Stefan Ruzowitzky, director of the Oscar-winning “The Counterfeiters,” and “The Grudge” screenwriter Stephen Susco have boarded “Alone,” a remake of the 2007 supernatural Thai thriller by Banjong Pisanthanakun and Parkpoom Wongpoom.
The new film follows conjoined twin sisters from an Asian family in Boston whose loving relationship is tested when one of them befriends a boy, leading to her demand for a surgical separation from her sibling. During the operation, the forsaken sister dies. Years later, the deceased girl’s vengeful ghost returns to haunt her twin.
Former 20th Century Fox exec Paul Higginson and Alexander van Dülmen and Stephan Wagner of Berlin-based Carte Blanche Intl. are producing the film. Budgeted at between $5 million and $10 million, “Alone” is set for a targeted 2021 Stateside shoot on the East Coast as a U.S.-European co-production.
Van Dülmen said he was a big fan of the original film and also acquired distribution rights to the title for Central and Eastern Europe via his licensing group A Company.
After landing the remake rights to the property, he approached Amy Beecraft at Verve, who recommended Susco for the project.
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Van Dülmen said Susco was ideal for the project, which he described as a horror film that plays on the unique connection twins have and explores questions of the soul.
Susco’s writing credits include “The Grudge 2,” “Texas Chainsaw 3D” and 2018’s “Unfriended: Dark Web,” which he also directed.
No stranger to horror and sci-fi, Ruzowitzky has also dabbled in the genre with pics like the pandemic thriller “Patient Zero” and the hit Sky Deutschland series “8 Days.”
Ruzowitzky jumped to literary classics for his latest work, an adaptation of Hermann Hesse’s Noble Prize-winning “Narcissus and Goldmund,” which Beta Cinema is premiering at the European Film Market in Berlin. The Sony Pictures Germany release, which stars Jannis Niewöhner (“Beat”) and Sabin Tambrea (“Babylon Berlin”), hits local screens March 12.
Niewöhner also toplines Barbara Ott’s social drama “Kids Run,” which unspools in the Berlinale’s Perspektive Deutsches Kino sidebar.
Carte Blanche Intl.’s latest title, the Wagner-directed Angele Merkel drama “Merkel — Anatomy of a Crisis,” is likewise making its EFM debut via Bavaria Media Intl. and A Company.
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