SUNDANCE: Fox Searchlight Closes Deal on 'Another Earth' for About $1 Million

Fox Searchlight has closed a deal to acquire all English-speaking rights to Another Earth, the Mike Cahill-directed drama that had its world premiere Monday at Sundance. The indie distributor paid about $1 million for the film after late-night negotiations that finally closed at 3 am.

Another Earth, a dramatic competition film written by Cahill and lead actress Brit Marling, is about an MIT student in astrophysics who leans out of her car window to better see a newly discovered planet and then accidentally crashes her car into a minivan, killing the family in it. After going to prison, she attempts to reach out to the surviving father of the family. The sci-fi drama also stars William Mapother, Jordan Baker, Robin Lord Taylor and Flint Beverage.

Cahill and Marling also produced, along with Hunter Gray of Artists Public Domain and Nicholas Shumaker. Tyler Brodie and Paul Mezey served as executive producers.

The Weinstein Co., which has already nabbed two pricey acquisitions, and IFC Films, which picked up the thriller The Ledge, both tried to get Another Earth, as well, among others.

Kevin Iwashina of Preferred Content and Graham Taylor, Mark Ankner and Liesl Copeland of WME Global repped the sale for the filmmakers. Andre Des Rochers of Gray Krauss Des Rochers LLP handled legal on behalf of Artists Public Domain.

This week, Fox Searchlight also acquired the 2011 Sundance program films Martha Marcy May Marlene (starring Elizabeth Olsen) and Homework as well as remake rights to the documentary The Bengali Detective.