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.