22/11/2013 - The writer-director who collaborated with Danish director Susanne Bier on her last films - including Oscar-winning In a Better World - is ready with a new black comedy

Danish writer-director Anders Thomas Jensen, who has scripted 49 films, is readying his fourth feature, Men & Chicken, almost 10 years after his last drama-thriller-comedy, Adam’s Apples [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Anders Thomas Jensen
interview: Mads Mikkelsen
interview: Tivi Magnusson
film profile] (2005). The project has been supported with €1.1 million from the Danish Film Institute, and backed by Danish pubcaster DR, Disney Denmark and Danish regional film centre, FilmFyn.

Thomas Jensen has co-written the last three films by Danish director Susanne Bier, including her In a Better World [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (2010), which won the Oscar for Best Foreign-Language Feature, the romantic comedy Love Is All You Need [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (2012) – the Pierce Brosnan-Trine Dyrholm starrer which is nominated for the European Film Award as Best Comedy – and her new film, A Second Chance, currently shooting on the island of Funen until January 16.

Described as a black comedy about two outcast brothers, who reunite with their relatives to learn a cruel truth about themselves and their family, Men & Chicken will have Mads Mikkelsen in the lead. As with Thomas Jensen’s Flickering Lights (2000), The Green Butchers [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (2003) and Adam’s Apples, the film will be produced by Tivi and Kim Magnusson, for M&M Productions. The local premiere is scheduled for 2015.

Meanwhile A Second Chance – Bier’s new drama scripted with Thomas Jensen, whose filming will start later this month – has received massive interest at the American Film Market in Santa Monica, US (November 6-13). Danish international sales agency, TrustNordisk, licensed the film to Germany/Austria (Prokino), Australia/New Zealand (MadMan), Japan (Longride), Benelux (Cineart), Israel (Lev Cinema) and Former Yugoslavia (Discovery). “It underlines her status as a star director who knows how to touch the audience in the most powerful way. We are so happy to have her on board," said ceo Rikke Ennis, of TrustNordisk.