Cannes Film Fest begins on a high note: Focus Features has acquired the opening night, Everybody Knows (Todos Los Saben), directed by two-time Oscar winning Iranian filmmaker Asghar Farhadi and starring Javier Bardem, Penelope Cruz and Ricardo Darin.
Focus has bought the film for the U.S., Canada, U.K., Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India, select Asian territories and the Middle East. It already had the film in Spain.
“Asghar is a world-class filmmaker whose work transcends language,” said Focus Features chairman Peter Kujawski. “Matching his talents with these emotionally charged performances from Penelope, Javier and Ricardo will leave audiences captivated.”
Farhadi, an Oscar winner for The Salesman and A Separation, wrote and directed the Spanish-language psychological thriller, which follows Laura (Cruz) on her travels from Argentina to her small home town in Spain for her sister’s wedding, bringing her two children along for the occasion. Amid a joyful reunion and festivities, the eldest daughter is abducted. This leads to various family and community tensions to surface and hidden secrets to be revealed.
The Focus deal had closed prior to the Tuesday night premiere; Netflix had also interest in buying the film.
UTA Indie Film Group and Memento Films International negotiated the deal on behalf of the filmmaking team. Farhadi is represented by UTA.
Everybody Knows was produced by Alexandre Mallet-Guy of Memento Films and Alvaro Longoria of Morena Films.