Polish director-producer Dariusz Jabłoński is readying his first TV project, a crime-thriller series entitled The Pleasure Principle. The series is the first transnational TV co-production between three Eastern European countries, and apart from Poland, the Czech Republic and Ukraine are also on board. After shooting in Warsaw, Prague and on the Black Sea coast, around Odessa, the ten-hour show is currently entering post-production.

The Pleasure Principle unfolds in the aforementioned Eastern European cities, where several body parts belonging to young females are found on the same day. Three different criminal investigators, one in each country, will head up the respective cases and will conclude that they are most likely connected. They will then have to put aside any differences they might have and collaborate on this cross-border inquiry. The trail leads to corrupt politicians, the insidious activities of businessmen, unethical lawyers, professional hitmen and vestiges of a common past. Even so, nothing is as it seems.

According to Jabłoński, the series is a challenging project that he hopes will feel more like a ten-hour-long feature film. Written by Maciej Maciejewski, The Pleasure Principle has recruited an international cast of popular actors, with Poland’s Małgorzata Buczkowska (Fugue [+lire aussi :
critique
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interview : Agnieszka Smoczyńska
fiche film]), Czech thesp Karel Roden (Little Crusader [+lire aussi :
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interview : Václav Kadrnka
fiche film]) and Ukraine’s Sergey Strelnikov (Ekaterina) playing the leading roles. Stipe Erceg (The Edukators), Magdalena Boczarska, Miroslaw Baka, Ana Geislerova, Miroslaw Haniszewski and Robert Gonera flank them in the cast.

The Pleasure Principle is being produced by Apple Film Productions, the production company owned by Jabłoński and Izabela Wojcik, in co-production with Anna Limbach-Uryn, for Canal+ Poland, Kateřina Ondřejková, of Czech Television, and Vlad Riashyn, for Star Media Ukraine. Munich-based Beta Film, which regularly invests in Eastern European TV series, such as Agnieszka Holland’s Burning Bush [+lire aussi :
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fiche film] and Ivan Zachariáš’s Wasteland, has acquired the international distribution rights and is also on board as a co-financing partner.