According to an interview with Noomi in the German newspaper Tagesspiegel, “Alive Alone” is not going to happen after all. This is bad news since the project sounded very exciting and it was apparent throughout the year how Noomi prepared visually for the part. The interview was conducted at the San Sebastian Film Festival back in September, so I’m a bit surprised there hasn’t been an official announcement on the project’s fate since then. Here’s a translation of the part of the interview, which revolved around Noomi’s extensive preparation for each new role:

For “Alive Alone”, I had the feeling to be extremly vulnerable. I was supposed to play a drug addicted prostitute. For this, I starved myself to a minimum weight and have spent much time with prostitutes and drug addicts to really feel how they live. I wanted to dig as deep as possible into human abyss and shut myself out of the real world. Unfortunately, the project was called off shortly before filming began.

According to the The Hollywood Reporter, Sam Worthington and Idris Elba will team up with Noomi Rapace in Alive Alone, a New York-set thriller marking the directorial debut of Khurram Longi. Elba will star as Jamal, an ex-detainee of Guantanamo Bay working as a taxi driver, and Rapace will play Sarah, a prostitute on the run from a feared crime boss. When their worlds collide, they unexpectedly find salvation in each other. Worthington will play the crime boss Murphy. Thunder Road Pictures will make the movie which is being touted to buyers during the EFM by Protagonist Pictures. Thunder Road’s Basil Iwanyk is producing with Rapace acting as executive producer. Michael Benaroya’s Benaroya Pictures is financing. Elba’s addition comes after Matthias Schoenaerts has had to pull out for personal reasons.

The Independent has a fantastic new interview with Noomi in its weekend edition. They talk about many of her upcoming projects, including “Child 44”, “Alive Alone”, “What Happened to Monday?” and also traveling the world, working with Tom Hardy and the ups and downs of moving constantly. A very interesting article. Find a preview belwo, the complete piece is here.

Noomi Rapace made her name starring in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and its sequels in the Millennium trilogy looking like she had just left a new-wave punk band – clad in a leather suit with her black hair combed forward over her left eye, and numerous ear and nose piercings. She was a new type of female hero, combining brains – an ace computer hacker – and brawn. Her gut-wrenching performance as Lisbeth Salander helped propel herself and the books into the international stratosphere. It’s this complete immersion in her role that explains why the 34-year-old actress looks so emaciated when we meet. At first I was taken aback by how different she is from when we last met, less than two years ago. The dark locks seen in Prometheus have been dyed blond. And her frame, which was then toned by doing an impressive amount of Bikram yoga – an activity pivotal to her character in the Brian De Palma flop Passion – has now dissipated. The weight loss is because she is currently shooting Alive Alone, in which she plays a heroin addict and prostitute who gets entwined in New York with a former detainee from Guantanamo Bay. So, no need to call in the medics then.

The Playlist has sat down with Noomi in Marrakech for an amazing interview in which she dishes on all of her new projects – including “Child 44” and “Animal Rescue” – and confirming “Alive Alone” and “What Happened to Monday”. Make sure to read the complete interview over at The Playlist.

On Child 44:

We did “Animal Rescue” and I love working with him. We know each other … sometimes you meet someone and you feel like you can go anywhere—step into different characters and time zones or a period film or contemporary or whatever—we have a very intimate [relationship] and trust each other a lot. But we have a lot of fun even if it’s quite dark or heavy, we’re always laughing a lot and having a good time, so I love working with him and he’s such an incredible actor, I’ve been really lucky. And Gary Oldman is in it, who is one of my heroes, and Ridley Scott produced so he’s in the background and Daniel Espinosa who is from Chile but grew up in Sweden he is directing it. He did “Safe House,” and “Snabba Cash” and he’s also a friend of mine. So it was a long shoot and quite a big epic movie in one way, but very much a character drama, also some kind of reverse love story between my character and Tom’s character: they’ve been married for eight years when the movie starts and it’s like a cold war between them.

On Animal Rescue:

I loved [his previous film] “Bullhead.” I saw it and was blown away and I called my team “I want to work with this guy!” Then I read “Animal Rescue” before he was even on board, and I was meeting with Fox Searchlight, we kept a dialogue going, and then when I heard Roskam was doing it, I wanted to do it. I think he’s very passionate, and intense and very well prepared, he knows what he wants and is very focused, very much an actor’s director. There’s actually a scene that’s not in the script, I came to him and said I think we need this scene, between me and Matthias, that tells more about the two of them, that they have a history together that you never really saw. We did it, like four takes and when I met them in L.A., they said it’s one of the best scenes, so he’s very open. I definitely think we will work together again.

On Alive Alone:

It’s actually one of the most beautiful scripts I’ve read, it’s a fantastic love story. I would say if you take “Taxi Driver” and “Leaving Las Vegas” and throw them together … It’s an intense story between my character who is a heroin addict and prostitute in New York and Matthias Schoenaerts, he is playing the other lead. We worked together on “Animal Rescue” and we really connected but we only had two scenes together. We felt straight away that we wanted to work together again, and he gave me the script and I read it and I thought it was amazing.

On What Happened to Monday:

Yeah I’m doing that, maybe it’s a big mistake! I will play seven twin sisters. I just came back from meeting with one of the producers in Paris and next week I’m in London to work with the director [Tommy Wirkola] on the script. It’s a Black List script, and was written for a man.

According to Deadline, Here’s a movie package that should be a hot one at Cannes. Protagonist and Thunder Road have teamed on Alive Alone, a drama that marks the feature directing debut of Khurram Longi. Bullhead star Matthias Schoenarts and Noomi Rapace are attached to play the leads in a thriller that focuses on the relationship between an ex-detainee of Guantanamo Bay, and a woman who is on the run from a crime boss. Longi’s script made both the Black List and the UK-centric Brit List. Thunder Road’s Basil Iwanyk is producing and Peter Lawson is exec producing, with production to start January in New York City. Protagonist Pictures will sell territories in Cannes while CAA reps domestic rights. Rapace and Schoenarts have recently filmed “Animal Rescue”. The complete article can be read here.