Bleecker Street has picked up North American rights to Laurel Parmet’s feature directorial debut The Starling Girl following its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival, slating it for release in theaters later this year.
Financials weren’t disclosed. The film written and directed by Parmet follows 17-year-old Jem Starling (Eliza Scanlen), who struggles to define her place within her fundamentalist Christian community in rural Kentucky.
Even her greatest joy — the church dance group — is tempered by worry that her love of dance is actually sinful, and she’s caught between a burgeoning awareness of her own sexuality and an instinctive resistance to her mom’s urging that the time has come to begin courting.
She finds respite from her confusion in the encouragement of her youth pastor Owen (Lewis Pullman), who is likewise drawn to the blossoming Jem’s attention.
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