Mk2 Films has acquired international rights to Raoul Peck’s Untitled Ernest Cole Documentary, with Magnolia Pictures taking rights for North America.
Mk2 will offer the project to buyers at this week’s Cannes market. Magnolia, who distributed Peck’s previous film I am Not Your Negro plans a theatrical release of the new film.
Cole, the first Black South African freelance photographer, captured the conditions of Blacks living under apartheid in his early photographs. He fled South Africa and lived in exile for a few years in the US. While there, he took photographs in New York City and in the South.
Peck’s Velvet Film, in collaboration with the Ernest Cole Family Estate, will work on the project. They have secured exclusive access to images from the family’s archive that were never before seen by the general public. Peck and Tamara Rosenberg are producing the film. It will be based on Cole’s writings, photographs and stories as well as those of his close friends.
Magnolia co-CEO Dori Beagle commented: “The chance to serve auteurs such as the great Raoul Peck, is why we do our work.” Team Magnolia is excited to share the story of this essential artist, guided by his unmatched vision and integrity.
Peck said: “Ernest Cole’s long, sometimes painful, and tedious journey to America takes me back to an era in my life when I developed my political commitment and artistic stamina.” I profoundly feel, cherish, and treasure his human eye on the facts of life and his piercing acuity over our terrible contradictions.”
Fionnuala Jamison, mk2 Films’ managing director, said: “The combination of a powerful human rights story, Ernest Cole’s own struggles as an exiled artist, and the mystery around his negatives and legacy promise to deliver an incredibly moving and thrilling film from the masterful documentarian.”
