Genre Studio Welcome Villain Films Acquires Gory Thriller ‘Beaten to Death’ (EXCLUSIVE)

EXCLUSIVE: Robert Morgan’s Talaria Media has launched development on Arigato Tokyo, a new drama set in the world of women’s professional wrestling, after acquiring a feature pitch by Daytime Emmy winner Mark Blutman (Ghostwriter, Boy Meets World). Jamie Anderson is on board to direct the pic, with Morgan to exec produce.

Koala Man and the upcoming series “Hazbin Hotel” (platform TBD and co-produced with A24). December 2022 saw Bent Box enter a multi-year production service agreement with leading Irish animation studio Boulder Media, which includes “Krapopolis” and “Grimsburg.”In 2021, Bento Box and Fox formed BCL, which launched Web3 platforms for unscripted series like “The Masked Singer,” “Krapopolis,” the United States Football League (USFL), Fox Deportes, SXSW, Dolly Parton and WWE.Daniel Weidenfeld, senior vice president of Animation at Fox Entertainment, will transition over to Bento Box, where he will be involved in development, working closely with creative Director Ben Jones.  They will jointly report to Coker.

EXCLUSIVE: 20th Century Studios has acquired Naughty, an original feature pitch from Siena East (Clone High) conceived as a starring vehicle for Amber Midthunder (Prey), multiple sources tell Deadline.

Joel Kinnaman (For All Mankind) is attached to star in They Found Us, an alien abduction thriller to be directed for AGC Studios and Temple Hill by Oscar-nominated filmmaker Neill Blomkamp (District 9), which will head into production in Australia later this year.

Actor Joel Kinnaman is teaming up with “District 9” and “Elysium” filmmaker Neill Blomkamp for a new sci-fi film. Stuart Ford’s AGC Studios will fully finance “They Found Us,” a new alien abduction thriller to be directed by Blomkamp with Kinnaman attached to star, AGC Studios Chairman and CEO Ford and Temple Hill’s Wyck Godfrey announced on Wednesday.“They Found Us” is based on an original screenplay by Jeremy Slater (“Moon Knight,” “Fantastic Four,” “The Exorcist,”) and will be produced by Wyck Godfrey and Marty Bowen for Temple Hill Entertainment (“Smile,” “Twilight” franchise, “Maze Runner” franchise).Ford is onboard as an executive producer along with Temple Hill’s John Fischer.

Manori Ravindran Executive Editor of International Joel Kinnaman is set to lead the alien abduction thriller “They Found Us,” from director Neill Blomkamp, for AGC Studios. AGC fully financed the project, and will launch sales via AGC International in Cannes next month. UTA Independent Film Group is co-repping U.S. rights. “They Found Us” is based on an original screenplay by Jeremy Slater (“Moon Knight”) and will be produced by Wyck Godfrey and Marty Bowen for Temple Hill Entertainment (“Smile”). Ford is on board as an executive producer along with Temple Hill’s John Fischer. The film will shoot in Australia this year.

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent Blue Fox Entertainment has acquired U.S. rights to Cédric Klapisch’s (“The Spanish Apartment”) hit dance film “Rise” (“En corps”) from Studiocanal. One of 2022’s highest grossing French films, “Rise” sold nearly 1.3 million tickets in local theaters and was sold around the world. The movie tells the story of a young ballet dancer whose life is upended when she suffers a career-threatening injury and catches her  boyfriend cheating on her. As she begins her physical and emotional rehabilitation, she finds solace in friends, a new love, and a new contemporary dance troupe. Marion Barbeau, a dancer-turned-actor, delivers a breakthrough performance in the lead role, and stars opposite French stars, including François Civil (“Three Musketeers”), Pio Marmaï (“How I Became a Super Hero”), Denis Podalydès (“Anaïs in Love”), as well as Hofesh Shechter (“Send Me an Angel”).

The Tribeca Festival on Tuesday announced its lineup of short narrative, documentary and animated films, as well as music videos, across 12 programs.

Veteran marketing executive Steven Melnick is leaving Disney Television Studios. His position was eliminated during day 1 of Disney’s second wave of layoffs.

’ fold,” Traugott said. “As individuals, their extensive development and production experience is impressive, but together as a team their combined creativity and passion make them a dream hire as we look to expand our remit into unscripted.” Keren Shahar, CEO of  Keshet International, added that Mayer and Long’s hiring signifies “the beginning of a new journey” for the studio branch of the company and a return to form for KI as a whole. “We launched as a formats business a decade ago and I am personally very excited to be announcing KI’s expansion into unscripted in the US,”  Shahar said.

BreAnna Bell Keshet Studios has appointed Rebecca Mayer and Benjamin Long to head the company’s unscripted division as it continues to expand its US footprint. Mayer will serve as executive vice president with Long reporting to her as vice president. In their new roles, the duo’s focus will be examining Keshet International’s catalog of international IP to build a non-scripted slate of entertainment formats specifically for the US broadcast, cable and streaming markets, alongside developing original IP with the potential to be distributed internationally by KI. Mayer will report to Peter Traugott, president of Keshet Studios, and will be based in Los Angeles.

