I am the first to acknowledge that I am horribly biased when it comes to the work of Spanish film maker Nacho Vigalondo. I fell in love with his work the first time I saw his Oscar nominated short 7:35 In The Morning and we've built up a friendship over the years that that has since developed into a loose, informal working relationship that got me credited as an associate producer on his debut feature Time Crimes and which is about to become a whole lot more formal when I step into the producer's role on Vigalondo's next feature, The Ramp, which involves a man building a giant ramp in the country from which he intends to jump his car and land it on a passing UFO. If you or anyone you know has a large bag of money you'd like to give us to make this film happen you should contact me. Really.
Anyway, all that to say that I'm biased but it's quickly become clear that I'm not the only one who feels this way about Vigalondo and his work. Time Crimes took home the gold at the 2007 Fantastic Fest, where it won Best Picture and placed second in audience polling, and the film drew strong reactions on its European debut at Sitges. And today word came down that Magnolia Pictures have acquired worldwide rights to the film. They plan a 2008 theatrical release and will be selling international rights at the upcoming AFM. Continue on for the full press release.
Magnolia Pictures Acquires World Rights to Nacho Vigalondo’s TIMECRIMES, Winner of “Best Feature” Prize at Fantastic Fest 2007
NEW YORK – Magnolia Pictures announced today the acquisition of world rights (excluding Spain) to director Nacho Vigalondo’s TIMECRIMES, a clever, mind-bendingly entertaining sci-fi film about a man who inadvertently discovers the perils of time travel. TIMECRIMES premiered at the 2007 Fantastic Fest film festival in Austin, where it received the “Best Feature” Prize and the Silver Medal for Audience Award, and went on to be a crowd pleaser at Sitges. The film will be screened at AFM by Laird Adamson, Head of International sales for HDNet, who will be handling all international sales.
TIMECRIMES is the feature film debut from Vigalongo, who is already an accomplished director of short films—his 2003 short, 7:35 IN THE MORNING, was nominated for an Oscar for Best Live Action Short. A self professed avid science fiction reader, Vigalongo was inspired to tell the story of a man who travels back in time and runs into himself, setting into motion a disastrous chain of unforeseeable consequences. Though the film’s aesthetic hearkens back to classic American crime films the story is closer in spirit to the science fiction of Philip K. Dick and Stanislaw Lem. A wickedly funny, jigsaw puzzle of a film, TIMECRIMES has excellent potential for an English language remake, and multiple parties are already pursuing the rights.
TIMECRIMES is an incredibly fresh, brilliantly cinematic take on the time travel concept. Nacho is a serious talent and we're excited to be involved with him at the start of what promises to be a great career,” said Magnolia President Eamonn Bowles.
“Working with Magnolia on TIMECRIMES is a dream come true. Knowing that my film is going to be shown in USA is something I can’t describe,” added Vigalongo.
“We are so excited to be working with Magnolia, not only because they’re the best company to market an extraordinary foreign language genre film like Nacho’s, but especially because of the commitment they show towards the films that they love," said Eduardo Carneros, Managing Director of KV Entertainment and joint owner of the company together with the Ibarretxe brothers.
The deal was negotiated by Magnolia’s Senior Vice President Tom Quinn, Director of Acquisitions Dori Begley, and Head of Business Affairs, Jason Janego, along with producer Eduardo Carneros. Magnolia will release the film theatrically in 2008.
About Magnolia
Magnolia Pictures (www.magpictures.com) is the theatrical and home entertainment distribution arm of the Wagner/Cuban Companies, a vertically integrated group of media properties co-owned by Todd Wagner and Mark Cuban that also include the Landmark Theatres chain, production companies 2929 Productions and HDNet Films, and high-definition cable networks HDNet and HDNet Movies.
This is incredibly exciting news! Todd you had mentioned Timecrimes for some time and having now seen it 4 times it only continued to get better and far exceeded initial expectations (which were already heightened). Best of luck at AFM.
I can't wait to see what Nacho and you and everyone else cooks up on the next outing (and hope it's not too long of a wait).
Where is the karaoke party to celebrate this?
Yeah, the sale has been brewing for a little while and I've been itching for the chance to say something. Hopefully The Ramp shouldn't take too long. Script will be done next month, then it's just a matter of rounding up the cash and this sale should prove to people that Nacho's commercially viable, which is always half the battle.
Karaoke? Heard today Nacho's going to be at AFM so there's a fighting chance the microphones will be broken out there ...
Yowza! This is great news. As a basically neutral party before I saw it, I was mighty impressed by TIMECRIMES - ok, really, I was fairly well blown away, just because it touched so many bases in such an elegant manner. I'm very happy to hear this. Nacho is a great guy and is clearly brimming with good ideas.
Can I be a production assistant on THE RAMP? As you know, I work cheap ...
Nacho is one of the best new directors, along with Bong Joon-ho.