Cannes Prize-Winning Nepal Oscar Entry ‘Elephants in the Fog’ Sells Wide for Best Friend Forever (EXCLUSIVE)

Abinash Bikram Shah’s “Elephants in the Fog” has been sold to distributors across 10 territories, Best Friend Forever has revealed, as the Cannes Un Certain Regard Jury Prize winner plays at the Toronto Film Festival with Nepal‘s Oscars international feature submission also confirmed.

New deals put the film with MetFilm Distribution in the U.K., Filmin in Spain, Vedette in Benelux, Trigon in Switzerland, Lev Cinema in Israel, Jayantii in Australia, EFAR Films in India, PT Falcon in Indonesia and the Film Development Council of the Philippines. An inflight deal with Silk Route rounds out the announcement.

These join previously announced deals with Arizona Distribution and Les Valseurs Distribution in France, missingFILMs in Germany and Austria, Imovision in Brazil and The Tea Folks Films for local Nepal distribution. A pan-Latin America deal is expected shortly; North American rights are in advanced negotiations.

The film – which follows Pirati, matriarch of a Kinnar community in a forested Nepalese village, as she investigates the disappearance of one of her daughters during a nightly patrol against wild elephants – also leads the Asia Pacific Screen Awards nominations, picking up nods for best film, best director and best performance.

“Elephants in the Fog” is produced by Underground Talkies Nepal, Les Valseurs and Die Gesellschaft DGS. Co-producers include Enquadramento Produções, Bubbles Project, Zischlermann Filmproduktion, Storm Films, Jayantii Creations and ZDF/Das kleine Fernsehspiel & ZDF/ARTE.

Shah previously directed the short “Lori,” which received a Special Mention at the Cannes Short Film Competition in 2022.

Best Friend Forever also heads to TIFF with Midnight Madness titles “Vintage Violence” by Eugene Kotlyarenko and “Half” by Samjad, French adult animation “Blaise” – which took best film honors at both the Annecy Contrechamp competition and Fantasia – and Canada’s Oscars submission “Nina Roza” by Geneviève Dulude-De Celles.

The Brussels-based company launched at Cannes in 2019 as a sister outfit of Paris-based Indie Sales, and is managed by Martin Gondre, Charles Bin and Indie Sales co-founder Nicolas Eschbach.