Daisy Ridley’s We Bury the Dead is bought by Vertical Entertainment ahead of Cannes

The upcoming Cannes market is seeing a whole slew of films picked up by distributors, including the 70s serial killer thriller, Golden State Killer, starring James Franco and Vincent Gallo. Deadline is now reporting that Daisy Ridley’s post-apocalyptic zombie film, We Bury the Dead, has also been sold. We Bury the Dead has been acquired by Vertical Entertainment.

Vertical Partner Peter Jarowey made a statement about the acquisition that said, “With a great cast led by Daisy Ridley and Brenton Thwaites, Zak has re-energized the zombie genre with We Bury the Dead. Next year, North American audiences will be on the edge of their seats watching this post-apocalyptic thriller.” Scripted by Hilditch, We Bury the Dead is said to be “a story about grief, loss, and the undead.” Ridley takes on the role of Ava, a desperate woman whose husband is missing in the aftermath of a catastrophic military experiment. Hoping to find him alive, Ava joins a “body retrieval unit,” but her search takes a chilling turn when the corpses she’s burying start showing signs of life.

Ridley is joined in the cast by Brenton Thwaites (Titans) and Mark Coles Smith (Mystery Road: Origin). The project was fully financed by Screen Australia, Screenwest, Lotterywest, the WA Regional Screen Fund, and Gramercy Park Media. We Bury the Dead is being produced by Kelvin Munro and Grant Sputore of The Penguin Empire, as well as Ross Dinerstein of Campfire Studios and Joshua Harris and Mark Fasano of Gramercy Park Media. Nathan Klingher and Ford Corbett are executive producing.

When We Bury the Dead was first announced, Sputore provided the following statement: “We’re thrilled to join forces with Zak and Campfire on this project. Zak is uniquely gifted when it comes to making movies that are just as moving as they are terrifying. Bringing one of his projects to our home state of Western Australia is especially exciting.“ Hilditch had this to say: “Having Daisy play the role of Ava is an absolute dream come true. She embodies the perfect mix of vulnerability, grit, and determination that Ava exudes throughout the film.“

When the film screened at SXSW, our Chris Bumbray found the movie to be nothing particularly special when he said in his review, “As such, We Bury the Dead, for all its ambitions, can’t help but occasionally feel like a retread. With so much zombie content out there, it’s very difficult to add anything new to the genre. Inevitably, this movie doesn’t manage to overcome the familiarity of the genre, but even still, it is mostly entertaining for much of its running time thanks to the ace technical packaging, and good performances from Ridley and Thwaites. It’s solid but unspectacular.”

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