CANNES - Star Danish helmer Lars von Trier is preparing to shoot English-language serial killer thriller “The House That Jack Built” in August.
Budgeted at 8.7 million Euros, “The House That Jack Built” was initially developed as a TV series but in February, Von Trier announced that he was turning the project into a film.
Set in Washington, “The House That Jack Built” revolves around a serial killer. The story is told from his perspective and takes place over ten to twelve years.
The film is scheduled to start shooting in August in Trollhättan/Vänersborg and Copenhagen and will premiere in 2018.
The cast will be a combination of American and European actors. Two big male characters and four big female characters, per the producer
“The House That Jack Built” is a co-production between four countries: France, Germany, Sweden and Denmark.
TrustNordisk has taken international sales rights. Zentropa is producing, with Film i Väst financing.
“It will be a serial killer movie like you´ve never seen before. He wants to be able to change it between periods of shooting because when we´ll have done the body of the film in the Fall, he will then go edit it and he sees how he can combine the murders,” said Louise Vesth, who is lead producing at Zentropa.
Vesth spoke to Variety following a press conference hosted by Film i Vast in Cannes.
Vesth said Von Trier wants to use different formats to bring together the incidents. “He calls it the five incidents, which is the murder cases and then he has a lot of digressions in between to connect the story, in a similar way as in ‘Nymphomaniac.'”
Von Trier, who is not in town, was last in Cannes in 2011 with “Melancholia.” He was declared a persona non grata after expressed sympathy for Hitler at the film´s press conference.
Since then, Cannes´ artistic director Thierry Fremaux has said the provocative Danish director was no longer banned and would be welcomed at the festival with a future film.
Von Trier´s last film, “Nymphomaniac: Volume 1,” premiered in Berlin.