Film sales and finance company Global Constellation has completed the first sale of Cannes’ blockbuster animated comedy Jim Queen, which will be screened at Annecy International Airport. Animation film festival.
Following a much-hyped premiere in Cannes’ late-night slot, the film will be released in Italy (I Wonder Pictures), Benelux (O’Brother), Germany (Capelight Pictures), Switzerland (Praesens), Austria (Polyfilm), Spain (Filmin), Israel (Lev Cinema), Australia and New Zealand (Madman), Canada (Photon Films), Brazil (Pandora Filmes/Belas Artes Grupo), and Mexico (Pimienta). It was sold on. Films) and Taiwan (Creative Century), with additional territories in talks including the United States.
Jokers Films released the film in French theaters on June 17th, debuting at number 3 at the box office behind Toy Story 5 and Backroom. The film attracted more than 16,000 admissions on 95 screens in its opening day, and over 54,000 admissions (valued at $450,000) in its first weekend of release.
The film will be directed by Marco Nguyen and Nicolas Asene and produced by Bobby Pills’ David Alric and Arthur Delavaise.
Hailed by Variety’s Guy Lodge as “a hilarious adult animation with a literal twist” and “contagiously dizzying,” the film provoked a rapturous response from the Cannes audience, with the Lumière Grand Théâtre “laughing, singing and ultimately erupting into a raucous late-night standing ovation,” Global Constellation said, and Cannes director Thierry Frémaux said: “Jim Queen” was one of the most beautiful films screened in the festival’s history. ”
A wildly comedic exploration of identity, fame, and queer culture at stake, the film tells the story of Jim, the ultimate gym queen, influencer, and object of universal covetment at the top of Paris’s gay scene. But his reign ends overnight when a strange virus called Heterosis begins to turn homosexual men straight. Unfollowed, abandoned, and stripped of his position, Jim is left with only one unexpected ally: Lucian. Lucien is a devoted, skinny guy with loyalty over influence. Together, they venture into the strange chaos of the Marais in pursuit of an unscrupulous doctor who is rumored to have a cure.
Co-written by Simon Balteaux and Brice Chevillard, Jim Queen is produced by Bobbypills, one of Europe’s most cutting-edge adult animation studios. Bobby Pills recently produced Creature Commandos, directed by James Gunn, the first television series and first official chapter for DC Universe, DC Studios and Warner Bros. Animation. Their credits also include “Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Remix,” produced for Ubisoft Film & Television and Netflix, and the adult animated series “Crisis Jung” and “Vermin,” currently streaming on Netflix.
Alumni of the Gobelin School, Nguyen and Assane bring extensive experience across animated features, series, and games, with significant credits on such acclaimed works as “Climb of the Gods,” “Ernest and Celestine,” “The Big Bad Fox and Other Stories,” “The Swallows of Kabul,” “Rabbi’s Cat,” and “The Red Turtle.”
Jim Queen is co-produced by Eumedia (The Count of Monte Cristo, The Night of the Calypse), in collaboration with Eurimage (Council of Europe), Avence sur l’Esset (CNC), Nouvelle Aquitaine, Charente and Réunion.
Moby and Lindsay Hicks are executive producers for Little Walnut in the US, and Katarzyna Janiak and Jacek Śvygost are executive producers for Timeless Studios.
Jim Queen is one of three animated features Global Constellation will represent at Annecy this year, along with Sébastien Rodenbach’s Viva Carmen, which is screening in competition following its debut at Cannes Directors’ Fortnight, and Reza Memari’s The Last Whale Singer, which is screening in the Annecy Presents category.
