Altitude Film Sales has acquired international sales rights to “Calm With Horses.” The film is based on a Colin Barrett novella from the collection of short stories “Young Skins,” and will star Cosmo Jarvis (“Lady Macbeth”), Barry Keoghan (“Dunkirk”), and Niamh Algar (“Without Name”).
Nick Rowland will helm the picture, which is set to shoot in Ireland. It is his feature directorial debut following “Slap,” his BAFTA and BIFA-nominated short film. Writer Joe Murtagh has adapted the screenplay having collaborated with Rowland since they studied together at the NFTS.
The film is set in rural Ireland and follows an ex-boxer who has become an enforcer for a crime family. He is also trying to be a father to his autistic five-year-old son. His life reaches a turning point when he is asked to kill for the first time.
Michael Fassbender, Conor McCaughan, and Daniel Emmerson’s DMC Film developed the project with Film4. Emmerson is producing and Fassbender and McCaughan will executive produce.
Mike Runagall from Altitude said: “Nick Rowland and Joseph Murtagh’s work has marked them out as exciting director and writer talent to watch and we are delighted to be working with them and our friends at DMC and Film4 to ‘Calm with Horses’ to audiences worldwide.”
Ed Guiney and Andrew Lowe will exec produce for Element Pictures, Sam Lavender and Daniel Battsek for Film4, Celine Haddad for the Irish Film Board, and Sarah Dillon for the WRAP Fund.
