NEON Nabs North American Rights To Ali Abbasi’s “Border” Following World Premiere In Cannes

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Immediately following the world premiere, NEON acquired the North American rights to Border, a troll love story directed by Ali Abbasi (Shelley) and based on a novel by the writer of Let the Right One In.

The Swedish genre film made its World Premiere yesterday at the Cannes Film Festival in Un Certain Regard.  Films Boutique is handling worldwide sales.

Border is the second feature from Iranian-born Danish director Abbasi. He co-scripted the film with Isabella Eklöf, in collaboration with novelist John Ajvide Lindqvist (Let the Right One In). The film tells the story of a border guard (Eva Melander) who has the ability to smell human emotions and catch smugglers. When she comes across a mysterious man with a smell that confounds her detection, she is forced to confront hugely disturbing insights about herself and humankind.


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Border is produced by Nina Bisgaard, Piodor Gustafsson and Petra Jönsson for Meta Film Stockholm, Spark Film & TV and Kärnfilm, in co-production with Meta Film Denmark, together with Film i Väst, SVT and Copenhagen Film Fund. The Swedish Film Institute and Nordisk Film & TV Fond provided production support. The film was also supported by the Danish Film Institute, MEDIA and Eurimages.

ABOUT NEON:
Founded by Tom Quinn (CEO) and Co-Founder Tim League, NEON’S debut film was Nacho Vigalondo’s Colossal, starring Anne Hathaway and Jason Sudeikis released April 7th, 2016.  NEON was an active buyer at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival, acquiring Reinaldo Marcus Green’s Monsters & Men, winner of the Sundance Dramatic Special Jury Award for Outstanding First Feature; Sam Levinson’s Assassination Nation; and Tim Wardle’s Three Identical Strangers, winner of the Sundance Special Jury Award for Storytelling. 

In its record breaking inaugural year, NEON released the runaway hit ($30M), 3 Golden Globe and Academy Award nominee and eventual winner I, Tonya by director Craig Gillespie, starring Margot Robbie and Golden Globe  / Oscar Winner for Best Supporting, Actress Allison Janney; Eliza Hittman’s Sundance Award Winner Beach Rats, Matt Spicer’s Sundance and Spirit Award Winner Ingrid Goes West; Laura Poitras’s Risk, Ana Lily Amirpour’s Venice Award Winner The Bad Batch and Errol Morris’, The B-Side


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Other upcoming NEON releases include Aaron Katz’s Gemini (Opening 3/30); Harmony Korine’s The Beach Bum and the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival Opening Night film by Janus Metz, Borg Vs  McEnroe (Opening 4/13); and Coralie Fargeat’s groundbreaking feature film debut Revenge (Opening 5/11).  NEON also recently announced a partnership with 30WEST as the sole majority investor in the film studio.

Films Boutique

Films Boutique, a Berlin-based sales company, has been thriving with critically acclaimed, director-driven movies in the last years, notably Ildiko Enyedi’s ON BODY & SOUL (Golden Bear 2017 and Oscar nominated), Houda Benyamina’s “Divines”, which won the Camera d’Or in Cannes; Lav Diaz's "The Woman Who Left", Golden Lion in Venice, Ciro Gerra's "Embrace of the Serpent", Directors' Fortnight winner and Oscar nom for Best Foreign Language Film.

The company unveiled 6 films in Cannes official selections this year, notably Cristina Gallego & Ciro Guerra’s BIRDS OF PASSAGE, opening film of Directors’ Fortnight.