The streaming giant has announced a major play that concluded in the final days of the EFM, flexing its mighty claws for all rights to one of the hottest packages in Berlin.
Netflix plans a multi-territory release in 2016 on Jadotville, the upcoming war thriller to star Jamie Dornan of Fifty Shades Of Grey and Guillaume Canet that Bloom introduced to international buyers at the recent market.
It is understood the release will incorporate a qualifying theatrical run for awards consideration. Netflix cut the deal with UTA Independent Film Group on behalf of the film-makers.
Commercials and video director Richie Smyth will direct from Kevin Brodbin’s screenplay and partners with producer Alan Moloney of Parallel Film.
Principal photography is set to begin in April on what Smyth and Moloney recently described to Screen in Berlin as an epic story of heroism that weaves together action, intrigue and geopolitics.
Dornan, riding high after the $266.4m global launch of Fifty Shades Of Grey over the weekend, will play Irish UN battalion commander Patrick Quinlan against the backdrop of an actual 1961 stand-off at a Congolese mine.
The soldier led 150 men in defiance of a 3,000-strong force of local troops and French and Belgian mercenaries. Canet will portray a French commander who sought to defeat Quinlan and his men.
The story received little publicity in Ireland until recently, when the heroics of Quinlan and his men finally earned recognition.
UTA and United represent Dornan.
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