A gripping true-crime drama with a tender queer heart opens in New York this month. 10 Kilos, directed by Doron Eran and adapted from Sharon Yitzhaki’s bestselling memoir, arrives at Village East Theatre on August 21st following a heavily buzzed run at the Cannes Marché du Film. Los Angeles audiences catch it the same day at Lumiere Music Hall, with a digital release on all major platforms following September 29th via Breaking Glass Pictures.
The film traces the true story of Yitzhaki, a young Israeli woman arrested at the La Paz airport with ten kilos of cocaine strapped to her body and thrown into Bolivia’s Miraflores prison — a lawless world run by inmates, cartel loyalties, and brutal hierarchy. Daniella Kertesz (World War Z, Shtisel) delivers what’s already being called a transformative lead performance as Sharon fights to survive a system designed to break her.
But at the emotional center of 10 Kilos is Sharon’s relationship with Terry (LeeOz Levy), a transgender inmate locked up for both her “lifestyle” and a smuggling charge. What starts as an alliance of necessity — Terry becomes Sharon’s protector as she learns the prison’s unspoken rules — deepens into something far more intimate. Their bond, built inside a place designed to strip away identity, becomes the story’s most human thread: two women, each remaking themselves under impossible pressure, finding in each other something between protection, kinship, and love. It’s a rare mainstream true-crime thriller that puts a transgender character at the emotional core of its narrative rather than at its margins.
“At its core, this is a film about survival, manipulation, fear, and the emotional cost of being trapped inside a world that keeps pulling you deeper,” director Doron Eran (Melting Away, Stay Forte) said of the film. “We wanted audiences to feel every moment with her.”
Sharon’s journey — from cartel affair to prison power broker to smuggling herself and her found family out of Bolivia — became a sensation when her memoir hit shelves in Israel in 2006. Nearly twenty years later, it’s landing in American theaters as a story about what people become when survival and identity collide.
“Daniella Kertesz delivers an unforgettable performance, and we’re thrilled to bring 10 Kilos to audiences across North America this summer,” said Rich Wolff, CEO of Breaking Glass Pictures.
10 Kilos opens August 21st at Village East Theatre in New York. For tickets, visit https://10kilosthemovie.com.
