Magnolia, Searchlight add to Sundance deal volume

Magnolia and Participant finalised a long-in-the-works Page One deal following an all-night session. Magnolia will release Andrew Rossi’s documentary about The New York Times theatrically later this year and Participant will build a social advocacy campaign exploring the challenges of journalism in the present day.

Magnolia svp Tom Quinn negotiated the deal with Submarine’s Josh Braun along with Diane Weyermann, Jeff Ivers and Ricky Strauss for Participant Media. Braun was one of the producers.

Searchlight’s deal follows yesterday’s worldwide swoop on Homework and the studio plans a 2011 threatrical release after evp of worldwide acquisitions Tony Safford, vp of acquisitions Ray Strache and svp of business affairs Megan O’Brien did the deal with Richard Klubeck, Rena Ronson and David Flynn of red-hot UTA on behalf of the filmmakers.

Elizabeth Olsen has earned strong reviews for her starring role in Sean Durkin’s drama as a cult refugee who moves in with her sister and her husband.

Earlier in the day IFC took The Ledge, Sundance Selects sealed a deal for Buck and National Geographic took Life In A Day.

Kevin Iwashina of Preferred Content and Cassian Elwes closed the Ledge deal with IFC in Park City at 5am [24] today. Charlie Hunnam, Liv Tyler, Patrick Wilson and Terrence Howard star in the story of a man who recounts recent events in his life to a troubled police officer who tries to talk him down from jumping off a high-rise building. Matthew Chapman directed.

Mark Damon and Michael Mailer produced and Damon’s Foresight Unlimited is handling foreign sales and as previously reported on Screendaily has closed a number of key territories. “We had a few distributors after it,” Damon said. “But in the end we didn’t want to let go of IFC and they didn’t want to let go of us.” IFC will release theatrically this summer.

Wearing her Sundance Selects hat, IFC head buyer Arianna Bocco closed a deal with Submarine’s Josh Braun for North American rights to Cindy Meehl’s Buck, playing in the US Documentary Competition section. The film focuses on Buck Brannaman, a living legend in the horse world.

Meanwhile Daniel Battsek’s National Geographic picked up US rights to Scott Free UK and Kevin Macdonald’s Life In A Day ahead of the world premiere on Thursday.

Macdonald and his editing team stitched together more than 4,500 hours from around 80,000 submissions from 190 countries to create a 90-minute snapshot of global existence. People were invited via YouTube to submit footage of themselves taken on July 24, 2010. Ridley Scott served as executive producer on the experiment.

The film will stream live on YouTube simultaneously with the Sundance premiere and National Geographic has set a July 24 theatrical release day-and-date with YouTube. Kattie Evans from National Geographic negotiated the deal with Tim Haslam of HanWay on behalf of Scott Free UK.