'A wonderful series of short office comedies that are quite unlike anything I’ve seen before: each one has a premise that’s absurd or fantastical, but they’re also sharp commentaries on social politics and mores. A powerful counterweight to the feeble sense of disappointment and regret and foreclosure that seems to go along with this ridiculous age we now are.'
Rollo Romig - Theatre critic for The New Yorker
Rollo Romig - Theatre critic for The New Yorker
What is Atopia?
This project has been through many iterations. What started as a short film in 2011, became an award winning web series in 2014 which then attracted interest from major production companies in Norway, Austria and the UK. Finally, in 2016, Warner Bros spent 5 weeks deliberating whether or not to turn it into a $24 million TV series before eventually deeming the project “Too much on the fringes to fit into a WB box." The bastards. No not really they were lovely people.
After that the project was shelved until in 2019 I suddenly realised how to finish it.
The remainder of the film was quickly shot in Norway, New York, London and Mexico City, just before the pandemic. Unfortunately there was one crucial scene that wasn't filmed and we had to wait until 2022 until we had to opportunity to film it.
And then the horrible truth came... It didn't work.
After much soul searching and deliberation I had to accept that I was forcing two projects together. There's the Norway stuff, and there there's ATOPIA.
So, to return to the title of this blurb, What is ATOPIA? Someone told me the other day that it is concept not a film. And they may be right. For now it is on the back burner as I concentrate on La Mirada.
However, here are some scenes... of the Atopia Machine and Club Atopia, and the original series
This project has been through many iterations. What started as a short film in 2011, became an award winning web series in 2014 which then attracted interest from major production companies in Norway, Austria and the UK. Finally, in 2016, Warner Bros spent 5 weeks deliberating whether or not to turn it into a $24 million TV series before eventually deeming the project “Too much on the fringes to fit into a WB box." The bastards. No not really they were lovely people.
After that the project was shelved until in 2019 I suddenly realised how to finish it.
The remainder of the film was quickly shot in Norway, New York, London and Mexico City, just before the pandemic. Unfortunately there was one crucial scene that wasn't filmed and we had to wait until 2022 until we had to opportunity to film it.
And then the horrible truth came... It didn't work.
After much soul searching and deliberation I had to accept that I was forcing two projects together. There's the Norway stuff, and there there's ATOPIA.
So, to return to the title of this blurb, What is ATOPIA? Someone told me the other day that it is concept not a film. And they may be right. For now it is on the back burner as I concentrate on La Mirada.
However, here are some scenes... of the Atopia Machine and Club Atopia, and the original series
"Carl, an un-extraordinary office worker, is the unknowing test subject of simulations being carried out by aliens searching for the ultimate fiction."
That was the plan...
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Produced by Nordås Film AS
Executive Producer:
Christopher Nielsen
Associate Producer:
Pedro German Lopez
Writer / Director
Matt Willis-Jones
Main Cast:
Harald Sørlie
Vera Holte
Ragnhild H. Myntevik
Peter Tjølsen
Cecilie Solberg
Charlotte Grundt
Jørn-Bjørn Fuller-Gee
Voice Cast:
Nikki Yee
Rydian Cook
Paul Whetstone
Angela Peters
Jennifer Willis-Jones
Hanne Carrington Reay
Nicolas Vander Biest
Music
Yann Latour / Pete Rycroft / Andreas ‘Cuckoo’ Paleologas / Motel Kaju / Elvira Nikolaisen
