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Sundance Selects on Wednesday said it has picked up the North American rights to Academy Award-winning director Paolo Sorrentino’s new film, Loro (Them), about Italy’s billionaire media mogul and four-time Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.
A 2019 theatrical release for the Toni Servillo-starrer is planned after a world premiere in Toronto. Loro, produced by Nicola Giuliano, Francesca Cima, Carlotta Calori, Viola Prestieri and Jerome Seydoux, focuses on Berlusconi and his court and sex scandals around his infamous “Bunga Bunga” parties.
“Paolo Sorrentino has defined himself as one of the masters of Italian cinema. He makes up his own rules and presents a cinematic vision that is totally unique. We are thrilled to premiere this film at the Toronto Film Festival, and bring this exceptional story to audiences across North America,” Jonathan Sehring and Lisa Schwartz, co-presidents of IFC Films/Sundance Selects, said in a statement.
Sorrentino’s 2008 film Il Divo, about Italy’s former Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti, was nominated for an Academy Award for best makeup. His 2013 film The Great Beauty, about life in Italy post-Berlusconi, won the Oscar for best foreign-language film.
Sorrentino will next work on The New Pope, a follow-up to the HBO series The Young Pope. Loro is an Italy-France co-production from Indigo Film, Pathe and France 2. Universal Pictures International for Focus Features will distribute the movie in Italy, while Pathe will release it in France and Switzerland and handle international sales.
The North American deal for the film was negotiated by Arianna Bocco, executive vp acquisitions and productions at IFC Films/Sundance Selects, and Pathe International on behalf of the filmmaker.
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