‘The Nightingale’ Star Aisling Franciosi To Lead Horror ‘Stopmotion’, Wild Bunch Launches Sales — Cannes Market

EXCLUSIVE: Veteran UK sales agent Anthony Buckner, former Head of Sales at Icon, is launching Buckstop Films to coincide with the Cannes Marché.

EXCLUSIVE: Kiana Madeira (Trinkets), Ross Butler (13 Reasons Why) and Matthew Noszka (Star) have been set to star in YA package Perfect Addiction.

EXCLUSIVE: Grindstone Entertainment Group has picked up North American rights to The Gateway, the crime thriller starring Shea Whigham, Olivia Munn, Frank Grillo, Bruce Dern, Taryn Manning, Keith David, and Mark Boone Junior.

Jesse Eisenberg, Adrien Brody, and Riley Keough will star in Manodrome, a film written and to be directed by South African director John Trengrove, marking his English-language debut. Pic package will be presented to buyers and financiers during the Cannes virtual market just getting underway.

EXCLUSIVE: In some powerhouse two-hander casting, we can reveal that Oscar nominees Jake Gyllenhaal (Brokeback Mountain) and Vanessa Kirby (Pieces Of A Woman) have been set to lead survival thriller Suddenly, which quickly becomes one of the must-have packages at the Cannes virtual market.

Nicolas Cage has been set to star in Butcher’s Crossing, an adventure adapted from John Williams’ seminal 1960 novel about the rugged frontier of the American West. Gabe Polsky (Red Army, Red Penguins) is set to direct. Altitude Film Group, which is producing and financing, has landed UK and Irish distribution rights and also will handle selling international at the Cannes Virtual Market that kicked off today. Shooting is set to begin in October in the U.S.

EXCLUSIVE: Downton Abbey and The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel star Penelope Wilton is joining Oscar winner Jim Broadbent (Iris) in Hettie Macdonald’s (Normal People) upcoming feature The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry.

EXCLUSIVE: Here’s a fun one uniting three screen greats. Oscar winner Christoph Waltz (Inglourious Basterds) and Oscar nominee Willem Dafoe (Spider-Man) are set to star in Western thriller Dead For A Dollar from legendary filmmaker and western aficionado Walter Hill (The Warriors).

Shailene Woodley will co-star with Jack Whitehall in the comedy Robots, which comes from Borat writer Anthony Hines.

Studiocanal and Imperative Entertainment are teaming up on psychological thriller Cat Person, based on Kristen Roupenian’s well-received short story published in The New Yorker in 2017.

EXCLUSIVE: Ahead of the Cannes virtual market, 13 Films has boarded sales on completed thriller-horror Karen, starring Taryn Manning (Orange Is The New Black), Cory Hardrict (American Sniper), Jasmine Burke (Saints & Sinners), Roger Dorman and Gregory Alan Williams.

EXCLUSIVE: Ed Westwick (Gossip Girl), singer-actor Matt Willis (Allies) and Rupert Graves (Sherlock) have been set to star in WWII action-thriller Wolves Of War, which began filming today in the UK.

Spinning Gold, the long-in-the-works biopic about 1970s Casablanca Records chief Neil Bogart, is heating up again in time for the Cannes Virtual Market. The pic, written and directed by Bogart’s son Timothy Scott Bogart, has added Wiz Khalifa to play Parliament leader George Clinton, Tayla Parx to play Donna Summer, Ledisi to play Gladys Knight and Lyndsy Fonseca to play music manager Joyce Biawitz.

K.J. Yossman Sam Worthington (“Avatar”) has signed on for crime thriller “Transfusion.” Altitude Media Group will represent the project at the upcoming Cannes Marche du Film (June 21-25).The feature is helmed by actor, writer and director Matt Nable (“Arrow”) and represents his directorial debut.

EXCLUSIVE: Oscar nominee Mickey Rourke (The Wrestler) and Jennifer Carpenter (Dexter) are set to star in supernatural horror She’s Still Here, which Archstone Entertainment is launching for the Cannes virtual market.

Sam Worthington and Phoebe Tonkin are starring in Matt Nable’s directorial debut, Transfusion. The thriller, which also features Nable, is about a former Special Forces operative thrust into the criminal underworld to keep his only son from being taken from him. Production began in Sydney earlier this week and Altitude has added it to its slate with international sales launching at the Cannes Market.

Oscar nominees Emily Watson and Richard E. Grant have been set to star in director Jason Wingard’s romantic comedy Fado! from a script by Andrea Mann. Global sales agent Protagonist Pictures will introduce the project to buyers at the upcoming Cannes Market.

EXCLUSIVE: Paul Feig (Bridesmaids) and Tiffany Haddish (Girls Trip) are set to produce musical dance dramedy Throw It Back, which MadRiver and CAA Media Finance will be launching at the virtual Cannes market.

Wild Bunch is getting deeper into animation with the launch of a new sales company it is setting up with French animation specialist Gebeka.

Kunal Nayyar, Lucy Hale and Christina Hendricks are set to star in The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry, an adaptation of the New York Times best-selling novel by Gabrielle Zevin. Hans Canosa will direct from Zevin’s adaptation of her own novel and David Garrett’s Mister Smith Entertainment will be shopping the project to buyers at the upcoming Cannes Virtual Market next week.