“Out Stealing Horses” hit novel to get film treatment

PanARMENIAN.Net - Critically acclaimed Norwegian director Hans Petter Moland (“In Order of Disappearance”) is set to helm and write “Out Stealing Horses”, the big-screen adaptation of Per Petterson’s novel, with Stellan Skarsgård (“Nymphomaniac”) attached to star, Variety reports.

Norway’s 4½ Fiksjon is producing the film. TrustNordisk is on board to handle worldwide sales.

“Out Stealing Horses” was published in 2003 and has been translated into 60 languages. On top of winning the Independent Foreign Fiction prize and International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, the novel also made it on to The New York Times’ list of Five Best Fiction Books 2007.

Set in 1999, “Out Stealing Horses” tells the story of Trond, a 67-year old man who has moved to a remote house in the forest where he can grieve the death of his wife. The countryside idyll is disturbed by a chance encounter with a neighbor whom he met during a fateful summer in 1948. That summer, his father and his first love both disappeared from his life.

Skarsgård, who was previously directed by Petter Moland in “A Somewhat Gentleman” and “In Order of Disappearance,” will star as Trond.

Turid Øversteen and Karin Julsrud are producing the feature film at 4½ Fiksjon and optioned the rights for the novel several years ago. Filming is to start next February.

Budgeted at 4.1 million euros ($4.6 million), “Out Stealing Horses” is co-produced by Zentropa Sweden and Zentropa Denmark. Norway’s NRK and Denmark’s DR are associate producers. Nordisk Film will release the film in Scandinavia. “Out Stealing Horses” is also being backed by the Norwegian Film institute.