Film ponders end of the world
Source: Agencies |
September 8, 2011, Thursday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
FILM director Abel Ferrara ponders how we would behave knowing death was coming to us all in an environmental disaster in "4:44 Last Day on Earth", his latest movie starring Willem Dafoe.
The film, one of 23 in the main competition at the Venice film festival, had its world premiere yesterday as the annual cinema showcase enters its final stretch ahead of Saturday's awards.
Dafoe plays Cisco, an actor, while -Shanyn Leigh portrays his partner, an artist, in the actress's first leading role.
The couple have sex, eat, cry and bicker as 4.44am, the time when everyone knows the end will come, gets closer.
Rather than reflecting the shock and panic of first learning of Earth's fate, the movie is set instead at a time when people have accepted what awaits them.
Ferrara, who has worked with Dafoe before on "Go Go Tales" and "New Rose Hotel," and is most known for 1992's "Bad Lieutenant," said the device made the movie more universal.
"We all know we are going to die every moment of every day," he told reporters after a press screening of the movie in Venice. "What you do in the meantime is what life is all about."
News footage in the film, including a real interview by environmental campaigner and former US vice president Al Gore, makes clear that the cause of Earth's demise is man-made.
"This film is about man's destruction of the Earth," Ferrara said. "It is on us. It is our responsibility. We did it. This is not an accident, or an act of God as they say in the insurance claim. This is an act of man."
Asked whether Gore was officially attached to the film, the director said he had "reached out" to Gore and that he was "definitely pro", although he had not seen it.
As Cisco looks out from his apartment roof, a man in a nearby building jumps to his death, while for others life goes on as normal - the couple even manage to order a takeaway.
The Asian boy who delivers the food uses Cisco's laptop to talk to his relatives abroad one last time over the internet, while Cisco himself breaks down as he says farewell to his daughter.
The film, one of 23 in the main competition at the Venice film festival, had its world premiere yesterday as the annual cinema showcase enters its final stretch ahead of Saturday's awards.
Dafoe plays Cisco, an actor, while -Shanyn Leigh portrays his partner, an artist, in the actress's first leading role.
The couple have sex, eat, cry and bicker as 4.44am, the time when everyone knows the end will come, gets closer.
Rather than reflecting the shock and panic of first learning of Earth's fate, the movie is set instead at a time when people have accepted what awaits them.
Ferrara, who has worked with Dafoe before on "Go Go Tales" and "New Rose Hotel," and is most known for 1992's "Bad Lieutenant," said the device made the movie more universal.
"We all know we are going to die every moment of every day," he told reporters after a press screening of the movie in Venice. "What you do in the meantime is what life is all about."
News footage in the film, including a real interview by environmental campaigner and former US vice president Al Gore, makes clear that the cause of Earth's demise is man-made.
"This film is about man's destruction of the Earth," Ferrara said. "It is on us. It is our responsibility. We did it. This is not an accident, or an act of God as they say in the insurance claim. This is an act of man."
Asked whether Gore was officially attached to the film, the director said he had "reached out" to Gore and that he was "definitely pro", although he had not seen it.
As Cisco looks out from his apartment roof, a man in a nearby building jumps to his death, while for others life goes on as normal - the couple even manage to order a takeaway.
The Asian boy who delivers the food uses Cisco's laptop to talk to his relatives abroad one last time over the internet, while Cisco himself breaks down as he says farewell to his daughter.
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