, Rafi Crohn, Ara Keshishian, Petr Jákl, Adam Kassan, Melissa Barrera
Key cast: Melissa Barrera
Synopsis: A young Salvadoran woman travels to Kentucky to meet her fiancé, uncovering something sinister beyond comprehension, as her American dream curdles into a nightmare proportions.
Sales: WME Independent
Green Bank
Director: Josh Ruben
Producer: Andy Horwitz
Key cast: Tatiana Maslany, Jasmin Savoy Brown
Synopsis: The film follows infant sleep-trainer Sloan (Brown), who realizes that the parents of the child she’s caring for are much more than the clueless yuppies they seem to be.
Sales: Protagonist Pictures
Hell of a Summer
Directors: Finn Wolfhard and Billy Bryk
Key cast: Finn Wolfhard, Billy Bryk, Fred Hechinger, D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai, Abby Quinn, Pardis Saremi
Synopsis: Original horror-comedy with the plot details under wraps.
Producers: Jason Bateman, Michael Costigan, Jay Van Hoy, Finn Wolfhard, Billy Bryk, Fred Hechinger.
Sales: Altitude Film Sales (international); 30West and CAA Finance (domestic)
It Lives Inside
Director: Bishal Dutta
Producers: Raymond Mansfield, Sean McKittrick
Key cast: Megan Suri, Neeru Bajwa, Vik Sahay, Betty Gabriel
Synopsis: Horror tale is based partially on Indian legend, partially on a personal family story from Dutta’s grandfather and partially on the filmmaker’s experience being born in India and moving to and being raised in America.
Sales: Protagonist Pictures (international)
Littlemouth
Director: Jonathan Sobol
Producers: William G. Santor, Doug Murray, Nicholas Tabarrok
Key cast: Isabelle Fuhrman, Dennis Quaid, David Thewlis, Josh Hutcherson, Kiera Allen
Synopsis: A brilliant computer scientist is recruited by a charismatic tech billionaire to work on a secret project that could change humanity’s place in the universe forever, but it comes at a great risk.
Sales: Radiant Films Intl.
Longlegs
Director: Osgood Perkins
Producers: Nicolas Cage, Dan Kagan, Brian Kavanaugh-Jones, Dave Caplan, Chris Ferguson
Key cast: Nicolas Cage, Maika Monroe
Synopsis: An FBI agent Lee Harker (Monroe) is a gifted new recruit assigned to the unsolved case of an elusive serial killer (Cage).
Sales: Black Bear Intl. (international), UTA Independent Film Group and CAA Media Finance (domestic)
Manodrome
Director: John Trengove
Key cast: Jesse Eisenberg, Adrien Brody, Odessa Young
Producers: Ben Giladi, Gina Gammell, Riley Keough, Ryan Zacarias
Synopsis: Ralphie scrapes by as an Uber driver, but his girlfriend has a baby on the way and the future is uncertain. Drama unspools in the Berlin Film Festival.
Sales: CAA
Moss & Freud
Director: James Lucas
Key cast: Ellie Bamber, Derek Jacobi
Producer: Matthew Metcalfe
Synopsis: The film is a dramatized account of supermodel Kate Moss when, at the peak of her fame, she made the decision to sit for famed British artist Lucian Freud. It was a decision that deeply impacted and transformed both of their lives.
Sales: Cornerstone (international)
Nobody Nothing Nowhere
Directors: Alex H. Fischer, Rachel Wolther
Producers: Josh Penn, Michael Gottwald, Allison Rose Carter, Octavia Spencer, Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Key cast: Octavia Spencer, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Lucy Liu
Synopsis: The story of Ruth, one of the Non-People, human-looking beings designed and trained for the sole purpose of filling in a realistic world for a bland guy named Dave, the only person that actually exists on Earth. Tired of serving as an extra in someone else’s life, she’s ready to demand a life of her own
Sales: The Exchange (international); The Exchange, CAA Film Finances and WME Independent (domestic)
The Order
Director: Justin Kurzel
Producers: AGC Studios, Chasing Epic Pictures, Riff Raff Entertainment
Key cast: Jude Law, Nicholas Hoult
Synopsis: In 1983, a series of increasingly violent bank robberies, counterfeiting operations and armored car heists frightened communities throughout the Pacific Northwest. As baffled law enforcement agents scrambled for answers, a lone FBI agent (Law) came to believe the crimes were not the work of traditional, financially motivated criminals, but a group of dangerous domestic terrorists, inspired by a radical, charismatic leader (Hoult), plotting a devastating war against the federal government of the United States.
