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A few photos from the Flensburg, Germany premiere of Flammen og Citronen (Flame & Citron), Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Director Ole Christian Madsen and actors Stine Stengade, Christian Berkel & Mads Mikkelsen.
More new photos from the Highlands. Word has it that filming has moved off the mountain so maybe we will be seeing some photos of the Viking longship
that was to be built for this production.
There is also a good article in the Daily Record
where Mads talks of filming in Scotland and also a bit about making Casino Royale.
There's a few more in our new Valhalla Rising Gallery
Photos: Dean Rogers, Blind Eye Production
More photos of Mads Mikkelsen in the Viking film Valhalla Rising are featured in an article on the Danish site
EkstraBladet. The article is in Danish, but the pictures speak for themselves.
There is also a link on the page to a great bit of video (also in Danish) where you get a good look at 'One-Eye'.
Photos: Dean Rogers, Blind Eye Production
Translation of the article:
It's wet, and it's cold, and thousands of small mosquitoes orbit a silent one-eyed man who sits on a mountain top and scouts not far from the
beautiful river Affric. He is filthy and dressed in leather clothes from top to toe and has the company of two other rough-looking men as well
as a little boy. It's a strange group who somehow bond with nature. But death is present all the time.
We are on a mountain top in the north of Scotland for the filming of Nicolas Winding Refn's next film "Valhalla Rising" where Mads Mikkelsen's
character is the dumb Viking One-Eye who, with the boy Are, face the hardest of lives, a dog’s life so to speak, and together with a crowd of
Vikings end up in America.
“It has been one of the Devil's hardest and most insane filming. We film in all types of weather here in the middle of the harsh nature.
I remember one day, for example, where I had to struggle with four stuntmen with a chain around my neck and full war paint for hours on end.
We fought in mud to the knees while the rest of the camera crew was dressed in mosquito nets and survival suits. And we shook with cold,”
Mads Mikkelsen says and adds with a small wry smile, “After a day like that, I looked right at my birth certificate and thought:
This is crazy! It would have been much better to make this film as 26-year old instead of as 42-year old.”
Mads Mikkelsen, also, reports that he had great problems with the fight scenes in the beginning because in the role of Enøje, he only has one eye.
“With only one eye, you lose depth perception. Therefore, we don’t use so many weapons in the film. This is more about coming all the way in on the body of
your opponent and then killing him with your bare hands. But I have my large axe, of course,” says Mads, who thinks that his character One-Eye becomes
a stylistic mixture of one of world-famous Japanese director Kurosawa's silent samurais and the western director Sergio Leone's nameless cowboys.
Can you recognize something in One-Eye with you?
“Yes, I recognize some things that I just enlarge. I can, for example, recognize Enøje's isolation. And I also recognize his energy and his
huge bitterness…a bitterness which just waits and waits on finding expression, and once it finally reaches its way out, it'll be quite ugly.”
How are you with the fact you can’t say a word in the film because you are mute?
“I got used to it very quickly because I, also, only have an eye. I could almost become claustrophobically insane because of it. But Enøje is
consequently not a normal human being. He cannot be shocked or be happy. He has an extreme neutrality and is more like a mirror other human beings
can look into,” says Mads, who also thinks that he has become a more quiet person because of the role as Enøje.
“I am normally a hyperactive person who has a hard time sitting quietly. But acting as the rather minimalistic Enøje has made me much more quiet of
a person the last three months. It has almost been a meditation-like yoga training to play Enøje.”
Mads Mikkelsen has climbed up and down steep mountains, fought formidable fights with Vikings and Red Indians, stood in pouring down rain and faced
tons of irritating mosquitoes daily over the last two months far from his family in Denmark who consist of his wife Hanne Jacobsen and the couple's
two children, Viola at 15 and Carl at 10 years of age.
“It has been hard to be away from my family for such a long time. But on the other hand, I have also had periods where I have been home for half a
year. I have also ensured that both Hanne and the children came here to Scotland to have a good experience,” says Mads Mikkelsen, who also reveals
that perhaps he is on the way to yet a major international role.
