Berlin: Picture Tree Intl. Rolls Out Pre-Sales on Box Office Hit ‘100 Things’ (EXCLUSIVE)
By John Hopewell
LOS ANGELES (Variety.com) – MADRID — In the long run-up to February’s Berlin Festival, Picture Tree Intl. has rolled out multiple pre-sales on “100 Things,” which Warner Bros. Pictures bowed in Germany on Dec. 6 to a robust first eight-day €2.7 million ($3.07 million).
“100 Things” will receive a market screening at the Berlinale’s European Film Market.
The third feature from Florian David Fitz as a writer-director and actor, whose 2016 “The Most Beautiful Day” earned in Germany, “100 Things” was released in its original German language day-and-date with Germany in Belgium (Kino Scala) and Luxembourg (Utopia).
Of major territories, Intl. has also closed CIS and the Baltic States with Volgafilm, which has scheduled a theatrical release in Russia in the first quarter of next year, and with China’s Red Apollo Group, which aims to release “100 Things” in Chinese theaters third-quarter 2019.
Inspired by the Finnish documentary “My Stuff,” “100 Things” has also closed former Yugoslavia (2i Film D.O.O.). the Czech Republic (AQS) and Taiwan (Moviecloud)
Picture Tree Intl. is now in what co-managing director Yuan Rothbauer describes as “intensive talks” with France, Spain, all Latin America, Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong and airlines.
Described by the sales company as a comedic family-targeting buddy movie, “100 Things” stars Fitz and fellow German star Matthias Schweighöfer (“Rabbit Without Ears”) as Paul and Toni who are inseparable, from each other and their things – Toni’s espresso machine. Paul’s smart phone, Toni hair-growth pills. Paul’s Amazon, Siri and sacred sneakers. They’re also constant rivals. In a 100-day wager, they commit to giving up everything they own, which finds them on Day 1 at home, naked and freezing.
A high-concept movie teaching the relative importance of possessions and addicted consumerism, “100 Things” has Toni and Paul asking how much they really need and whether they had become robot consumers.
Schweighofer produced, directed and starred in Amazon Prime Video’s first German-language Original Series, the 2017 “You Are Wanted.” “100 Things” is produced by Schweighofer’s Pantaleon Ent. in co-production Warner Bros. Ent.
News of pre-sales on “100 Things” comes just days after PTI announced it had acquired world sales rights to Berlin competition player “The Ground Beneath My Feet,” an Austrian drama directed by Marie Kreutzer and starring Valerie Pachner, Mavie Hörbiger and Pia Hierzegger.
“We are very excited to present the film to all the buyers during the and EFM. I personally love Marie Kreutzer’s work so much, and I am a big fan of Valerie Pachner, since I got to know her from “Egon Schiele – Death and the Maiden,” said Yuan Rothbauer.
Picture Tree already sold Kreutzer’s third and most recent film, 2016’s “We Used to be Cool,” produced, like “The Ground Beneath My Feet,” by Vienna-based Novotny & Novotny – evidence of the strategy of PTI under Andreas Rothbauer, who founded the company in 2011, of growing relations with talent. It also aims for a slate of disparate titles, its line-up of up to 15 films a year designed “to ensure the right mix of arthouse and crossover productions to fully maximize the revenue potential of each film,” it explained in a company statement.
Also on its slate, for example, and screened at last week’s Ventana Sur, is “Ever After,” a feminist zombie road movie sold by PTI to the U.S. (Juno Films), France (E-Cinema), Japan (New Select) and Mexico.
