Model-new boutique distribution label 1-2 Particular has made its first huge purchase — out of the Berlinale, and it’s a banger. The brand new shingle has Friday introduced that it has acquired North American rights to “Kontinental ’25,” the newest movie from Radu Jude, director of 2021 Golden Bear winner “Unhealthy Luck Banging or Loony Porn” and “Do Not Anticipate Too A lot from the Finish of the World.” The Romanian filmmaker’s work has been extensively acclaimed within the States.
The movie premiered in competitors earlier this month on the Berlin Worldwide Movie Pageant, the place it received the Silver Bear for Finest Screenplay from a jury led by Todd Haynes. Formally described as “an existential black comedy that follows Orsolya (Eszter Tompa), a bailiff in Cluj, Transylvania,” the movie follows what occurs “someday [when] she should evict a homeless man who lives within the basement of a constructing. An sudden occasion creates an ethical disaster she tries to resolve as finest she will be able to.”
IndieWire’s assessment of the movie famous that “its ethical dimensions are extra easy than these in Jude’s earlier work (and its kind a lot easier in sort), however solely as a result of their sensible purposes are that a lot knottier in return. The place ‘Unhealthy Luck Banging or Loony Porn’ and ‘Do Not Anticipate Too A lot from the Finish of the World’ scaled their characters’ private depravities in opposition to sprawling backdrops of systemic abuse, the much more intimate — and fewer uproarious — ‘Kontinental ’25’ filters the perversity of neoliberalism by the eyes of a well-meaning girl’s try and do the proper factor.”
The movie is the primary purchase for Jason Hellerstein’s lately launched 1-2 Particular, and Hellerstein shared in an official assertion, “There couldn’t be a greater first acquisition for us than the latest movie from Radu Jude, one of the crucial progressive and provocative filmmakers working immediately. It’s a privilege to work with Radu to carry ‘Kontinental ’25’ to audiences throughout North America.”
1-2 Particular is a theatrical-first, all-rights distributor, “devoted to releasing boundary-pushing works from visionary administrators.” Hellerstein launched the corporate earlier this month, after leaving his perch at Sideshow, the place he served as co-founding govt. Previous to Sideshow, he labored in acquisitions at Magnolia Photos and in advertising and marketing and PR at Cinetic Media. With the New York-based 1-2 Particular, Hellerstein goals to launch as much as 10 movies yearly. Hellerstein will function CEO of 1-2 Particular and can announce extra hires this spring.
In an official word, the always-wily Jude shared, “Pricey pals, the makers of ‘Kontinental ’25’ are comfortable to have the ability to share the movie, which takes place in the Transylvanian area of Romania, with the American audiences. For me personally, because the writer-director of the movie, America is before everything the nation of cinema (even when a bunch of crooks run it) and I deeply hope our movie will meet an excellent viewers there, people who find themselves curious to see how the world seems like in a faraway land. As for Canada, we’re very honoured to indicate our movie in a courageous and unbiased nation.”