Danish director Michael Noer is reteaming with Scandinavian powerhouse TrustNordisk on an untitled period suspense drama that will be the director´s follow-up to his remake of “Papillon,” which is screening in the Toronto fest.
TrustNordisk, which has come on board to handle international sales on the film, worked on Noer´s previous Danish films, “Key House Mirror,” “Northwest” and “R” (co-directed with Tobias Lindholm).
Noer´s new film will be set in 1850s rural Denmark and will star critically acclaimed Danish actor Jesper Christensen (“Casino Royale,” “A Family”) as an old farmer who, with his family, is facing starvation. In his attempt to secure his daughter a better life, the farmer sets off to find her a suitable husband, but to make this happen, he will compromise his own moral values.
Noer told Variety that he aims to treat the drama “like a hard-boiled genre movie, a dark moral Western about survival and anguish, directed with the same documentary nerve as my other feature films.
“I´m the father of two young children, so I know that the limit for how far parents will go for their children is infinite. At the same time, I also feel how quickly you get ambitions on behalf of your children, but are they in the children´s best interest or in fact my own dreams?,” said Noer, adding that the movie, though a period drama, will speak to the present time.
Rene Ezra, who is producing the film with Matilda Appelin and Tomas Radoor at Nordisk Film Production, said that the feature would have “Michael Noer´s trademark hyper-realistic style.” The film shows “how far a man will go to ensure his bloodline in a dog-eat-dog world,” Ezra added.
Set to start shooting Oct. 16, the film will be lensed by cinematographer Sturla Brandth Grovlen, whose credits include Sebastian Schipper´s “Victoria.” The pic´s local release is expected to be in early 2019.
The drama will mark Noer´s return to Danish cinema after the English-language feature “Papillon,” which is making its North American premiere at Toronto in the Special Presentations section. The movie stars Charlie Hunnam and Rami Malek.