FILM OF THE WEEK
INTERVIEW | Lone Scherfig and Alejandro Amenábar start shooting 'An Education', 'Agora' |
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| Written by the editor | |
| Monday, 17 March 2008 | |
 Max Minghella, director Alejandro Amenábar and Rachel Weisz on the set of 'Agora'. Photo (c): Premier PR Danish director Lone Scherfig (Italiensk for begyndere / Italian for Beginners) and Spanish director Alejandro Amenábar (Mar Adrentro / The Sea Inside) both start shooting today on their latest features, and both do so abroad. Scherfig, who besides the dogma film Italiensk for begyndere -- one of the most financially successful of all dogma films -- also made the English-language feature Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself and most recently made the Danish-language film Hjemve (Homesick). Her new feature is called An Education and was written by popular UK writer Nick Hornby (About a Boy, Fever Pitch), who adapted an autobiographical piece from Lynn Barber. The story is set in London in the early 1960s, where a 17-year-old girl (Carey Mulligan, one of the Bennet sisters from Joe Wright's Pride & Prejudice) falls under the spell of an utterly unsuitable 30-something (US actor Peter Sarsgaard, Kinsey), who introduces her to an exciting new world of art auctions, trips abroad and smoky clubs.
Scherfig has started filming in London and will shoot through early May on the film, with locations also including Oxford and Paris. Alfred Molina and Cara Seymour star as the girl's parents, while the cast also includes her Pride co-star Rosamund Pike, recent Silver Bear winner Sally Hawkins (Happy-Go-Lucky), British star actress Emma Thompson (Love Actually) and upcoming young actor Dominic Cooper (The History Boys). The latter replaces Orlando Bloom in the role of the business partner of Sarsgaard's character. Bloom had to drop out at the last moment because of reported scheduling conflicts. Amenábar has started filming on Malta on his ancient epic Agora today. The film is his first feature since his intimate Oscar-winning biopic Mar adentro. Agora is set in Egypt during the Roman occupation and is again a biopic, this time of Hypatia of Alexandria, a female astrologer and philosopher who lived in the fourth century. Oscar-winner Rachel Weisz (The Constant Gardener) will play Hypatia, while Max Minghella (George Clooney's son in Syriana) will co-star as her slave, who is torn between his secret love for her and the rising tide of Christendom that threatens to destroy the great library of Alexandria. The film is Amenábar's second English-language film after the ghost story The Others, with Nicole Kidman, and will film for a total of 15 weeks on the Mediterranean island. Regular Amenábar' collaborator Mateo Gil co-wrote the screenplay. The cast of Agora further includes Oscar Isaac (The Nativity), Ashraf Barhom (The Kingdom), Michael Lonsdale (Munich), Rupert Evans (Hellboy) and Homayoun Ershadi (The Kite Runner). |
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