IFC Buys Winterbottom’s ‘Killer’

Report From Sundance

Controversial film had provoked angry q&a over violence

Sharon Waxman

 Latest deal at Sundance: 

IFC announced that it had acquired the controversial film by director Michael Winterbottom, "The Killer Inside Me."

The company released this statement on Saturday morning: 

IFC Films, one of the leading American distributors of independent and foreign films, announced today at the Sundance Film Festival it is acquiring U.S. distribution rights to Michael Winterbottom’s THE KILLER INSIDE ME.  Since its premiere on Sunday, it has become the most provocative and discussed films at this year’s festival.  Based on the novel by legendary pulp writer Jim Thompson, THE KILLER INSIDE ME stars Casey Affleck, Jessica Alba, Kate Hudson, Simon Baker and Bill Pullman, from a script by John Curran.  It is Winterbottom’s first foray into pure American cinema.  The film is a Hero Entertainment presentation of a Stone Canyon, Muse, Revolution production in association with Wild Bunch, Curiously Bright Entertainment and Indion Entertainment Group.  It was produced by Chris Hanely, Bradford L. Schlei, Andrew Eaton and executive produced by Jordan Gertner and Lily Bright.

 
THE KILLER INSIDE ME will next be screened in competition at the Berlin Film Festival in February.
 
The deal for THE KILLER INSIDE ME was negotiated by Arianna Bocco, Vice President of Acquisitions and Co-Production for IFC Films, with Graham Taylor of William Morris Endeavor Entertainment and Carole Baraton of Wild Bunch. Wild Bunch is also a co-producer on the film and handling all International Distribution.
 
The deal marks the second time IFC Films has worked with Winterbottom and Eaton’s Revolution Films.  This February, IFC Films is releasing the highly anticipated THE RED RIDING TRILOGY, a fictionalized account of the investigation into the Yorkshire Ripper.
 
 THE KILLER INSIDE ME tells the story of handsome, charming, unassuming small town sheriff’s deputy named Lou Ford (Casey Affleck).  The film takes place in an idyllic West Texas town in the early 1950’s.  As a lifelong resident, Ford has difficulty juggling his long-term girlfriend Amy (Kate Hudson), the prostitute named Joyce (Jessica Alba) that he mistakenly falls for, and the sociopathic tendencies inside him. In Thompson’s savage, bleak, blacker than noir universe nothing is ever what it seems.

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Sharon Waxman

Sharon Waxman

Sharon Waxman, is the founder, CEO and Editor in Chief of TheWrap. She is an award-winning journalist and best-selling author, and was a Hollywood correspondent for The New York Times. Twitter: @sharonwaxman

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