“I am currently in the process of some negotiations for a role in a great international film. But I will not say more before there is a final
signature.”
Thanks to Melisa for the translation and link!
This is the video mentioned above. Thanks to twitchfilm.net for uploading it so I can embed it here.
The first photo of Mads Mikkelsen as 'One Eye' in the Viking film Valhalla Rising has surface on the Danish news site
B.T.
Photo: Dean Rogers, Blind Eye Production
Cineuropa
reported a few days ago:
July 9, 2008
Production – France
Mikkelsen and Mouglalis to star in Kounen’s Chanel & Stavinsky
After an eventful start, the film project exploring the love affair between fashion designer Coco Chanel and Russian composer Igor Stravinsky
is taking shape. Shooting on Chanel & Stavinsky, l’histoire secrète (“Chanel & Stavinsky: The Secret Story”) will kick off in late September and
the cast will include French actress Anna Anna Mouglalis (Romanzo criminale) and Danish star Mads Mikkelsen
(Casino Royale, Adam's Apples, Pusher and currently filming Nicolas Winding Refn’s Valhalla Rising).
The title will be directed by Jan Kounen whose latest work, 99 Francs, has enjoyed considerable success (1.23m admissions in France).
Adapted by Chris Greenhalgh from his novel Coco and Igor, the film will be set in early 20th-century Paris, from 1913 to the 1920s.
Rising fashion star Coco Chanel crosses paths with Igor Stravinsky, who is exiled with his family after the Russian revolution and trying to
impose his avant-garde style (epitomised by his major work The Rite of Spring).
A race to the finish line seems to have begun with Anne Fontaine’s project Coco avant Chanel (“Coco Before Chanel”) starring Audrey Tautou.
The latter film will start shooting in October, whereas Chanel & Stavinsky, l’histoire secrète is expected to wrap up in mid-December and be ready
for release by spring 2009.
Produced by Claudie Ossard and Chris Bolzli for Eurowide Film, Chanel & Stavinsky, l’histoire secrète has a €12m budget, which includes co-production
support from Japan and Wild Bunch. The latter will also handle international sales.
Fabien Lemercier
Thanks to Melisa for the link!
Filming has begun on Valhalla Rising and you can expect exclusive updates from Scotland on our new Valhalla Rising ~ On Set page thanks to Johnny, who is working as an extra on the film.
So be sure to keep checking back for the latest news on this long awaited Viking epic!
MadsOnline.net has been chosen as the Celebrity Site of the Day for July 15th, 2008. This should create more traffic for the site!
Here's a clip of an interview with Mads and his co-star, Jessica Schwarz, during filming in Germany.
From hobnox.com.
Thanks to Kim on MAMM for the link!
From Denmark's TV2 5/19/2008:
Mads Mikkelsen is, according to the free daily newspaper Urban, in negotiations about a leading role in the film "Black Heart."
The film is a political thriller about illegal arms trading, and has two brothers at its center.
It's the role as one of the brothers that Mikkelsen is a candidate for.
The British actor Sam Riley is negotiating the role of the other brother, the film magazine Screen tells, according to Urban.
The film is produced with partners from Britain, Italy and South Africa. The director is the Italian Cristiano Bortone.
Ipso Facto who is producing Valhalla Rising is the British and primary producer of "Black Heart:
SYNOPSIS:
1978. BLAKE, a young and idealistic Interpol officer discovers that his long lost brother JOHN has become a ruthless mercenary in Africa.
When Blake is sent to Kenya by his superiors at the agency to track his brother and bring him in, he uncovers that John is in fact looking
for secret files that prove the Western involvement and complacency in the illegal ivory for arms trading.
A political thriller based on the real life diaries of ex-mercenary Jean Vaudrec.
Thanks to Melisa for the info and translation!
From Denmark's TV2 5/17/2008:
The film has Mads Mikkelsen in the leading role as the harsh Viking One-Eye who discovers America after a chance escape from a Scottish prison.
