Michael Weber's The Match Factory has picked up worldwide rights, excluding Scandinavia and German-speaking territories, to Bent Hamer's latest project O'Horten which began shooting in Norway on January 29.

The film, which follows locomotive driver Odd Horten on a fatefully absurd odyssey on his first days of retirement, has actor Bard Owe, internationally known from Lars von Trier's Europa (1991) and The Kingdom (1994/1997), cast in the lead role with Joachim Calmeyer and Bjorn Floberg.

Speaking about the film, Hamer says that his ambition with O'Horten is 'to create a familiar, yet odd, universe, where the more situation-oriented than action-driven style will appeal to the viewer with its distinctive character and atmosphere. A cinematic universe in which it is enjoyable being.'

O'Horten will now be Hamer's second collaboration with Germany's Pandora Filmproduktion after Factotum, and additional financing has come from the Norwegian Film Fund, Nordic Film & Television Fund, Idmemento, ZDF/Arte and Scanbox.

The Match Factory is also handling international sales on Serbian Stefan Arsenijevic's feature debut Love And Other Crimes, produced by Cologne's Icon Film with Belgrade-based Art & Popcorn at locations in New Belgrade since the beginning of February, and starring Anica Dobra, one of the female leads in the Forum film The Trap (Klopka) by fellow Serbian director Srdan Golubovic.