Erik Skjoldbjaerg's Oil Rush Thriller 'Pioneer' Gets Toronto Slot

By THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER // Stuart Kemp

25-07-2013

 

The film will unspool in the

Canadian film festival's special presentations sidebar during this year's

shindig, which runs Sept. 5-15.

 

Norwegian director Erik Skjoldbjaerg´s oil rush thriller Pioneer

has secured a special screening slot during the 38th Toronto Film Festival.

 

Billed as “a high-octane conspiracy thriller inspired by 1970s classics

such as The Conversation, Three Days of Condor and Chinatown,"

the movie stars Aksel Hennie as a professional deep-sea diver with Ane

Dahl Torp, Jorgen Langhelle, Wes Bentley and Stephen Lang.

 

It is produced by Christian Fredrik Martin of Friland Film and

details the story of a deep-sea diver who investigates oil companies and their

government links after one of his friends dies unexpectedly.

 

Scripted by Hans Gunnarsson, Kathrina Valen Zeiner, Cathinka

Nicolaysen, Nikolaj Frobenius and Skjoldbjaerg, Pioneer will

open the Norwegian International Film Festival in Haugesund on Aug. 15.

 

Denmark´s TrustNordisk sold the film to Magnolia Pictures for U.S.

distribution.

 

 

The movie's inclusion in the Canadian festival will be Skjoldbjærg´s third

visit having previously traveled there with Insomnia (1997) and Prozac

Nation (2001).

 

It also marks Norway´s third entry in three years in Toronto´s special

presentations sidebar after Morten Tyldum´s Headhunters in 2011

and Espen Sandberg and Joachim Ronning´s foreign Oscar hope Kon-Tiki

in 2012.

 

Skjoldbjaerg described the Toronto festival shindig as the "most

important showcase for the industry in North-America" noting it was also

an audience festival.