Sony Pictures Classics has acquired the rights for multiple territories to Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck’s “Never Look Away” ahead of the Venice Film Festival, an individual with knowledge of the project told TheWrap.
The distributor nabbed the rights for the psychological thriller for North America, Latin America, Australia, New Zealand Scandinavia. The film, produced by Beta Cinema, will have it world premiere in Venice on Sept. 4 before it heads to the Toronto International Film Festival.
“Never Look Away” stars Tom Schilling, Paula Beer, Sebastian Koch, Saskia Rosendahl and Ina Weisse and is a period drama spanning over three eras of German history. Schilling stars as a young artist who flees from East Germany to West Germany but still remains haunted by his childhood under the Nazis and communism. He begins to work through his trauma through his paintings.
Jan Mojito produced the film alongside von Donnersmarck, Quirin Berg and Max Wiedemann of Wiedemann & Berg Film production, and Christiane Henckel von Donnersmarck. Mojto’s Pergamon Film and Wiedemann & Berg produced with ARD/Degeto, Bayerischer Rundfunk and Beta Cinema.
Sony Pictures Classics also previously distributed von Donnersmarck’s “The Lives of Others” (2007), which awarded him the Best Foreign Language Oscar. Sony Pictures’ also released his follow-up, “The Tourist,” starring Johnny Depp and Angelina Jolie. That film earned $278 million worldwide when it was released in 2010, but wasn’t a hit among critics.