Jim Gaffigan Thriller ‘American Dreamer’ Lands At Saban Films

Saban Films has acquired North American rights to American Dreamer, Derrick Borte’s thriller starring Jim Gaffigan as a down-on-his-luck ride-share driver who gets in way over his head with drug dealers and a kidnapping. The film had its world premiere at the Los Angeles Film Festival. Saban plans a theatrical release.

Gaffigan plays Cam, who in addition to driving makes extra cash chauffeuring a low-level drug dealer around town. He soon finds himself in a serious financial bind and decides to kidnap the dealer’s child, and tension grows as he escorts the drug dealer in search of the child. Robbie Jones, Isabel Arraiza, Alejandro Hernandez and Tammy Blanchard co-star. Borte wrote the script with Daniel Forte.

Scott Lochmus produced for Storyland Pictures in association with the Virginia Film Office and Old Dominion University. Jonathan Gray, Mary Vernieu, XYZ Films and Sugar Studios executive produced. Ness Saban and Jonathan Saba negotiated the deal for Saban Films, with XYZ Films’ Nate Bolotin for the filmmakers.

Saban Films recenlty acquired U.S. distribution rights to James Marsh’s King of Thieves, the heist movie about the 2015 robbery of the Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Company that stars Michael Caine, Jim Broadbent, Tom Courtenay and Michael Gambon. It is slated for an early 2019 U.S. theatrical release after already playing the UK and elsewhere.