Tinder Swindler studio AGC Unwritten has sold US rights to Monica Villamizar and Jordan Bryon’s feature documentary Transition to Gravitas Ventures.
The film follows Australian filmmaker Bryon, a trans man, as he embeds with a Taliban unit as they retake control of Afghanistan.
The primary subjects of the story are Bryon, Afghan cinematographer Farzad Fetrat (Teddy) and Iranian-Canadian photojournalist Kiana Hayeri.
AGC International will screen Transition and launch international sales at the AFM next week, and Gravitas Ventures plans a March 2024 release.
The documentary received its world premiere at Tribeca Festival and has played in official selection at Sheffield DocFest, Sydney Film Festival, and the Human Rights Film Festival in Berlin where it won the Audience Award this past weekend.
It will screen at International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) and Watch Docs festivals in the coming weeks.
Villamizar served as producer and AGC Unwritten and Our Time Projects financed Transition. Oscar-nominated documentary director Matthew Heineman (Cartel Land) serves as executive producer with AGC Studios head Stuart Ford, Lourdes Diaz, Joel Zimmer, BJ Levin, Sebastian Hernandez, Juan Manuel Betancourt and Joedan Okun.
AGC Unwritten president Zimmer and Gravitas VP of acquisitions and international sales Danielle Gasher announced the deal on Thursday.
“We are so thrilled to be partnering with AGC on Bryon and Villamizar’s hard-hitting documentary,” said Gravitas. “The film offers an incredible look at one man’s personal journey in a larger-than-life tense political setting.”
Zimmer stated, “We’re proud of this award-winning, powerful film and look forward to partnering with Gravitas to share it with a wider audience.”
Bryon has won two Baftas and a Human Rights Award, among others. His debut feature documentary Birds Of The Borderlands shot in Jordan, and screened at 12 international film festivals.
He has lived and worked in Afghanistan where he has co-directed diverse features including two-time Bafta-winning Children Of The Taliban on Channel 4, and one episode of The Brave which won an Emmy in the Short Format Daytime Program class.
Villamizar is a Colombian-American director, producer and on-air reporter who has won three Emmys. She produced Showtime’s docuseries The Trade, which premiered at 2020 Sundance Film Festival, and was also a producer on Heineman’s award-winning National Geographic documentary The First Wave.
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