Sony Pictures Classics has acquired all North and Latin American rights to Andrey Zvyagintsev’s “Loveless,” SPC announced Wednesday.
The Russian language film is set to premiere In Competition at the 2017 Cannes Film Festival on Thursday.
SPC and Zvyagintsev previously worked together on “Leviathan,” which was the winner of Best Screenplay at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival, Best Foreign Language Film at the 2015 Golden Globes and was Oscar nominated for Best Foreign Language Film. “Loveless” also marks the third partnership between Zvyagintsev and producer Alexander Rodnyansky.
“Loveless” follows Zhenya and Boris who are going through a vicious divorce. Both are already starting new lives with new partners and are so impatient to start over again that they are threatening to abandon their 12-year-old son Alyosha. But when Alyosha witnesses one of their fights, he disappears.
Co-written by Zvyagintsev and Oleg Negin, the film is produced by Non-Stop Production (Russia), Fetisoff Illusion (Russia), Why Not Production (France), Les Films du Fleuve (Belgium) Senator Film Production (Germany) with support from Eurimages, Arte, Canal+, WDR and Cine+.
“I am very pleased to be working with the excellent team at Sony Pictures Classics again; they were sensitive and inspired in their tremendous efforts on ‘Leviathan,’ and I look forward to our new collaboration,” Zvyagintsev said in a statement.
Sony Pictures Classics added, “There is no more timely film than ‘Loveless.’ Andrey is one of the world’s finest directors in peak form here. It is just great to be in business again with him and Alexander following our success together with ‘Leviathan’ a few years ago.”
CAA brokered the deal with SPC on behalf of Wild Bunch.
Cannes: 16 Hottest Movies for Sale (Photos)
Jennifer Aniston, David Oyelowo, Diane Keaton, Amy Schumer, Jamie Dornan and more are attached to projects up for sale at the Cannes Film Festival this year.
"All the Old Knives" Chris Pine and Michelle Williams dip into "Mr. and Mrs. Smith" territory with this romantic thriller, but expect something much darker as these former lovers and CIA operatives recall events of the past. Shocking revelations come over an idyllic dinner date. [Sales Agent: WME and CAA, Sierra/Affinity]
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"Book Club" Candice Bergen, Diane Keaton and Jane Fonda have complicated but rich lives that get thrown into chaos when the women choose "50 Shades of Grey" as their monthly book club read. [Sales Agent: WME, Bloom]
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"Dreamland" Margot Robbie stars as a bank robber on the run not only from the local police and the FBI -- but a 15-year-old hellbent on catching her and collecting the bounty on her head to save his family’s farm. Robbie also serves as producer. [Sales Agent: WME, Sierra /Affinity]
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"Fonzo" Tom Hardy tackles notorious gangster Al Capone as we've never seen him -- 47-years-old, rotting in prison and exhibiting early signs of dementia as his violent life flashes before his eyes. [Sales agent: CAA and WME, Bloom]
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"Dumplin" Kirstin Hahn adapts Julie Murphy's hit YA novel about a young girl named, well, Dumplin' who enters a local beauty contest to prove the mean girls wrong and win the boy she loves. Jennifer Aniston plays her pristine, former pageant queen mom. [Sales agent: UTA and CAA, IMR International]
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"Hotel Artemis" Jodie Foster returns to acting in this futuristic thriller from Drew Pearce. As "The Nurse," Foster runs a hospital with an exclusive clientele of hardened criminals -- one in particular who is there to assassinate another. [Sales Agent: WME, Lionsgate International]
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"Red Sea Diving Resort" Chris Evans trades in his Captain America shield for some scuba gear as covert operative helping turn a deserted resort into a functioning vacation spot -- as a cover to help thousands of refugees in the Sudan.
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"The Florida Project" Sean Baker returns after his iPhone-shot breakthrough "Tangerine" with this selection playing in Cannes' Directors Fortnight starring Willem Dafoe. A group of Southern kids have a magical summer, while the grownups in their periphery are hit with hard times.
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"Oh Lucy" Based on Atsuko Hirayanagi's Sundance award winning 2014 short, "Oh Lucy" stars Shinobu Terajima as a lonely office worker in Tokyo who takes a one-off class to learn English. There she disappears into fantasy -- an alter ego she names Lucy -- and becomes obsessed with her language instructor (Josh Hartnett). [Sales agent: UTA / Elle Driver]
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"Arc of Justice" Director Jose Padilha and David Oyelowo tackle an African American doctor in Detroit on trial for murder in the 1920s. [Sales agent: CAA and UTA, Sierra/Affinity]
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"Escape" High off the success of his Universal Pictures hit "Split," James McAvoy heads to Cannes with an intense true story directed by "Peaky Blinders" helmer Colm McCarthy. McAvoy stars as a professor who remains in '90s Sarajevo to continue teaching as a siege rages. [Sales agent: WME, IM Global]
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"H-Block" When he's not experimenting with nipple clamps and chains, Jamie Dornan has an eye for grittier action fare like serial killer series "The Fall." Here he leads off knock-around Irish boys including Cillian Murphy and Pierce Brosnan to retell the true story of a prison escape in 1983. [Sales agent: WME and UTA, Mister Smith Entertainment]
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"I Feel Pretty" Abby Kohn and Marc Silverstein's hot script does not have a logline -- one that filmmakers will share, anyway -- but it was enough to lure Amy Schumer away from Sony's feature based on Mattel's Barbie doll, so we imagine this is much more her lane. McG is on board to produce. [Sales agent: UTA, Voltage]
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"Freak Shift" Director Ben Wheatley ("High-Rise") takes his taught thriller skillset and goes full monster for Cannes. Alicia Vikander and Armie Hammer will star as misfit hunters targeting underground monsters who only come out at night. The pair showed off their chemistry in Guy Ritchie's underrated 2015 "The Man From U.N.C.L.E." feature adaptation. [Sales agent: WME and UTA, IMR International]
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"Bubbles" This concept was so irresistible that it topped the Black List -- and "Thor: Ragnarok" director Taika Waititi and co-pilot Mark Gustafson are on board to bring the animated vision to life. This film is described as the "offbeat coming of age story" of Michael Jackson’s celebrity pet chimpanzee, Bubbles. [Sales agent: CAA, Rocket Science]
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"Why We're Killing Gunther" Former leading "SNL" player Taran Killam makes his directorial and leading man debut in this comedy he also wrote. He snagged a whale in Arnold Schwarzenegger to lead an ensemble that includes his wife and Marvel player Cobie Smulders and Hannah Simone of "New Girl." The story follows an oddball group of assassins that conspire to take out a legendary, braggart hittman (Anrie). [Sales agent: CAA and UTA, IMR]
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Star-studded titles will spark competition at Marche du Film, from Michael Jackson’s chimp to Tom Hardy’s Al Capone
Jennifer Aniston, David Oyelowo, Diane Keaton, Amy Schumer, Jamie Dornan and more are attached to projects up for sale at the Cannes Film Festival this year.
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