Focus Features chairman Peter Kujawski announced today that Focus has acquired the Cannes Film Festival’s opening night film Everybody Knows (Todos Los Saben).  Focus Features will distribute the film in the U.S., Canada, UK, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India, select Asian territories and the Middle East, apart from Iran.  Focus had previously acquired rights in Spain last year.

On the heels of his second Academy-Award® winner The Salesman following his first for A Separation, Asghar Farhadi wrote and directed this Spanish-language psychological thriller starring Penélope Cruz, Javier Bardem and Ricardo Darín.  The film follows Laura (Cruz) on her travels from Argentina to her small home town in Spain for her sister’s wedding, bringing her two children along for the occasion.  Amid the joyful reunion and festivities, the eldest daughter is abducted. In the tense days that follow, various family and community tensions surface and deeply hidden secrets are revealed.

“Asghar is a world-class filmmaker whose work transcends language,” said Focus chairman Peter Kujawski.  “Matching his talents with these emotionally charged performances from Penelope, Javier and Ricardo will leave audiences captivated.”

Everybody Knows is produced by Alexandre Mallet-Guy of Memento Films and Álvaro Longoria of Morena Films.

UTA Indie Film Group and Memento Films International negotiated the deal on behalf of the filmmaking team. Farhadi is represented by UTA.

Focus Features acquires and produces specialty films for the global market, and holds a library of iconic movies from fearless filmmakers.  Current and upcoming domestic releases from Focus include Jason Reitman’s new comedy Tully, starring Charlize Theron and written by Diablo Cody; Won’t You Be My Neighbor?, director Morgan Neville’s documentary on Mister Rogers; Lenny Abrahamson’s atmospheric thriller The Little Stranger; Joel Edgerton’s coming-of-age and coming-out drama Boy Erased, about a boy’s true-life experience at a conversion therapy program, starring Lucas Hedges, Nicole Kidman and Russell Crowe; Mary, Queen of Scots with Saoirse Ronan as Mary and Margot Robbie as Elizabeth I; On the Basis of Sex, the real-life drama of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg staring Felicity Jones and Armie Hammer; Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre’s directorial debut Mustang; and Spike Lee’s new film BlacKkKlansman.

For more information please visit www.focusfeatures.com

About The Author

Dean Rogers

Editor-in-Chief/Entertainment Reporter

I knew early on that I wanted to take my place among the stars. One day, my mother saw me reading The Washington Post at a very young age. Who would have known that it would be the building blocks of my journey? Since that day, I dedicated my life to learn all that is learnable. I read everything from encyclopedias, to books, to dictionaries, to magazines. I’m also an avid consumer of television, with my favorite genre being game shows. If you’ve seen me on Who Wants to be a Millionaire or Wheel of Fortune, then you know that this interest has served me well!

My unique style of reporting began back in junior high school, when I started to chronicle the events that shaped my life. Whether it was the annual family vacation or the local science fiction convention, I shot numerous pictures and recorded my thoughts so I could truly appreciate the history. During my senior year at Friendly High, I wrote what was to be my first masterpiece, “Advanced Space Academy – A One Week Journey.” I sent the eleven-page article back to the U.S. Space Camp staff. The article was highly praised for being “one of the best written articles in the history of U.S. Space Camp.” From then on, I knew what I wanted to do for rest of my life — to be a reporter.

Since then, I have trained in Broadcast Journalism at Bowie State University (2008) in Bowie, MD earning a B.S. in Communications. I gained experience in news production and editing through field experiences with Bowie Community Media Corporation, Prince George’s Community Television, and Bowie State University Television. I also wrote scripts for a variety of quiz shows for over five years.

As a lifelong movie buff, I now see close to 100 films every year. I took this love of movies to the next step when I became a co-host for Eclipse Magazine TV in the fall of 2005. While at EMTV, I interviewed celebrities, worked red carpets, and attended a wide variety of movie screenings. In January 2009, I took a leap of faith and started my own entertainment news magazine, The Rogers Revue. Shortly afterward, my life-long journey of studying the silver screen and writing about what I learned finally earned me a place in the Washington Area Film Critics Association.

All of this has led me here, giving you the latest entertainment news for the DMV and the entire nation, and I am truly excited for whatever will come next.

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