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Simon Staho

Simon Staho

Directing

Biography

Danish film director Simon Staho (born 1972) has worked with a number of renowned Swedish actors, including Mikael Persbrandt, Noomi Rapace, Pernilla August and Erland Josephson. Staho’s first feature film Vildspor/Wildside (1998) was shot in Iceland and starred Mads Mikkelsen and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau. It was selected for the San Sebastian International Film Festival. Variety wrote in its review: “A solidly crafted thriller with links to classic film noir, though the bleakly beautiful Icelandic settings invest this tale of friendship and betrayal with a distinct ambience. Intelligent and suspenseful fare.”

Known For

The Stranger

It's a movie about a subject that captivates me. And I can see that it also captivates the world and people and has done it at all times. It is the meeting with the stranger. Why is it so difficult to relate to those who's not like ourselves? We constantly divide the world into 'us against them'. Each time we meet a new person, we define ourselves in contrast to the other. We do not look at what connects us, but what separates us. It seems like something that is pervasive - not just for Denmark, Europe and the US, but in every possible society and culture in the world at all times. It is a common human condition that we have endless difficulty in dealing with the stranger. With this movie, I want to ask a single question that sets the world on fire. It is an exploration of my own wonder why the encounter with the stranger is so explosive and can make seemingly sensible people like myself and others mad.

The Stranger

2025Movie