2009 Award-Winning Cannes Film Will Have North American Premiere at the 2009 Toronto Film Festival and U.S. Premiere at the 2009 New York Film Festival
New York (NY) (August 19, 2009) – IFC Films, one of the leading American distributors of independent and foreign films, announced today it has acquired U.S. rights to POLICE, ADJECTIVE, a smart policier about a cop on a surveillance mission who has a crisis of faith. Written and directed by Corneliu Porumboiu, the film is his follow up to "12:08 East of Bucharest" which won him the Camera d’Or prize at the 2006 Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best Foreign Film. POLICE, ADJECTIVE stars Dragos Bucur, Vlad Ivanov, Ion Stoica and Irina Saulescu.
POLICE, ADJECTIVE had its world premiere in the Un Certain Regard section of the 2009 Cannes Film Festival, winning the jury prize and FIPRESCI international critics’ prize. POLICE, ADJECTIVE will have its North American premiere in September at the Toronto Film Festival, followed by its U.S. premiere in October at the New York Film Festival.
The deal for POLICE ADJECTIVE was negotiated by Arianna Bocco, IFC Films VP of Acquisitions, with Pape Boye of Coach 14.
The acquisition of POLICE, ADJECTIVE marks IFC Films continued commitment to bring the best of Romanian cinema to the United States, following its successful distribution of Christian Mungiu’s Palme D’or winner 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days and their recent pickup of Mungiu’s Tales From The Golden Age, a collection of Romanian urban legends. The company has also released Cristian Nemescu’s California Dreamin’ which won the Un Certain Regard prize at Cannes and Radu Muntean’s Boogie (aka Summer Holiday). The deal also marks IFC Films’ fifth acquisition from the 2009 Cannes Film Festival including Tales from the Golden Age, Lars Von Trier’s Antichrist, Ken Loach’s Looking for Eric and Andrea Arnold’s Fishtank.
In POLICE, ADJECTIVE Cristi (Dragos Bucur) is a policeman who refuses to arrest a young man who offers hashish to two of his school mates. "Offering" is punished by the law. Cristi believes that the law will change, he does not want the life of a young man he considers irresponsible to be a burden on his conscience. For his superior the word conscience has a different meaning…
Jonathan Sehring, President of IFC Entertainment commented "Romanian films have been taking the world by storm, and we’re thrilled to continue bringing them to America. Corneliu Porumbiou’s POLICE, ADJECTIVE is surely the smartest and drolly funny film of the year with one of the most remarkable endings in recent memory. We’re happy to make this film available on all of our platforms next year."
IFC Films is releasing POLICE, ADJECTIVE via its IFC in Theaters platform which brings critically-acclaimed independent movies to on demand viewers at home the same day they premiere in theaters.
About IFC Entertainment
A leader in the independent film industry, IFC Entertainment consists of multiple brands that are devoted to bringing the best of specialty films to the largest possible audience: IFC Films, Festival Direct, IFC Productions, and the IFC Center. IFC Films is a leading distributor of independent film. Its unique day and date distribution model, ’IFC In Theaters,’ makes independent films available to a national audience by releasing them simultaneously in theaters as well as on cable’s On Demand platform and through Pay-Per-View, reaching 50 million homes. ’IFC Festival Direct’ features a wide selection of titles acquired from major international film festivals and offers them exclusively through Video on Demand. IFC Productions is a feature film production company that provides financing for select independent film projects. IFC Center is a three screen, state-of-the-art cinema with luxurious seating and HD digital and 35mm projection that shows art-house films in the heart of New York’s Greenwich Village. IFC Entertainment’s companies are subsidiaries of Rainbow Media Holdings LLC.