WarnerIndependent Pictures (WiP) has acquired all rights in North America and the UKto Hany Abu-Assad's Berlin Audience Award winning drama Paradise Now.

The film, which was one of the most talked about at thefestival, follows two Palestinian childhood friends whose planned suicide bombstrike on Tel Aviv is thrown into chaos after they are separated from their handlersat the Israeli border.

Abu-Assad wrotethe story with Bero Beyer of Augustus Film, who also served as producer. KaisNashef and Ali Suliman star.

WiP senior vice president of production and acquisitionsPaul Federbush negotiated the deal with Hengameh Panahi and Charlotte Mickie ofCelluloid Dreams.

"The combinationof the Audience Award and Amnesty International Award for Paradise Now in Berlin prove what we have alwaysbelieved about the movie - that the film is humanistic and balanced,politically scrupulous and accessible," Panahi said in a statement.

During theBerlinale the Israeli Film Fund announced that it would offer the picture thesame distribution support if offers to other home-produced features when itopens in Israel.