Mikkelsen is the only Dane in the film.
The 40 million crowns' film will take place in Scotland and in the US, Ekstra Bladet writes.
There is a similar article on the B.T. website.
Thanks to Melisa for the info and translation!
A little more info on Past Perfect (Die Tuer) filming in Germany -
Mads is in Berlin filming his new movie Past Perfect, which has a German title of Die Tuer (The Door).
(Not sure if they will be changing the English title.) Here are couple brief articles from German sites about the film:
From movie-infos.de:
As March ended in Berlin, the first door to the exciting thriller Die Tuer (The Door) opened. The film introduces the failed painter, David, to
the tempting possibility of a new beginning that gradually turns into a veritable nightmare.
After a fatal decision that results in the death of his seven-year-old daughter, Leonie, the once successful painter, David (Mads Mikkelsen),
loses control of his life. But one day, he discovers a door, which gives him the chance to go back and start again. What begins as a promising opportunity
for a fresh start soon turns into a true horror scenario, because in the past, not everything is as it seems.
From Bild.de:
This article gives the same basic synopsis of the plot, but tells that Jessica Schwarz plays Mads' wife in the film and that they are in Hamburg,
not Berlin. Mads says he has not seen much of Hamburg yet, "Just the hotel and the film set. No time."
Thanks to René for the links!
Please excuse my translation....if it's not quite right please let me know!
From propworld.nu:
Mads appeared at the Convention in Malmö, Sweden last weekend - April 5 - 6
Photos from flickr.
Mads is the cover story of the May 2008 issue of Danish Arena Magazine.
Here's a bit of the article and pictures:
"Just call me Mads"
Mads Mikkelsen stops in the intersection between Noerrebrogade(Northbridge
Street) and Moellegade(Mill Street). He's ready to throw the small Mini Cooper car to the left,
and while he keeps an eye out for people on bicycles, he puts the car in gear and turns. He's the kind
of driver who turns the wheel with the palm of his hand instead of gripping the wheel. Mads Mikkels drives
50 meters along the street.. He then pulls to the side and puts the car in neutral in his childhood neighborhood.
Two pedestrians stop talking and look down at us. True, Mads Mikkelsen grew up on Noerrebro, but Denmark's most
feted actor is still a rare sight on his old hunting grounds. He leans to the right and points: "In there was my backyard.
They've removed some of the buildings, but there was a factory that had a goods elevator. All the kids had to ride up in it
at one time. Then you sat up there for a couple of hours," says Mads Mikkelsen, putting the car in gear, and continuing on Moellegade.
"Everybody had to do it. That's just how things were."
Photos by Franne Voigt
Arena Magazine
Thanks to Anne on MAMM for the translation!
The Door - Photocall -
HAMBURG, GERMANY - APRIL 03: Actor Mads Mikkelsen and co-star, Jessica Schwarz, attend a photocall for the movie 'The Door' ('Die Tuer') on April 3, 2008 in Hamburg, Germany.
(Photos by Krafft Angerer/Getty Images)
Check out the Gallery here for more pics from the photo shoot.
The opening gala of Mads' new film Flammen og Citronen (Flame & Citron) was held Tuesday, March 25th in Copenhagen.
The Crown Prince Frederik and Princess Mary attended, as well as Mads Mikkelsen and Thure Lindhardt, the two stars in the title roles.
The crown prince and his wife met both the surviving resistance fighters and the actors when they participated in Tuesday evening's opening night of "Flammen and Citronen" at the Imperial-SIC movies.
96-year-old Elisabeth Bomhoffs was the first who got permission to shake the hands of the crown prince, Frederik, and crown princess, Mary.
Bornhoffs had the Flame living in her basement during the occupation.
The main characters themselves died fighting against the Germans during Anden Verdenskrig.
Links:
Se og Hør
Berlingske.dk Video
tv2.dk Video
Se og Hør Video (wmv file)
Thanks to Monalisa on MAMM for the info!