EXCLUSIVE: Magnify has bolstered its Cannes sales slate with international rights to Pete Ohs’ recent SXSW genre-bender The True Beauty Of Being Bitten By A Tick.
The Narrative Spotlight premiere stars Zoë Chao, whose credits include Bubble & Squeak, as a young woman whose idyllic rural escape unravels after a tick bite triggers a series of unsettling transformations.
The cast includes Callie Hernandez (Jethica, La La Land), Jeremy O. Harris (The Sweet East), and James Cusati-Moyer (Maestro).
Ohs, Hernandez, Harris, Chao, and Cusati-Moyer co-wrote the screenplay, and the producers are Ohs, Hernandez (Invention), Harris (Slave Play. Not a Movie. A Play.), and Josh Godfrey (Caddo Lake). CAA Media represents US rights.
Austin Kennedy, director of sales at Magnify, called the film “an unexpected, genre-bending gem that surprises at every turn”, adding: “We’re thrilled to team up with Pete again and platform him on the global stage as one of the most exciting and explorative voices in the next generation of filmmakers.”
Ohs most recently produced and directed the horror satire Jethica, which premiered at SXSW in 2022, and the absurdist comedy Love And Work that premiered at Slamdance in 2024. He co-wrote, produced, and shot Albert Birney’s fantasy adventure and Sundance 2025 selection OBEX that Oscilloscope Laboratories snapped up for theatrical distribution. He is in post-production on Erupcja starring Charli XCX, which filmed in secret last summer.
The True Beauty Of Being Bitten by A Tick joins a Magnify sales slate that includes Gastón Solnicki’s The Souffluer starring Willem Dafoe; Ulrike Ottinger’s The Blood Countess with Isabelle Huppert; Filipiñana by Rafael Manuel, in partnership with Film4; Berlin Generation winner The Botanist directed by newcomer Jing Yi; and OBEX.
Kennedy will launch international sales on the Croisette with Phoebe Liebling, Magnify’s manager of global sales.
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