Ahead of its premiere at the Berlin Film Festival tomorrow, the first international poster for Hossein Amini’s The Two Faces of January has surfaced online from the festival.
Viggo Mortensen, Kirsten Dunst, and Oscar Isaac lead the thriller, due to be released on our shores in the spring.
1962. A glamorous American couple, the charismatic Chester MacFarland (Mortensen) and his alluring younger wife Colette (Dunst), arrive in Athens by boat via the Corinthian Canal. While sightseeing at the Acropolis they encounter Rydal (Isaac), a young, Greek-speaking American who is working as a tour guide, scamming tourists on the side. Drawn to Colette’s beauty and impressed by Chester’s wealth and sophistication, Rydal gladly accepts their invitation to dinner. However, all is not as it seems with the MacFarlands and Chester’s affable exterior hides darker secrets. When Rydal visits the couple at their exclusive hotel, Chester presses him to help move the body of a seemingly unconscious man who he claims attacked him. In the moment, Rydal agrees but as events take a more sinister turn he finds himself compromised and unable to pull himself free. His increasing infatuation with the vulnerable and responsive Colette gives rise to Chester’s jealousy and paranoia, leading to a tense and dangerous battle of wits between the two men.
The Oscar-nominated Amini makes his directorial debut with the film, directing from his own script, adapting the original 1964 novel by Patricia Highsmith.
Fellow Oscar nominees Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner (Les Misérables, Rush) are producing.
The Two Faces of January is set to be released in the UK on 16th May. No word yet on a US distributor, but here’s to hoping that a strong bow in Berlin tomorrow will soon change that.
