WestEnd Films is set to embark on an English-language remake of “Rams,” part of a new co-production partnership WestEnd has signed with Australia’s
WBMC.
The original “Rams,” a hit Icelandic film about two long-estranged brothers in a remote valley who must reconcile in order to save their sheep, won Un Certain Regard’s top prize at the 2015
Cannes Film Festival. The remake will be adapted by Australian screenwriter Jules Duncan and will shoot in Western Australia.
It is the first collaboration between WestEnd and WBMC under a newly announced strategic partnership, which calls on the two companies to develop and produce new feature films and television projects. The deal will give WestEnd a first-look option to co-finance and sell projects from the WBMC slate as well as co-develop and co-produce new material, while offering WBMC access to additional financing and international distribution for its projects.
Eve Schoukroun, co-managing director of WestEnd, said the company had sought an Australian partner in response to the “fantastic projects and talent coming out of Australia” but also the “great incentives to making films in Australia.”
“Australia can sometimes feel a long way from the rest of the world, so sharing WestEnd’s marketplace knowledge and connection is a great advantage for us,” added WBMC President Janelle Landers.
The new partnership will also see the companies develop and acquire projects for WestEnd’s WeLove brand, which aims to deliver high-quality commercial projects for a female audience, working primarily with female creative talent. The companies are already developing an adaptation of Adele Dumont’s asylum-seeker memoir “No Man Is an Island” for the banner.
