The Berlin Film Festival kicks off this evening with the gala world premiere of Rebecca Miller’s She Came to Me. Ahead of the opening night out-of-competition screening, Miller met the Berlinale press corps alongside cast members including Anne Hathaway, Peter Dinklage, Marisa Tomei, Joanna Kulig and Evan Ellison.
Hathaway is also a producer on the multi-generational story that’s set in New York, but she was quick to note that even though this is an independent movie, her “heart beats for (all) film, and the more types of them the better.”
The Oscar winner clarified, “I think sometimes we think of these things as isolated from each other. But right now I think the way we’re all participating in films and the way we all kind of are unsure as to what the future of audience culture is, I think it’s important to love all types of films and show up in person at the movie theater for all the types of films that we can if this art form is to continue.”
Speaking of continuing, Dinklage commented that turning 50 had led him to “wonder if I want to be an actor for the next 30 years… It’s a common story when you hit 50 there’s a fork in the road.” However, the now 53-year-old doesn’t appear to be gearing up for retirement. “You either wait for inspiration or you seek it out. I intend to keep seeking it out.”
She Came to Me, which Miller scripted and which reps her fourth in Berlin, is billed as an exploration of “love in all its forms.” Miller today commented, “Love and hate are the two great motivators for human beings. Obviously love is the more positive and I do think it is the thing that really does transform people and change the trajectory of their lives.”
The film follows a composer (Dinklage) suffering from writer’s block who rediscovers his passion after an adventurous one-night stand; as well as a couple of gifted teenagers who fight to prove to the parents that their young love is something that can last forever; and a woman who seemingly has it all for whom love arrives in the most unexpected places.
Some of the cast shared different experiences with accepting their roles. Dinklage said choices “have so much to do with where you are in your own life — creatively, non-creatively — and Rebecca brought this to me at the perfect point in my life… I couldn’t have played this part 20 years ago or twenty years from now.” Tomei for her part had been wanting to work with Miller for a long time. “Her movies always made me laugh but also had great depth.” When Tomei received the script, she called Miller immediately “giggling and screaming.”
Hathaway likened her participation in She Came to Me to fate. The actress auditioned for Miller as a teenager, and though that project was not meant to be, Hathaway recalled leaving the room “feeling a sense of destiny about her. I always kept hope alive we would find each other with the right thing.”
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky will address the opening ceremony tonight before She Came to Me screens. Hathaway called him “a hero of our times.” Commented Miller, “I think of filmmaking being a kind of patriotic act, to show different aspects of the country… One of the ways in which we can perhaps have a more peaceful world is by having our art talk to each other across the nations.”
She Came to Me is produced by Damon Cardasis, Pamela Koffler, Christine Vachon, Rebecca Miller, Len Blavatnik and Anne Hathaway. Protagonist Pictures is handling international sales and CAA is repping North America.
source: deadline.com
