Netflix buys African drama by True Detective director Cary Fukunaga
NewsNetflix announced that it will debut Beasts of No Nation, a new film written and directed by Cary Fukunaga, the Emmy-winning director of HBO’s True Detective and the films Sin Nombre and Jane Eyre.
Beasts of No Nation will star Golden Globe-winning actor Idris Elba, who played Detective John Luther in the BBC series Lutherand starred in the film Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom. Elba played drug lord Russell “Stringer” Bell in HBO’s series The Wire. Elba will next be seen in Pierre Morel’s The Gunman, alongside Sean Penn and Javier Bardem.
Beasts of No Nationwill tell the story of a young boy that's made to join a group of soldiers in West Africa.
“There are hundreds of thousands of children fighting as soldiers in conflicts around the world and with Beasts of No Nation, Cary has succeeded in humanizing their terrible struggle with an incredibly emotional story and brilliant filmmaking built around Idris Elba and Abraham Attah’s performances,” said Jonathan King, EVP, Narrative Film at Participant Media.
The film will debut later this year in select theaters in the U.S. and worldwide on Netflix. A theatrical release is required for Academy Award consideration.
According to Deadline, Netflix paid nearly $12 million for the film and will promoting it heavily during Oscar season.
“‘Beasts of No Nation is a powerful film that unfolds beautifully in the hands of director Cary Fukunaga with Idris Elba delivering a career-defining performance,” Netflix Chief Content Officer Ted Sarandos said in a statement. “We are so proud to bring a film of this caliber exclusively to Netflix members around the world at the same time as it appears in select theaters.”
“Making this film has been one of the most profound professional experiences of our careers. Everyone, from Cary to our production assistants, sacrificed so much to make this film authentically in West Africa, where Uzo’s story was set,” said Red Crown Productions co-founder Daniela Taplin Lundberg. “To know that this harrowing and beautiful movie is going to reach the more than 50 million people within Netflix’s reach is beyond our wildest dreams. The Netflix team is bold and has the same pioneering spirit about distribution that I like to think we had about making the film in the jungles of Ghana. We could not be happier about this partnership.”
Cary Fukunaga won the the 2014 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series for True Detective. Fukunaga is currently developing a two-part feature adaptation of Stephen King’s It.
SOURCE: TV BY THE NUMBERS
