Susanne Bier might have to get another work visa abroad, as it will be highly unlikely that she’ll be working on back to back Danish language projects. After working on some false starts post Things We Lost in the Fire, Bier who is currently filming Civilization a.k.a Hævnen (about Sudan’s refugee camps and in a little Danish provincial town) and might jump onto Which Brings Me to You next for Steve Golin and Richard Brown’s Anonymous Content.
Adapted by Keith Bunin (a writer on television’s In Treatment), this is based on Julianna Baggott and Steve Almond’s novel which centers on a single man and single woman who meet at a wedding and begin a relationship in which they write letters describing past romances and missteps. This is the messy relationship territory that Bier works best in.
Here’s the book’s official synopsis, which tells us that the paired leads would have a large supporting cast.
Two rambunctious, romantic flameouts. One boring wedding. One heated embrace in a quiet coatroom. This is not exactly the recipe for true love. John and Jane’s lusty encounter at a friend’s wedding isn’t really the beginning of anything with any weight to it; even they know that. When they manage to pull back, it occurs to them that they might start this whole thing over properly. They might try getting to know one another first, through letters.
What follows is a series of traded confessions—of their messy histories, their past errors, their big loves, their flaws, and their passions. Each love affair, confessed as honestly as possible, reveals the ways in which Jane and John have grown and changed—or not changed—over the years; the people they’ve hurt, the ones still bruised. The ones who bruised them. Where all of this soul-baring will take them is the burning question behind every letter—a question that can only be answered when they meet again, finally, in the flesh.
