RAGE
“a voyage that is nothing short of global…I have never before seen a film with so many simultaneous levels of humour, of meaning and of vertigo.”
John Berger (author of ‘Ways of Seeing’)
Defying the usual conventions of film, RAGE is the new cinematic creation from ground-breaking writer/director Sally Potter. Using a radical narrative structure focusing entirely on individual performances, RAGE builds a tragicomic portrait of people persuaded to reveal their secrets in the midst of a crisis. The film consists entirely of a dynamic series of interviews, as if shot by a schoolboy on his mobile phone. He goes behind-the-scenes at a New York fashion show during seven days in which an accident on the catwalk turns into a murder investigation.
Fourteen actors, both celebrated stars and exciting emerging talents, play characters who each have a role in the show, from the designer (Simon Abkarian) and his models (Lily Cole and Jude Law), the fashion critic (Judi Dench) and photographer (Steve Buscemi), through the seamstress (Adriana Barraza) to the fashion house financier (Eddie Izzard) and his bodyguard (John Leguizamo). As they start to confide in Michelangelo, the unseen schoolboy with his phone camera, their personal truths begin to surface and the reality of events taking place off screen at the show start to unravel.
Writer/director Sally Potter spent two days with each actor, shooting the character’s interviews against a blue screen, with just herself behind the camera and a sound recordist. Returning to this type of pure performance and intimate style of filmmaking was a liberating and challenging experience for both the cast and director.
The avant-garde style and filmmaking methods of RAGE are also embraced in its unique multi-territory, cross-platform distribution strategy, which will see the film premiered by Babelgum as a custom seven-part version on mobile and internet, day and date with the digital screen and DVD release.
See the complete cast of characters at www.sallypotter.com/gallery
RAGE
SALLY POTTER (WRITER / DIRECTOR)
Sally Potter’s work has, from the early 1970’s, embraced dance, theatre, music and film. After her cult hit with the short film Thriller (1979), Potter directed her first feature, The Gold Diggers (1983), starring Julie Christie. Potter then made another short, The London Story (1986), and several documentaries before the internationally acclaimed and multi-award winning Orlando (1992), starring Tilda Swinton. This was followed by The Tango Lesson (1996) and The Man Who Cried (2000), starring Christina Ricci, Johnny Depp, Cate Blanchett and John Turturro. In 2004 Potter made Yes, starring Joan Allen, Simon Abkarian, and Sam Neill. In 2007 she created a new production of ‘Carmen’ for English National Opera, and is currently working on a range of projects in film, theatre and the internet. As with all her films, Potter has written the screenplay for RAGE. She has a blog and interactive message board at www.sallypotter.com.
INTERVIEW WITH SALLY POTTER
QUESTION: RAGE is a murder mystery set in the New York fashion world, but you never see New York, the fashion world, or the murders. Why?
SALLY POTTER: We have been so oversaturated with glossy images of the fashion world that we can no longer see beyond them. Similarly, New York itself is, in a way, over familiar. Thus the simple solution of not showing the city or the fashion collection; the world around the characters is created in the imagination of the viewer, from clues on the soundtrack, from things people say and things they don’t say.
Q: There is a detective in the film, but – unusually for a thriller – he’s not our POV character.
SP: This particular detective is atypical, in that he's a Shakespeare-quoting character, somebody who sees himself performing a role – the role of detective – and dresses for the part.
Q: As do all the characters – none of whom are what they appear.
SP: We live in a culture obsessed by appearance and fame, but parts of the fashion industry are dependent on an illegal workforce, whose invisibility is a survival strategy. Likewise, Michelangelo (who is interviewing the characters) is invisible and unheard throughout, a diminutive witness whose steady eye and non-judgmental gaze allows the characters to open up to him.
Q: He’s invisible, but making others visible – especially the people we don’t usually see, like the garment workers and bodyguards.
SP: Maybe it’s his antidote to a value system based on celebrity, power and wealth. He is equally interested in the pizza delivery person and the mogul.
Q: Was that reflected in how this film was made?
SP: Everyone worked on equal terms for very little money. Each actor gave themselves completely to the process without complaint and with great dedication.
Q: It sounds like just the film for the “credit crunch” era. Was that part of your intention?
SP: I saw it as a celebration of “poor cinema”; using minimal means, concentrating on text and performance, a return to the basic elements of storytelling by exploring the landscape of the human face. It's by far the lowest budget feature film I've ever made, shot in photographers’ studios, using a greenscreen as background. On set, there were only three of us at any time; the actor, me, operating the camera, and Jean-Paul Mugel recording the sound. The process was as intimate as the final product.
Q: So the film was shot as if you were Michelangelo?
SP: Yes. At times, I tried to embody him, and to shoot and frame following his emotional responses to the character. But as a director it also meant I was extremely close to each actor physically and we were able to work very intensely, a luxury that this minimalist setup afforded us.
Q: Is the film a rage against fashion’s constructions and impossible aspirations?
SP: Actually, there's a lot of tenderness in the film. The setting may be the fashion world but the issues could apply to people working in any high-pressure industry – the dynamics of power and powerlessness, fears of redundancy and failure, confusion about youth and ageing. The rage is the quieter rage against an economy that ruins lives and turns people into things, that forgets what's important about being alive.
Interview by Sophie Mayer, whose book, The Cinema of Sally Potter, is due for publication in 2009.