Sales: AGC Intl. (international); CAA Media Finance (North America)
The Penguin Lessons
Director: Peter Cattaneo
Producers: Rory Aitken, Ben Pugh, Robert Walak
Key cast: Steve Coogan
Synopsis: Based on Tom Michell’s bestseller, drama is the true story of a disillusioned Englishman who went to work in a school in Argentina in 1976, and expecting an easy ride, he discovered instead a complicated and divided nation – and a class of practically unteachable young boys. However, when he finds a small penguin washed up on an oil slicked beach, his life is turned upside down – and the penguin becomes not only a valued friend, but also a teacher of life’s most important lessons, for Tom, the boys and, in fact, everyone he meets.
Sales: Rocket Science (international); CAA Media Finance (domestic)
The Prima Donna
Director: Nathan Silver
Production: David Lancaster, Julian Lawitschka, Wolfgang Hammer, Hal Sadoff , Ethan Erwin, Alex Mace
Key cast: Toni Collette, Odessa Young
Synopsis: Darkly funny revenge thriller about dysfunctional family dynamics.
Sales: Cornerstone (international); CAA Media Finance and Anonymous Content (North America)
The Riker’s Ghost
Director: Neil Jordan
Key cast: Liam Neeson
Synopsis: Thriller follows a convict set for release (Neeson) who is forced to break a terrorist out of prison, when his lawyer is kidnapped, as he is the only one who knows a way out.
Producers: Alan Moloney, Steve Richards, Jake Katofsky, Susan Mullen, Rupert Wyatt
Sales: Capstone Global (international)
Seven Veils
Director: Atom Egoyan
Producers: Rhombus Media and Ego Film Arts, produced with the participation of Telefilm Canada, in association with Cinetic Media, IPR.VC, XYZ Films and the Canadian Opera Company
Key cast: Amanda Seyfried
Synopsis: Haunted by dark and disturbing memories from her past, a theatrer director has been given the daunting task of remounting her former mentor’s most famous work, the opera “Salome.”
Sales: XYZ Films
Sneaks
Director: Rob Edwards
Producers: RTG Features, Lengi Studios, Cinema Gypsy Productions, RB Ventures, Modern Toons, Waffle Iron Entertainment
Key cast: Anthony Mackie, Martin Lawrence, Chloe Bailey, Laurence Fishburne, Macy Gray, Chris Paul
Synopsis: Animated feature follows the adventures of Ty, a misguided designer sneaker who doesn’t know life outside the comforts of his velvet-lined shoe box. After his sister is stolen by a shady collector, Ty must venture into the big city to rescue her.
Sales: CAA Media Finance (North America/China); GFM Animation (International)
Strictly Confidential
Director: Damian Hurley
Producers: Raymond Mansfield, Sean McKittrick
Key cast: Elizabeth Hurley, Georgia Lock, Genevieve Gaunt
Synopsis: Mia is haunted by the suicide of her best friend, Rebecca. She reluctantly accepts an invitation to Rebecca’s family home in the Caribbean, where a group of her friends have gathered on the anniversary of her death. However, once on the island, Mia is plagued by suspicions that there’s more to Rebecca’s death than meets the eye and finds herself drawn into a world of sex, duplicity and betrayal.
Producers: Philippe Martinez, Elizabeth Hurley
Sales: MSR Media Intl.
Wichita Libra
Director: Henry Dunham
Producer: Jay van Hoy
Key cast: Phoebe Dynevor
Synopsis: In the aftermath of a triple murder in her hometown, Frannie Jacobs fled rural Kansas for Chicago and started a new life. A decade on, she is drawn back home after her brother’s death to decode a cryptic letter he left behind, suggesting that the wrong man was charged with the crime that tore her community and family apart all those years ago, and that an anonymous missing woman could clear his name.
Sales: Mister Smith Entertainment (international); UTA (North America)
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