Exclusive: Netflix's All the Light We Cannot See to film in Hungary

Hungary is attracting several high-profile productions to its shores in 2022, including Netflix’s All the Lights We Cannot See and Legendary/Warner’s sci-fi epic Dune: Part Two. 

Part One of Denis Villeneuve’s blockbuster, starring Timothee Chalamet, partly shot in Hungary, and now the film-maker is set to return to the country to shoot part two at the Origo Studios in Budapest.

Netflix’s All the Light We Cannot See limited series is an adaptation of Anthony Doerr’s epic war novel, produced by Shawn Levy’s 21 Laps Entertainment, with Levy directing all the episodes. The book-to-screen adaptation is written by Steven Knight (Peaky Blinders) with Aria Mia Loberti as the lead actress.

Other big projects to choose Hungary include Netflix and Carnival Films’ The Last Kingdom: Seven Kings Must Die, a feature version of the popular TV series, which has been filming in Hungary for the past eight years. Plus Amazon TV and Paramount’s Jack Ryan S4, starring John Krasinski, Netflix’s Shadow and Bone S2; Netflix and Yes Studios’ Fauda S4, and CBS/Wolf Entertainment/Universal Television series FBI: International.

These follow a record-breaking year of €544m production spend in Hungary last year, according to the National Film Institute of Hungary. Major projects to shoot in the country in 2021 include the Marvel series, Moon Knight, starring Ethan Hawke and Oscar Isaac, Lionsgate and Starz project The Continental, an event series expanding the John Wick universe, starring Mel Gibson; Mikael Hafstrom's sci-fi thriller Slingshot, starring Casey Affleck and Laurence Fishburne; and Yorgos Lanthimos’s Poor Things, backed by Searchlight Pictures, Film4 and Element Pictures, starring Emma Stone, Mark Ruffalo and Willem Dafoe.

”The engine of development is the production of high-budget, international films, which are attracted to Budapest by the world-renowned Hungarian film tradition, wonderful locations, state-of-the-art studios, up-to-date expertise, and the tax rebate scheme. Thanks to the supportive attitude of the government, the excellent domestic production companies and the trust of our foreign partners, even the pandemic couldn’t break the growing trend,” said the Hungarian Film Comissioner, Csaba Káel.

Hungary offers a cash rebate of up to 30% to international film and TV productions with no minimum spend requirement.

Main image: Marvel series Moon Knight filming in Hungary