Festival Predictions

2013 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: Zal Batmanglij’s The East

Published on November 20, 2012

Zal Batmanglij (see on set above) barely had time to unpack his bags after showing Sound of My Voice (11′ Sundance) and he quickly rejoined Brit Marling and a huge cast comprised of Alexander Skarsgård, Ellen Page, Julia Ormond, Patricia Clarkson, Toby Kebbell and Shiloh Fernandez for The East, a Fox Searchlight project that the distributor has been tight-lipped about – no updates have been made since he project has been in post production of January of this year.

Gist: Co-written by Brit Marling and Zal Batmanglij, this centers on a private contracting firm tasked with protecting big corporations from radical environmentalists and anti-business extremists, who tasks its best and brightest agent, Sarah Moss (Marling), to infiltrate a mysterious terrorist organization known only as ‘The East’.

Production Co./Producers: Marling, Michael Costigan, Jocelyn Hayes, Scott Free Productions’ Ridley and (R.I.P) Tony Scott.

Prediction: Premieres section

U.S. Distributor: Fox Searchlight

Related Topics:2013 Sundance Film Festival, The East, Zal Batmanglij

Eric Lavallée

Eric Lavallée is the founder, CEO, editor-in-chief, film journalist and critic at IONCINEMA.com (founded in 2000). Eric is a regular at Sundance, Cannes and TIFF. He has a BFA in Film Studies at the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema. In 2013 he served as a Narrative Competition Jury Member at the SXSW Film Festival. He was an associate producer on Mark Jackson's This Teacher (2018 LA Film Festival, 2018 BFI London). In 2022 he served as a New Flesh Comp for Best First Feature at the 2022 Fantasia Intl. Film Festival. Current top films for 2022 include Tár (Todd Field), All That Breathes (Shaunak Sen), Aftersun (Charlotte Wells).