Cannes 2021 Title: Foe

From Deadline: 

"Saoirse Ronan, Paul Mescal and LaKeith Stanfield will star in Foe, an adaptation of the Iain Reid bestselling science fiction novel. Lion helmer Garth Davis will direct a script he wrote with the author and filming will get underway in January in Australia. Pic takes shape as a hot title in the upcoming Cannes Virtual Market, with FilmNation brokering international rights and CAA Media Finance and UTA’s Independent Film Group co-repping domestic rights.

“I’ve been on the hunt to do something in sci-fi, it was always on my bucket list, and also to find material I could make an actor’s piece with a Cassavetian level of performance,” Davis told Deadline. “I read Foe and could not put it down. It’s incredibly suspenseful, very moving and dealt with sci-fi in a most grounded way that spoke to where we are heading as a society, with a lot of the questions we all have, explored in a profound way. And the love story just broke my heart, this story of self-determination, fighting for the things that are most precious in our lives, and reminding audiences that this time we have here is precious and the way we treat each other is the way we need to be treating the planet. Foe was just a bull’s-eye, for me.”

The film is a taut, sensual, psychological mind-bender set in the near future where corporate power and environmental decay are ravaging the planet. Junior (Mescal) and Hen (Ronan) are a young couple married seven years and living a solitary life on their isolated farm. One night, a stranger named Terrance (Stanfield) knocks on their door, bringing news that throws their lives into turmoil: Junior has been randomly selected to travel to a large, experimental space station orbiting Earth. The most unusual part? Arrangements have already been made so that when he leaves, Hen won’t have a chance to miss him, because she won’t be left alone—not even for a moment. Hen will have familiar company that pushes her to make a life-changing decision.

Producers are Kerry Kohansky-Roberts of Anonymous Content, Davis through his I Am That shingle, and See-Saw Films’ Emile Sherman and Iain Canning. Reid and Samantha Lang are the executive producers and the film is an Anonymous Content Studios production."

Read the full article on Deadline here.