Susanne Bier turns to comedy in her new film "Love Is All You Need" which has been selected for the Venice Film Festival 2012. As announced Thursday at a press conference in Rome, the film will be showcased out of competition in the official programme. Also in the line-up is Tobias Lindholm's "A Hijacking", competing in the Orizzonti section and the Finnish-Paraguyan-Danish short documentary "Resistance" by Salla Sorri and Renate Costa, competing in the Orrizzonti Short Film section.
Bier teams up with Brosnan
"Love Is All You Need" is a new film by Oscar winner Susanne Bier starring Pierce Brosnan and Trine Dyrholm. The film tells the story of the wondrous unpredictability of life: Just when you think it's all over, it may have only just begun.
Ida has had a rough year. She is recovering from a long-term illness, and she has just found out that her husband is cheating on her with a beautiful blond from accounting. Now, on the way to her daughter's wedding in Italy, Ida has accidently backed up into a car which, as it turns out, belongs to Philip, a wealthy businessman and the father of her soon-to-be son-in-law. As the two families finally gather in a beautiful old Italian villa set in the middle of an idyllic lemon grove, everyone is expecting a romantic wedding planned down to the very last detail. They couldn't have been more wrong.
The story is created by Susanne Bier and Bier's long-time collaborator Anders Thomas Jensen. The duo was also responsible for the screenplay for Bier's 2011 Oscar triumph "In a Better World".
"Love Is All You Need" is produced by Vibeke Windeløv and Sisse Graum Jørgensen for Zentropa with support from The Danish Film Institute. TrustNordisk handles international sales. Domestic release is set for 6 September.
Read interview A True Romantic
Filmed in piracy-prone waters
Pilou Asbæk in "A Hijacking". Photo: Magnus Nordenhof Jønck
Tobias Lindholm made his directorial debut with the hard-hitting prison drama "R" (co-directed with Michael Noer, 2010). Over the last few years, he has carved out a name for himself as a screenwriter on Thomas Vinterberg's films, including this year's Cannes winner "The Hunt", and the international hit TV series "Borgen". "A Hijacking" is Lindholm's second feature, with a screenplay by the director.
Featuring Pilou Asbæk and Søren Malling, best known to international audiences from "Borgen", the film takes us to the cargo ship MV Rozen in The Indian Ocean which is heading for harbour when it is boarded and captured by pirates. Amongst the men on board are the ship’s cook Mikkel (Pilou Asbæk) and the engineer Jan (Roland Møller), who along with the rest of the seamen are taken hostage in a cynical game of life and death. With the demand for a ransom of millions of dollars a psychological drama unfolds between the CEO of the shipping company (Søren Malling) and the Somali pirates.
"A Hijacking" was made according to the same principle of authenticity as Lindholm's debut feature "R" which was actually filmed in a prison with a cast mostly of real guards and ex-convicts. The shooting took place in all secrecy in The Indian Ocean in piracy-prone waters on a freighter that was hijacked once in real life, with a cast including a professional hostage negotiator in a leading role.
"A Hijacking" is produced by Tomas Radoor and René Ezra for Nordisk Film with support from the Danish Film Institute, the national broadcaster DR and NFTF. TrustNordisk handles international sales. Domestic release is set for 20 September.
Read interview If I Told You I Saw a Cow …
84-year-old soul searcher
Finnish Salla Sorri and Paraguyan Renate Costa tell the story of Don Alberto Bonnet, 84, an unsatisfied spiritual searcher and a believer of reincarnation. With the struggle of not finding what he has been looking for all his life, he is tired of the idea of having to be born again, but has not yet lost his hope. While the spider nets, rays of the sun and the moving leafs surrounding him carry promises of the interior change, he once again opens his favorite book that starts: There is a faith which is of a man's self, and a faith which is the gift of God; or, a Power of believing which is found in the nature of fallen man, and a power of believing which is given from above...
"Resistance" is produced by Tine Fischer, Salla Sorri and Renate Costa for DOX:LAB.
Venice International Film Festival (29 Aug-8 Sep)