Cannes UCR jury prize winner ‘Joyland’ seals UK-Ireland deal (exclusive):

UK-based Studio Soho has acquired UK and Ireland rights to Cannes 2022 Un Certain Regard jury prize winner Joyland from Film Constellation.

Saim Sadiq’s debut feature was the first film by a Pakistani director to be selected for Cannes and also won the festival’s Queer Palme award.

It follows a patriarchal family as they yearn for the birth of a baby boy to continue the family line, while their youngest son secretly joins an erotic dance theatre and falls for an ambitious trans starlet. Their impossible love story begins to illuminate the entire family’s desire for a sexual rebellion.

Ali Junejo, Alina Khan, Rasti Farooq, Sarwat Gilani, Sohail Sameer, Salman Peerzada, and Sania Saeed star.

Sadiq’s previous short film Darling won the best short film award in the Horizons strand of the 2019 Venice Film Festival.

Joyland will have its UK premiere at London Film Festival on October 6 and will play as part of the first feature competition.

It is produced by the US’s All Caps and Pakistan’s Khoosat Films in association with Diversity Hire, One Two Twenty Entertainment, Blood Moon Creative, Film Manufacturers Inc., Astrakan AB, and Noruz Films. The producers are Apoorva Guru Charan, Sarmad Sultan Khoosat and Lauren Mann.

Other titles released by Studio Soho include The Man Who Sold His Skin, Sadie Frost’s directorial debut Quant and Cannes title Here We Are.

View this article at Screen Daily.