Dark Star Pictures has acquired North American rights to Australian queer horror film “Bad Girl Boogey,” the second film from writer-director Alice Maio Mackay,“Bad Girl Boogey”, per the official description, tells the story of “Angel, whose mother was brutally murdered one Halloween night, when blood was shed by a deranged killer wearing a parasitic mask cursed with black magic and bigotry. Sixteen years later, when Angel’s best friend is slaughtered by a killer with the same mask, they must overcome their personal struggles, fight their fear, and find the masked killer before he, or it, slaughters everyone they hold dear.”Cowritten with Ben Pahl Robinson when Mackey was just 17, the film features a cast of queer and trans actors.

Ed Meza @edmezavar Warner Bros. Intl. Television Prod. (WBITVP) has appointed former Fremantle exec Harry Gamsu as new VP, creative, for format, development and sales. He will report to Andrew Zein, SVP creative, for format development and sales and oversee relations between WBITVP’s international division and the WB’s U.S. TV production units Warner Horizon, Telepictures and Shed. Gamsu will also evaluate formats in WB’s catalogue for international exploitation and format sales to Canada. He succeeds Adam Steinman, who ankled WBITVP earlier this year. In his previous role as VP of non-scripted content acquisitions at Fremantle, Gamsu managed the U.S. content acquisition team and working on factual and entertainment series.

EXCLUSIVE: Studiocanal has acquired rights to develop Peter Cameron’s well-received 2020 novel What Happens At Night into a feature film, with Martin Scorsese aboard to produce and Oscar nominee Patrick Marber (Notes On A Scandal) adapting the screenplay.

Ed Meza @edmezavar Studiocanal has sold two new thrillers from Benelux to international buyers at MipTV in Cannes. The eight-part crime thriller “1985,” produced by Eyeworks for Belgian public broadcasters VRT and RTBF, follows three friends as they move to Brussels and get caught up in the horrifying events of Belgium’s most notorious unsolved crime spree that shocked a generation and left a scar on the entire country. The series went to SBS Australia; Filmin for Portugal and Spain; Canal+ for France, Czech Republic and Slovakia; TG4 in Ireland; and Free TV in Israel.

Brent Lang Executive Editor Vertical has acquired U.S. rights to Catherine Hardwicke’s “Prisoner’s Daughter,” a thriller with Brian Cox and Kate Beckinsale that premiered at last year’s Toronto International Film Festival. The film is about a terminally ill father who is recently released from prison and struggles to connect with his daughter and grandson. Vertical will release “Prisoner’s Daughter” in theaters on June 30, 2023. It’s a starry collection of talent. Cox is best known for playing the mephistophelean Logan Roy on “Succession,” while Beckinsale has starred in blockbusters and indie films such as “Underworld,” “Love and Friendship” and “Pearl Harbor.” Hardwicke has directed critical and commercial hits like “Twilight” and “Thirteen.”

EXCLUSIVE: Blockers actress Geraldine Viswanathan and Joy Ride‘sMeredith Hagner are joining Will Ferrell and Reese Witherspoon in Nick Stoller’s wedding comedy You’re Cordially Invited, from Amazon Studios.

John Hopewell Chief International Correspondent As free-to-air operators’ ratings tumbled last decade, Alex Pina seized the chance to make two YA-targeted shows at Spain’s Atresmedia, firing up their ambitions: “Locked Up” and “Money Heist.” Now Marc Cistaré – a main writer on early Pina shows “Paco’s Men”and “The Boat” over 2005-13 and a scribe on “Locked Up” – has seized another industry opportunity, the strategic co-production alliance between TelevisaUnivision’s ViX streaming service and The Mediapro Studio.  Rolling off the hiked ambitions of Spain’s TV scene after streamer success, he has created“Las Pelotaris, 1926,” which The Mediapro Studio Distribution is bringing onto the market at this week’s MipTV. 

Tayla Winter has claimed she was edited unfairly on the latest series of Married At First Sight Australia, saying she was portrayed as the 'female villain' of the show.Tayla, 27, was paired with Hugo Armstrong on the reality TV show, but the pair's relationship got off to a rocky start with Tayla doubting her ability to engage in the MAFS process before she'd even made it down the aisle.The nurse, who hails from Tasmania, had a dramatic time on the show, with her and Hugo eventually deciding to leave the experiment after realising their relationship wasn't going to work. Tayla has now spoken out about her MAFS experience, revealing that she feels she was given an unfair edit and portrayed to be a villain, which is not a "true reflection" of her in real life.

EXCLUSIVE: Lyrical Media has snapped up Sam Haysom’s short story Purgatory Games which Titans and Ash vs. Evil Dead scribe Bryan Edward Hill will adapt into a feature film.