Cargo Film & Releasing Acquires Sales Rights To Tribeca-Premiering Docs ‘The Conductor’ And ‘Father Of The Cyborgs’

Matt Grobar
·2 min read

EXCLUSIVE: Cargo Film & Releasing has acquired sales rights to The Conductor and Father of the Cyborgs, a pair of documentary features premiering at the Tribeca Film Festival in June.

Directed by Bernadette Wegenstein, and produced by Annette Porter of Nylon Films, The Conductor tells the overdue story of world-renowned conductor Marin Alsop, who was the first woman to serve as music director of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, as well as the São Paulo Symphony Orchestra and the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra. After years of overcoming various obstacles and proving naysayers wrong, we see how Marin was able to succeed against all odds, and break the glass ceiling for women conductors around the world. The film notably utilizes stirring musical segments conducted by Alsop herself, to accentuate the highs and lows of her life, and reflect for the audience her inner world.

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Marking the directorial debut of award-winning filmmaker David Burke, Father of the Cyborgs follows neurologist Phil Kennedy, who made global headlines in the late ’90s by connecting the brain of a paralyzed man to a computer. Drawing comparisons to famed inventor Alexander Graham Bell, Kennedy became known as ‘The Father of the Cyborgs.’ In 2014, he would once again shock the scientific and medical communities, by implanting his own brain, in an effort to continue his research. The doc examines what drives scientists to explore new frontiers in human knowledge, but also is timely, with the arrival of brain-computer interface technology, and its implications should not be ignored.

The Conductor debuts in the Viewpoints section of the Tribeca fest, while Cyborgs is set to premiere in the section dubbed Movie Plus.

Cargo Film & Releasing holds worldwide sales rights to the former title, as well as worldwide rights to the latter, excluding the UK.

Making the acquisition announcement today, on behalf of the NYC-based global documentary film sales agent, was President David Piperni. “We’re excited to be a small part of the return of the Tribeca Film Festival this June,” said Piperni, “with films about two remarkable and inspiring lives who are true pioneers and trailblazers in their respective fields.”

Led by Piperni and Dan Cantagallo, Cargo Film’s past acquisitions include The Conservation Game (featuring Tiger King‘s Carole Baskin), Us Kids (Sundance 2020), and Anthony Baxter’s Flint, among others.

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