EXCLUSIVE: With a slew of crowd-pleasing fare at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, studios are buying movies again. We’re hearing at this point in time that bids for Olivia Wilde’s latest feature as director, The Invite, have exceeded $10 million. Following the world premiere of the sexual rom-com starring Seth Rogen, Edward Norton, Penélope Cruz and Wilde to great laughs on Saturday night at the Eccles Theatre, several buyers were in talks last night for the pic including A24, Netflix, Searchlight, Focus Features, Black Bear and Neon. UTA is repping sales on the film.
Wilde directs off a screenplay by Rashida Jones and Will McCormack based on the Spanish upstairs/downstairs movie The People Upstairs. Pic follows Rogen and Wilde as a couple whose marriage has seen better days. They invite the sexually aggressive and open-mind Norton and Cruz downstairs for a dinner.
In addition, we understand that Neon has entered into exclusive talks for global on the Adrian Chiarella Midnights horror film Leviticus, which has Mia Wasikowska’s return to the screen after a three-year break in a deal worth around $5M (sans Australia and New Zealand). Leviticus stars Talk to Me‘s Joe Bird and Stacy Clausen as star-crossed teenage boys who must escape a violent entity that takes the form of the person they desire most — each other. The genre pic, for which WME Independent is repping sales, deals with the controversy of conversion.
Last year, Neon took the Dave Franco-Alison Brie romantic horror Together for $15M worldwide.
The good news is that there will be a couple of deals before people leave. In addition, we’re hearing good vibes around Topic Studios’ Wicker starring Olivia Colman, Alexander Skarsgård and Elizabeth Debicki, and the Channing Tatum drama Josephine among others. The finalizing of these deals take time, but there’s bright prospects for indie fare on the horizon.
RELATED: ‘Josephine’ Review: Channing Tatum & Gemma Chan In Earnest Drama Focused On Rape Through 8-Year-Old Child’s Eyes – Sundance Film Festival
