Post-apocalyptic tale, executive produced by Louis Leterrier, marks feature debut for Jean-Patrick Benes [pictured], director of hit TV series Kaboul Kitchen.
French director Jean-Patrick Benes’ post-apocalyptic tale Ares, about a free-fighter trying to keep his family safe, is beginning to entice buyers for Gaumont.
The film, which started shooting last week, has sold to South Korea (Double and Joy), Greece (Odeon), former Yugoslavia (Pa-Dora) and Turkey (Calinos).
As reported yesterday, Tiberius acquired German rights.
It marks a first feature for Benes who wrote and directed the hit TV series Kaboul Kitchen, about a French-run restaurant serving the expat community in post 9/11 Afghanistan. The programme won a Fipa d’Or at the international television festival in Biarritz in 2012.
The feature is co-produced by Gaumont and Matthieu Tarot’s Albertine Productions with The Incredible Hulk director Louis Leterrier taking an executive credit.
The film pulls together an impressive crew featuring Colombiana and 3 Days to Kill DOP Dominique Fouassier and visual effects guru Alain Carsoux.
Set in a not distant future, Ares unfolds against the backdrop of an age in which France has slipped behind economically to become one of the world’s poorer nations.
The film’s protagonist Pablo, nicknamed Ares after the Greek god of war, is a veteran professional fighter who earns his living competing in the odd second rate contest and odds jobs as a security man.
When his coach proposes he try out a fitness new drug which is still in the experimental stage, Ares declines but when his political activist sister is arrested on firearms charges, he is forced to reconsider his decision.
Other pictures on Gaumont’s slate include Franco-Iranian comedian and actor Kheiron’s feature debut All Three of Us in which he co-stars alongside Leïla Bekhti, Zabou Breitman, Gerard Darmon as an Iranian political activist in post revolutionary Iran in the 1970s and 1980s.
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