Jeremy Strong will star in “The Passenger,” a historical escape thriller from Magnus von Horn. FilmNation Entertainment has acquired worldwide rights, excluding German-speaking territories and Poland, to the film.
This marks the English-language debut of von Horn, a Swedish and Polish director whose previous film, “The Girl with the Needle,” was nominated for the Academy Award for best international feature film.
Strong was an Oscar nominee for his turn as Roy Cohn in “The Apprentice” and won an Emmy for his performance on “Succession” and a Tony for the 2024 revival of “An Enemy of the People.” His credits include “Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere,” “The Gentlemen,” “The Trial of the Chicago 7” and “Armageddon Time.” Strong will next portray Facebook founder and Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg in “The Social Reckoning,” a follow-up to “The Social Network.”
The script for “The Passenger,” which von Horn co-wrote with Aleko Gotscheff, is based on the 1938 novel of the same name by Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz. It was a U.K. Sunday Times Top Ten bestseller translated into over 30 languages.
In “The Passenger,” respected businessman Otto Silbermann is forced to flee Berlin after the November 1938 pogroms, known as Kristallnacht or the Night of Broken Glass. According to an official plot description, the film follows Otto as he tries “to escape with his wealth” and “drifts from train to train as his homeland becomes a cage and his identity dissolves.”
“I keep being struck by how history repeats itself. Boschwitz wrote ‘The Passenger’ as a 23-year-old refugee in 1938, he didn’t have the luxury of hindsight, and neither does Otto Silbermann, who moves through Germany over four days believing the next train, the next acquaintance, the next bank counter will return him to the life he knew,” Von Horn said in a statement. “I want to make a film about that exact moment, the moment before someone admits the world has changed. I see it everywhere now: in headlines, in negotiations, in the rooms of people I love. We are extraordinary at staying.”
“The Passenger” is produced by Port au Prince Films (Jan Krueger, Rosh Khodabakhsh) and Lava Films (Mariusz Włodarski), Martina Valentina Baumgartner serves as an executive producer. FilmNation is co-financing the film and launching sales out of Cannes.
Alice Laffillé, FilmNation’s vice president of sales, said “Magnus’ work on ‘The Girl with the Needle’ was remarkable — he is a true auteur filmmaker with an extraordinary ability to weave contemporary themes into historical narratives, and the FilmNation team is thrilled to bring his English-language debut to audiences around the world.”
“We’re thrilled to partner with Magnus, Jeremy Strong, and FilmNation on bringing this gripping and vital story to the screen, uniting international voices in a film with true global reach,” said producers Krueger, Khodabakhsh and Włodarski in a joint statement.
FilmNation’s projects include Sean Baker’s “Anora,” Edward Berger’s “Conclave” and Emerald Fennell’s “Promising Young Woman.” Recent TV releases include the Prime Video Original Series “The House of the Spirits” and “Small Town, Big Story” for Sky. FilmNation’s theater credits include 2024 Best Play Tony-Winner “Stereophonic” and the Tony Award-Winning productions “Prima Facie” and “The Band’s Visit.”
The deal for “The Passenger” was negotiated by Laffillé on behalf of FilmNation Entertainment, Włodarski on behalf of Lava Films, and Krueger on behalf of Port au Prince Films.
Von Horn is repped by WME and Range Media Partners. Strong is repped by WME, Range Media Partners, and Hansen, Jacobson, Teller, Newman, Warren, Richman, Rush, Kaller, Gellman, Meigs & Fox.
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