EXCLUSIVE: Olga Kurylenko (Black Widow), Jenny Seagrove (The Guardian), Anna Friel (Marcella) and Ben Miles (The Crown) have wrapped shoot on under-the-radar psychological thriller My Sister’s Bones, whose first look images we can reveal today (scroll down for more).
Bill Kenwright’s BKStudios is behind the project, adapted from Nuala Ellwood’s novel of the same name.
Supporting cast includes Harry Potter and Game Of Thrones actor David Bradley, who recently voiced Guillermo Del Toro’s Oscar winner Pinocchio, and Maggie Steed (Ten Percent). Shooting took place on location in Whitstable, Herne Bay, London and Morocco.
The project marks the second film from director Heidi Greensmith, who’s debut feature, Winter, garnered three awards at the New York Film Festival, including Best Director, as well as a BIFA nomination in the Discovery Award category. The film was adapted for the screen by Naomi Gibney (Devils).
The film opens in a bleak police station where celebrated war correspondent Kate Rafter (Seagrove) faces questions from psychiatrist, Dr Shaw (Kurylenko) as they work through the painful events of Rafter’s life. A horrific incident in war-torn Iraq and the death of her mother (Steed) have brought a haunted Rafter home to Herne Bay, a place she believed she had escaped forever. Her resentful sister (Friel) has not made her sister welcome and her forbearing husband Paul (Miles) fails to broker peace. Whilst packing up her mother’s belongings from her childhood home, Rafter comes to believe there is something strange and terrifying happening in the house next door.
Pic is produced by Bill Kenwright (Broken), and executive-produced by David Gilbery (The Lost Daughter) and Naomi George (My Pure Land) for London-based BKStudios. BKStudios optioned the film rights from Madeleine Milburn Literary, TV & Film Agency in association with Soloson Media Limited.
Director Heidi Greensmith said: “Creating a strong distinctive style that would reflect the complexity of the story was as important to me as working with our incredible ensemble cast on finding the truth in the Rafter family trauma so that together we could craft a distinctive thriller. Every story needs an element of suspense but as Hitchcock said, ’There is no terror in the bang, only the anticipation of it.’”
Greensmith reunites with a number of her Winter collaborators: director of photography, Joel Devlin (Willow), and composer, Dominic Greensmith. They are joined by production designer Alan Gilmore (The Pope’s Exorcist), costume designer Howard Burden (The Last Kingdom) and hair and make-up designer Susanna Peretz (Hamlet).
Upcoming projects from BKStudios include period thriller, The Critic, starring Ian Mckellen, Gemma Arterton, Mark Strong and Leslie Manville, and the screen adaptation of Eugene O’Neill’s classic play Long Day’s Journey into Night, starring Jessica Lange, Ed Harris, Ben Foster and Colin Morgan.
West End theatre producer and film producer Kenwright has also been the chairman of Everton Football Club since 2004.
Kurylenko is repped by Independent Talent Group and UTA; Jenny Seagrove by Independent Talent Group; Anna Friel by The Artists Partnership, UTA and Todd Deiner; Ben Miles by Markham, Froggatt & Irwin.
