Acquisitions – Indie Films

Fiscal Accuracy: SPWA to Rep Kelly Reichardt’s Untitled 7th Feature Film

Published on April 16, 2015

Landing world sales right in the month of April not only facilitates future Cannes Film Festival deals, but if you’re Tom Bernard and Michael Barker, you’re looking the strong possibility for a future handover to SPC. Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions have bought Kelly Reichardt’s small-town set untitled Montana backdrop drama which just recently wrapped up. Produced by her usual producers in Filmscience’s Neil Kopp and Anish Savjani, a Venice, TIFF and/or Telluride premiere is definitely in the cards.

Gist: Starring Laura Dern, Kristen Stewart, Michelle Williams, James LeGros and Jared Harris, this is based on short stories by Maile Meloy and sees Stewart portray a lawyer from Boise, Idaho, who takes a teaching job several hours from her house. After taking the job, Stewart’s character develops a friendship with a local woman who’s auditing her class.

Worth Noting: Reichardt’s last film (Night Moves) premiered at Venice.

Do We Care?: Usually distributors take a wait and see approach with her films, we’re hoping this does indeed becomes an in-house hand me down item.

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).