Roadshow Films has released the trailer for the eagerly anticipated Australian adaptation of “RAMS”, which is currently without a specific release date but is tagged as being “in cinemas soon”. Australian/New Zealand royalty Michael Caton and Sam Neill will star in the comedy-drama, playing estranged brothers and farmers who are forced to work together after a crisis hits their farms.

The new Australian picture is an English-language re-imagining of the critically acclaimed 2015 Icelandic film of the same name (Hrútar in its native language) which was a huge success for Palace Films who distributed the film here in Australia. The original film was written and directed by Grimur Hakonarson, it was set and shot in his native Iceland and went on to win best film in Un Certain Regard at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival.

The adaptation tells the story of two estranged brothers on adjoining sheep farms who haven’t spoken to each other in 40 years. When a rare disease threatens their sheep, the brothers must find a way to work together to save their flock, their small town and their family’s legacy. Screenwest describes the film as ‘Far from a ‘remake’, RAMS is a fresh interpretation of the original film and will give a universal story a distinctly Australian context’.

Along with Neill and Caton, the film boasts an outstanding (almost) all-Australian supporting cast including Asher Keddie (Offspring, Love My Way), Wayne Blair (Mystery Road, The Sapphires), Leon Ford (The Letdown, The Light Between the Oceans), Travis McMahon (Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries), Hayley McElhinney (The Babadook, Doctor Doctor), Kipan Rothbury (Sacred Heart), the Aussie cast is also joined by British actress Miranda Richardson (The Hours, The Crying Game).

Jeremy Sims acts as director, reuniting with Caton after the two worked together on Last Cab to Darwin in 2015. The script has been adapted by Western Australian screenwriter Jules Duncan and produced by Janelle Landers and Aidan O’Bryan from WBMC. When the film started production, Sims told Variety “I am excited to have the chance to take this elegant and powerful tale and set it in the place that I spent my summers growing up. This is a story about family, connected through land and community, and the relationships at the heart of those communities”.

The film was shot at the end of 2018 in the picturesque town of Mount Barker in Western Australia’s Great Southern region, Sims continued “Regional WA is a vast and complex place, and the Great Southern has such a unique flavour that audiences deserve to see it on the big screen.”

We can’t wait to see Jeremy Sims’ exciting reimagining of the Icelandic classic and are looking forward to the uniquely Australian tone that will resonate with both local and international audiences. You can watch the trailer for RAMS below.