Highland Film Group Runs Up ‘Final Score’ Sales; Strand Bringing Toshiro Mifune Docu To U.S. – Toronto Briefs

EXCLUSIVE: Highland Film Group has closed a number of key international territory deals in Toronto for Scott Mann’s Final Score, starring Dave Bautista and Pierce Brosnan. Alexandra Dinu and Julian Chen also star in the thriller written by the Brothers Lynch and Jonathan Frank. The story sees an ex-soldier forced to use his military skills to save the lives of a stadium full of people when it is seized by a group of heavily armed criminals demanding ransom at a sporting event. The film has sold to M6 in France, Wild Bunch in Germany and Leone in Italy. Further sales include Benelux (Dutch Film Works), Eastern Europe (Prorom), Greece (Feelgood), India (Tanweer), Indonesia (Prima Cinema), Israel (Shoval), Japan (Klockworx), Korea (Jane & U0, Latin America (California), Middle East (Falcon), Pan Asia TV (Fox), Philippines (ABS-CBN), Portugal (Cinemundo), Scandinavia (Mis Label), South Africa (Ster Kinekor), Spain (Corbi), Thailand (M Pictures), Poland (Monolith), Turkey (Movieturk) and Vietnam (Noori). Signature Entertainment’s Marc Goldberg produces alongside the Fyzz Facility’s Robert Jones, James Harris, Mark Lane and Wayne Marc Godfrey. Babak Eftekhari is co-producing and Elizabeth Williams exec produces. Highland Film Group’s Arianne Fraser and Delphine Perrier handle global sales and serve as exec producers alongside Mark Canton, Courtney Solomon, Zac Adler and David Sullivan. The Gersh Agency is co-repping U.S. rights to Final Score, which is shooting at Upton Park Stadium in London.

Strand Releasing has picked up U.S. rights to Steven Okazaki’s documentary Mifune: The Last Samurai, about legendary Japanese actor Toshiro Mifune (Rashomon,Seven Samurai). Keanu Reeves narrates the film, which screened at Venice and Telluride. The documentary features interviews with Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, Koji Yakusho as well as Mifune’s co-stars Kyoto Kagawa, Haruo Nakajima and Yoshio Tsuchiya. The deal was negotiated between Strand co-presidents Marcus Hu and Jon Gerrans and Hengameh Panahi, president of Celluloid Dreams, which handles worldwide rights for the film. Celluloid also closed deals for all German-speaking territories with Koch Media and for France with La Rabbia while in Toronto.

Indican Pictures has acquired Search Engines, director/writer Russell Brown’s modern comic take on a Thanksgiving when all hell breaks loose after cell phone and computer reception fails, forcing a dysfunctional family to actually connect. Search Engines stars Joely Fisher, Barry Watson, Daphne Zuniga, Natasha Gregson Wagner, Connie Stevens, Nick Court, Michelle Hurd, and Jonathan Slavin. Indican plans to roll out the film Thanksgiving week. The film was produced by the Kerry Barden, John Baumgartner and Russell Brown. The deal was negotiated by Shaun Hill for Indican Pictures, Russell Brown and Kerry Barden for the Production company and Shelley Surpin of Surpin, Mayersohn & Coghill, LLP for the filmmakers.