US Briefs: Spotlight acquires international rights to 'Courage'

Aaron Eckhart stars in Courage, based on Jim Dent’s novel Courage Beyond The Game: The Freddie Steinmark Story and Spotlight will commence sales at the EFM this week.

Angelo Pizzo directed the film about about a university athlete who receives a shocking diagnosis following an injury. Clarius distributed Courage in the US last November under the title My All American.

• Production is underway in the Los Angeles area on Mark Pellington’s The Last Word starring Shirley Maclaine and Amanda Seyfried. Bleecker Street will distribute the drama in the US and Myriad Pictures handles international sales at the EFM. Anne Heche, Philip Baker Hall and Scott Speedman and Tom Everett Scott round out the key cast.
• Kristin Stewart and Helena Bonham Carter are in talks and James Franco is attached to star in JT Leroy, about the hoax female blogger who passed herself off as a transgender male. LBI Entertainment /Aquarius / Rabbit Bandini Productions produce and Fortitude International represents international rights at the EFM.
• Broad Green Pictures has signed Emmy-nominated The Killing writer Veena Sud to write a remake of We Monsters, the German film by director Sebastian Ko that premiered in Toronto last autumn. In We Monsters, a husband and wife try to conceal a crime committed by their teenage daughter. 
• Keira Knightley is reportedly in talks to star opposite Will Smith in New Line/Village Roadshow’s drama Collateral Beauty. Warner Bros will distribute in the US on March 16.
• Music Box Films announced on Tuesday that it acquired The Innocents (formerly Agnus Dei) from Films Distribution following its world premiere in Sundance last month. Anne Fontaine’s drama centres on a convent in postwar Warsaw in the aftermath of a series of sexual assaults by Russian soldiers. The US release will take place in July and the film opens in France through Mars on Wednesday.
• Alcon Entertainment has set novelist Isaac Adamson to adapt psychological thriller The Ice Twins by S.K. Tremayne. The story centres on a couple whose daughter believes she is her recently deceased sister. Adamson wrote Bubbles, a biopic of Michael Jackson’s chimpanzee, which was the number one script last year on the Black List.
• Paladin will distribute Michael Damian’s dance-driven High Strung theatrically on more than 100 screens nationwide on April 8, 2016. The Orchard holds home entertainment rights and will launch the film in spring. Bloom Media handles worldwide sales and Disney acquired the majority of international rights.
• FilmBuff has come on board as worldwide distributor on Jane Wants A Boyfriend starring Louisa Krause and Eliza Dushku. The story of adult sisters will open theatrically and on digital platforms on March 25. William C. Sullivan directed from a screenplay by Jarrett Kerr. FilmBuff brokered the deal with the producers.
• Visual effects veteran Bill Romeo has launched the Burbank-based post house Picture Shop, a sister company to Formosa Group that will operate under the Picture Head umbrella.
• Warner Bros has moved up Untitled DC Film from March 23 2018 to March 16 2018. Untitled WB Event Movie will open on March 2 2018. Ready Player One moves from December 15 2017 to March 30 2018 and Untitled New Line Tentpole will be released on April 20 2018.