The Studio Babelsberg-produced action thriller Unknown will be screening in the Berlinale Competition and celebrating its European premiere at Potsdamer Platz in February. The lead actors Liam Neeson and Diane Kruger are expected as guests along with the film discovery January Jones, director Jaume Collet-Serra and producer Joel Silver. The film, which was shot completely in Germany, is being shown in the Competition in an out of competition slot. Kinowelt will release the film nationwide on March 3, 2011.
The audience can look forward to seeing a very exciting Berlin film. UNKNOWN is set completely in Berlin and will bring a lot of international attention to the capital region.
Christoph Fisser
COO Studio Babelsberg AG
Co-producer
Christoph Fisser, COO of Studio Babelsberg and co-producer:
“We are pleased to be able to present Unknown at the Berlinale. The audience can look forward to seeing a very exciting Berlin film. Unknown is set completely in Berlin and will bring a lot of international attention to the capital region. It is also wonderful that we have another big international feature film being cast with superb German-speaking actors like Bruno Ganz, Sebastian Koch, Stipe Erceg and Karl Markovics. That is important for our talents and the film location of Germany as a whole.”
Unknown impresses with an ensemble of both international and German-speaking stars: Liam Neeson (96 Hours) and Diane Kruger (Inglourious Basterds) can be seen in the leads. They are joined by January Jones from the feted TV series Mad Men, Bruno Ganz, Sebastian Koch, Karl Markovics and Stipe Erceg. Other roles are taken by Petra Schmidt-Schaller, Eva Löbau, Frank Langella and Aidan Quinn.
The 10-week shoot under the direction of Jaume Collet-Serra (House of Wax, Orphan) began at the end of January 2010. Studio Babelsberg was the executive production company. Numerous original locations in Berlin, Brandenburg and Saxony were used for the shoot along with interiors in Babelsberg. Berlin, in particular, proved itself once again to be the perfect backdrop for fast chase sequences, spectacular stunts and explosive showdowns. The shoot visited, among other places, at the Oberbaumbrücke, in Friedrichstraße, at the Hauptbahnhof, on Pariser Platz and in the Hotel Adlon. The lobby of the Adlon was constructed on a scale of 1:1 in the venerable Marlene Dietrich Halle sound stage in Studio Babelsberg since much of the hotel is destroyed in the film.
Unknown is a German-British-French co-production in association with Dark Castle Entertainment. The co-producers are Studio Babelsberg, Horticus UK and StudioCanal. The film was supported by Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg and the German Federal Film Fund (DFFF). Joel Silver, Leonard Goldberg and Andrew Rona served as producers. Susan Downey, Steve Richards, Sarah Meyer, Peter McAleese and Olivier Courson were executive producers. The film was co-produced from the German side by Dr. Carl Woebcken, Christoph Fisser and Henning Molfenter of Studio Babelsberg.
Synopsis:
The film tells the story of the scientist Dr. Martin Harris (Liam Neeson), who comes out of a coma after a serious car accident in Berlin. He discovers that his wife Elisabeth (January Jones) no longer recognises him and another man (Aidan Quinn) has taken his place at her side. In order to win back his wife and his old life, he traces Gina (Diane Kruger), a taxi-driver who had saved him after the accident. She and the former Stasi agent Ernst Jürgen (Bruno Ganz) are his only allies in the struggle to reclaim his identity against an all-powerful opponent.
