CAA Signs Director of France’s Oscar Entry (Exclusive)

CAA has signed Deniz Gamze Erguven, the filmmaker behind France’s submission for next year’s Academy Awards, The Hollywood Reporter has learned.

The drama, Mustang, premiered at Cannes in May as part of the festival’s Directors’ Fortnight and went on to win the sidebar’s Fortnight Europa Cinemas award. Erguven co-wrote (with Alice Winocour) and directed the film, which Cohen Media Group will release theatrically in North America early next year.

The story takes place in a coastal village in Erguven’s native Turkey, where five adolescent sisters are locked up by their overbearing, propriety-obsessed relatives. “What makes the transfixing film so effective is that the director refuses to portray them simplistically, as misunderstood angels,” THR critic David Rooney wrote in his review. “She has enough trust in her audience to leave the drama’s implicit feminism unstated.”

In addition to receiving training as a director at Parisian film school La Femis, Erguven studied literature and African history in Johannesburg. She has previously directed two shorts, Mon trajet prefere and Bir damla su (A Drop of Water).

Deniz continues to be repped by Eryn Brown at Management 360.

Related Stories

Related Story

'Selma's' Ava DuVernay Moves to CAA From Paradigm