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Jumai Yusuf’s feature debut Cocoa Doll is being launched to international buyers at the Toronto Film Festival this week.

Co-producers and sales agents The Dazey Phase and Unger Media are shopping the horror pic about, Nora, a young Black woman who takes a caregiving job for the McNeils, a rich white family, only to discover they’re hiding a deadly secret.

Cocoa Doll was earlier selected for the Black List’s Muslim List. Yusuf wrote and and is set to direct the indie, which was inspired by caricatures of Black people from the Jim Crow era not lost to history.

“When I set out to write a horror film, I knew I had to tap into the things that truly haunt me. Cocoa Doll is my way of reminding people that Jim Crow isn’t some distant past. It’s a horrifyingly recent chapter of American history,” Yusuf said in a statement.

Set in a small coastal town in New Zealand, Mysterious Ways quietly explores what it means to follow your heart in the face of adversity. At the center of the story are Reverend Peter Simmons, the vicar of St. John’s Anglican Church, and his partner Jason, a former prisoner turned local rugby coach.

Peter is an openly loving man who believes the church’s message of acceptance and compassion. Under his leadership, St. John’s parish embraces people from all walks of life. But when Peter proposes to Jason over the radio and requests to wed in the church, it awakens reaction in their tight-knit community. Not all share Peter’s progressive values, and conservative forces within the diocese move to pressure the reverend into backing down.

Directed by Paul Oremland, Mysterious Ways follows Peter and Jason’s journey with subtlety. Shot elegantly on location around Auckland, it feels...

Specialty distributor Ariztical Entertainment has acquired international sales for Cannes on Paul Oremland’s LGBTQ+ drama Mysterious Ways excluding the UK and Germany.

British actor Richard Short from The Tragedy Of Macbeth and New Zealand’s Nick Afoa star in the story of the media storm that ensues when a vicar and his Samoan boyfriend announced plans to get married in a traditional church wedding.

The feature was shot in New Zealand with Ngaire Fuata, founding director of SunPix in Auckland, serving as producer. Executive producers include Taualeo’o Stephen Stehlin, Brian Holland, Tracey Gardiner and Jonathan Unger of Unger Media in Los Angeles.

Specialty distributor Ariztical Entertainment has acquired the North American rights to New Zealand-set wholesome gay love story ‘Mysterious Ways.’ Ariztical plans a multi-platform digital release in 2024.

Written and directed by New Zealand’s Paul Oremland, the film follows a media storm that threatens the marriage between a Vicar, portrayed by Richard Short (“The Tragedy of Macbeth”) and his Samoan boyfriend, portrayed by Nick Afoa (“The Lion King”), after they announce their intentions to have a traditional wedding in the church.

The film also marks one of the first on-screen representations of what is known in the Samoan community as a fa’afafine. The character Billy is played by relative newcomer Joe Malu Folau. An integral part of Samoan culture, fa’afafine are assigned male identity at birth, but explicitly embody both masculine and feminine gender traits in a way unique to Polynesia.

The film was produced in New Zealand by...

Exclusive: Sales outfit also has two documentaries on its Efm slate.

Mpi Media Group has commenced talks with buyers in Berlin on its new slate led by awards-winning zombie thriller It Stains The Sands Red from The Vicious Brothers and two documentaries.

Colin Minihan directed Sitges 2016 Midnight X-Treme winner It Stains The Sands Red and co-wrote with his Vicious Brothers associate and Grave Encounters co-director Stuart Ortiz.

Brittany Allen stars in the post-apocalyptic tale as a troubled woman from Las Vegas who flees across the desert from a relentless zombie. Juan Riedinger also stars.

Mpi will screen two documentaries. Meat explores the lives and practices of four compassionate food producers including TV and YouTube star Josh James, known as ‘The Kiwi Bushman’. David White directed.

Paul Oremland’s 100 Men follows the director on a personal quest as he chronicles changing attitudes towards homosexuality over four decades and tracks down some of the memorable men he has met...