Shine selling 9/11 doc Rebirth internationally

Shine International has picked up the international distribution rights to Rebirth, the upcoming 9/11 feature-doc from Hollywood producer Jim Whitaker (8 Mile, American Gangster).

The doc has been almost a decade in the making and debuted at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year to critical acclaim. In the US, cable network Showtime has taken the TV rights and will show it to coincide with the tenth anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terror attack on New York.

Shine is shopping the factual film internationally and is understood to have in ked deals with broadcasters, although which ones are not yet clear.

Rebirth is the brainchild of Whittaker and producer colleague David Solomon who set up not-for-profit organisation to get the film made. It has unique time-lapse footage of Ground Zero site with the camera filming from six months after 9/11.

The producers also found five people affected by the disaster who would commit to being filmed at regular intervals during the period in which Ground Zero was being rebuilt – providing a ‘human time-lapse’ element to complement the images of the site itself. The film got a standing ovation at Sundance and in the US, Oscilloscope Laboratories will distribute it theatrically from August.

Solomon says: “This is a very emotional subject for Americans, but we think this will be compelling viewing for people all around the world. We’ve always thought of it as a hopeful piece – it is a way of thinking about 9/11 without returning to the tragedy. We think the way we filmed it over years gives a unique perspective. It’s different to coming along ten years later and looking back.”