MUMBAI: Overture Films has acquired the distribution rights of Antoine Fuqua‘s crime thriller Brooklyn‘s Finest.

The deal was almost arrived at in Venice when the film‘s financier Avi Lerner along with former WMi head Cassian Elwes negotiated the transfer with Overture CEO Chris McGurk. McGurk is currently in Toronto with the North American premieres of The Men Who Stare At Goats and Michael Moore‘s Capitalism: A Love Story.

Overture had been one of the companies initially wanting to take over Brooklyn‘s Finest when it premiered in Sundance last January, before Senator‘s former president Mark Urman got into a deal worth around $3m plus a substantial P&A commitment.

Senator‘s difficulty in coming up with substantial P&A funds for its slate was a critical factor in the company‘s demise. Matters came to a head last spring with the ill-fated release of The Informers, which failed at the box-office and precipitated Urman‘s departure.

The former THINKFilm head is in Toronto scouting titles for his new venture Paladin.