CANNES 2012 Market
'A full cinema experience' from Söderberg’s The Serious Game
by Jorn Rossing Jensen
23/05/2012 - 100 years after Swedish Hjalmar Söderberg wrote The Serious Game, about Arvid and Lydia who fell in love when they were young and remained in love while marrying others, will finally be made into “a full cinema experience”, according to Swedish producer Patrik Andersson, of Stockholm’s B-Reel Feature Films.
The novel has been adapted for the screen twice, by Swedish director Rune Carlsten (1947) and Norwegian director Anja Breien (1977) – Andersson has assembled the “Scandinavian dream team” for a new, €5 million feature - Swedish actress-turned-director Pernilla August (photo - on the right) will bring a screenplay by Danish writer-director Lone Scherfig (photo - on the left) to life.
At Cannes to introduce the production, which will start beginning next year – Scherfig is about to finish the first draft – Andersson said he had been inspired by British modern interpretations of literary classics, such as Joe Wright’s Pride and Prejudice [trailer], Cary Fukanaga’s Jane Eyre [trailer] and Andrea Arnold’s Wuthering Heights [trailer, film focus].
“I think that Scherfig’s adaptation will bring out the romantic and cinematic core of the love story, at the same time aiming for a full uncompromised scope. Both previous are clearly products of their time: Carlsten’s a humorous and lighthearted comedy, Breien’s a still-life drama of the actual text,” he explained.
Andersson will produce the film with Fredrik Henig: "And the beauty of Oscarian, Strindberg Stockholm will most certainly make it the hottest item for city marketeers since Millennium. I look forward to see Japanese tourists walk around Djurgården, spinning small turn-of-the-century umbrellas and dreaming of the lost love of Arvid and Lydia.”
August, whose feature debut Beyond [trailer] won her three Guldbaggar - Sweden’s national film prize – including Best Director, has recently performed in Swedish directors Mikael Marcimain’s Call Girl [trailer] and Jan Troell’s Truth and Consequence; she is currently directing Danish writer Maya Ilsøe’s TV series, The Legacy of Veronika, for Danish pubcaster DRTV.
Scherfig, who most recently adapted UK author David Nicholls’s One Day for the screen, with Anne Hathaway and Jim Sturgess in the leads, will next film the late UK writer Tim Guest’s memoir My Life in Orange, about his childhood in an Indian commune. Her 2009 UK feature, An Education, won her three Oscar nominations,adding numerous international prizes.
