HBO Latino has picked up U.S. rights to Juan Carlos Maneglia and Tana Schembori’s adventure thriller “Los Buscadores” (“The Gold Seekers”), Paraguay’s foreign-language Oscar entry and a local box office hit.
Deals in France, China, Japan, Australia, Italy and German-speaking territories are under discussion, said FilmSharks’ Guido Rud.
In a previously announced agreement, Sony Pictures TV acquired all Latin American rights.
Selling more than 160,000 admissions since it opened in Paraguay last year — a standout figure — “Gold Seekers” marks Maneglia and Schembori’s follow-up to 2012 box office, sales and festival breakout hit, action thriller “7 Cajas,” a Breaking Glass Pictures pickup for the U.S.
“Gold Seekers” “has became an international sales sensation after it received an upbeat reaction and amazing reviews off its world premiere at the Palm Springs Festival,” according to Rud.
Produced by Maneglia-Schembori Producciones, “Gold Seeker” is set in the neighborhood of Chacarita, right next to downtown Asunción, where Manu, a young paperboy, accidentally discovers an old map and photos in an ancient book given him by his grandfather. He teams with other paperboys in a hunt for buried treasure.
