Nyqvist joins Kenyeres' Hier

Swedish star Michael Nyqvist (The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, Mission Impossible - Ghost Protocol) has been confirmed as the lead in Hier, the debut feature from highly regarded young Hungarian auteur, Bálint Kenyeres.

The $1.2 million film, which combines “a film noir-style investigation with an exploration of altered states of consciousness,” is due to shoot in Morocco this spring. Made through Mirage Film Studio, it is being backed by the Hungarian Film Fund and by foreign partners, Les Films de L’Apres-Midi (France), One Two Films (Germany), Rotterdam Films (Netherlands) and Bleck Film (Sweden).

The project passed through Sarajevo CineLink and Cannes l’Atelier and is supported by Netherlands Film Fund, Film i Vast, ARTE Germany, Saarlandischer Rundfunk, CNC France and the MEDIA Programme.

A sales company is expected to be announced shortly.

Nyqvist will play 50-year-old Otto Ganz, a businessman who owns a thriving building and civil engineering company that operates worldwide. Some very costly problems draw him to North Africa where he is confronted with memories of his youth, which have been carefully buried in the depths of his mind. As he endures meetings in ministries, disinformation, and the reappearance of a past love who had mysteriously disappeared, Ganz slowly plunges into a labyrinthine world where present and past intertwine.

“He (Nyqvist) is perfect for the role,” producer Andrea Taschler told ScreenDaily. “He plays a middle-aged man who has a very established family and business life. The whole story is based on the main actor. He is in every minute, every moment of the film. We needed to find someone with a very strong character and who was very professional.”

Kenyeres is already a well established figure in Hungarian film circles. His short History Of Aviation (2009) screened in Cannes Directors’ Fortnight.