Universal Music Classics/Decca Gold announced today, the release of the score to the highly anticipated biopic from IFC Films, Mary Shelley, which features original music by composer Amelia Warner (Mum’s List).Mary Shelley will be released digitally on May 25th – the same date the film premieres in theaters in the US.
In describing the composition process, Amelia emphasized the ghostly themes of the film by utilizing vocalists and orchestral rhythms to assist in telling this illuminating tale.
“We used a lot of synths layered with the orchestra. The real strings layered with electric synths created a strangeness and modernity that I think works well with Mary’s character. We found some amazing musicians and two incredible singers who are a huge part of the score. We used a soprano and a counter tenor and had them sing in a very expressive way. For example, when things start to go a bit crazy in those Geneva scenes, we got the singers to scream and to slide up and down the scale to create an unsettling disorientation. It was a difficult cue and took a while to get right. Voice was really important as were the strings, which are slightly discordant. We also used breath and heartbeat to feel like we are experiencing it as Mary.”
Mary Shelley the original motion picture score is now available, and the track list is as follows.
01 Mary Shelley 02 Storm in The Stars 03 My Sanctuary 04 Rights of Woman 05 Mary’s Decision 06 We Shall Become the Same 07 It’s Time We Left This Place 08 An Unreal Mystery 09 Bloomsbury 10 Mary Meets Percy 11 Kings Cross 12 Caged Bird 13 Mary’s Nightmare 14 The Book 15 Séance 16 Scotland 17 None of This Will Matter 18 Clara 19 Lost in Darkness and Distance
Mary Shelley is directed by Haifaa al-Mansour, and stars: Elle Fanning, Douglas Booth, Bel Powley, Ben Hardy, Tom Sturridge, Maisie Williams, Stephen Dillane, and Joanne Froggatt.
For more information on composer Amelia Warner, visit her website, www.ameliawarnermusic.com and her Instagram: @awarnermusic
The film follows the stormy relationship between Shelley and renown romantic poet, Percy Bysshe Shelley. Mary and Percy declare their love for each other and much to her family’s horror they run away together, joined by Mary’s half-sister Claire. In the midst of growing tension within their relationship, during their stay at Lord Byron’s house at Lake Geneva, the idea of Frankenstein is conceived when a challenge is put to all houseguests to write a ghost story. A monstrous character is created, which will permanently stake its claim on popular culture worldwide, but society at the time puts little value in women authors. At the young age of 18, Mary is forced to challenge these biases, to protect her work and to develop her own identity.
Born in Merseyside in 1982, the only child of actors Alun Lewis and Anita Ekblom, Amelia Warner first made a name for herself as an actor. She starred in the 2001 BBC production of R.D. Blackmore’s Lorna Doone, and soon established herself as a performer of quiet insight in films such as Philip Kaufman’s Quills, Adam Rap’s Winter Passing and Stephen Wooley’s Brian Jones biography, Stoned. On the set, in down time, Warner would compose music and write songs, a passion that had been there since childhood. Using the name Slow Moving Millie (a playful nickname from friends who felt she should do more with her music, and fast) Warner began to create music. Her first major project was scoring British short film Mam, which won several awards on the film festival circuit. Working with an old midi keyboard, Warner came to Universal a new EP titled “Arms”, produced by Fyfe Dangerfield. These five poignant, textured pieces for grand piano took Warner to No. 1 in the iTunes classical music charts. Following “Arms” came her second EP “Visitors”, which featured 7 songs each based off of a fictional female character and gave her another No 1. on iTunes.
In 2016, Amelia scored her first feature length film – Mum’s List – and is now scoring the upcoming film Mary Shelley, a movie about the writer’s love affair with Percy Bysshe Shelley – the relationship that inspired her to write Frankenstein.
Now, here’s a great example of counter-programming. As of last Friday, with the return of Marvel’s superstar super-team, the onslaught of the big blockbuster, “check your mind at the door”, movie season officially began. But what about those cultured folks needing an oasis at the multiplex, a quiet escape from the movie mayhem. The colder temps generally welcome those more serious, somber films, often adapted from literary classics. However, a few of these often seep through the Summer season (LEE DANIELS’ THE BUTLER, THE HELP). That’s the case with this literary adaptation, but it’s also a reboot since there was a celebrated film version starring Julie Christie way back in 1967. Now, once again, from the classic tome written by Thomas Hardy (no, not next week’s “Mad Max”), here’s FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD.
With the first fade-in, we meet the story’s heroine, Bathsheba Everdene (Carey Mulligan) on horseback, as she dashes through the 1870’s English countryside. Her striking visage catches the eye of simple farmer/shepherd Gabriel Oak (Matthias Schoenaerts). He soon learns that the lady has come there to help her family out at a nearby, more opulent farm. The two develop a casual friendship, until Bathsheba is stunned by Gabriel’s abrupt, unexpected proposal of marriage. She demurely declines and is surprised once more when she soon learns that another relative has died and left her a huge farm several miles away. Meanwhile Gabriel’s’ luck has gone the opposite direction as tragedy causes him to lose his home and property. As he heads toward a local village in search of work, he comes upon a farm threatened by a fire. After helping snuff the flames, Gabriel learns that this is the property of Bathsheba, who hires him as a supervisor. She’s also caught the attention of successful neighboring farm owner William Boldwood (Michael Sheen). The shy, much older bachelor also shocks her by proposing marriage (more of a merging of lands). As she considers this, Bathsheba meets Francis Troy (Tom Sturridge), a soldier who had recently been stood up at the altar by Fanny Robbin (Juno Temple). The handsome young Sargent sweeps Bathsheba off her feet, and soon they are wed. But it is not a happy union, and eventually the young woman soon wonders if she passed up her chance at happiness by rebuffing Boldwood. Or maybe that stoic Mr. Oak?
Mulligan makes a most understandable object of desire in the nineteenth century countryside with her large, piercing eyes and crimson mane of hair as she charges into life at full gallop. But her beauty belays a fierce determination. She won’t tolerate intimidation or condescension from her fellow land barons or her employees. This is particular evident when she dismisses her farm’s former foreman and later as she proves to be a formidable negotiator at the marketplace. This is one of Mulligan’s finest screen performances and she carries the film with great confidence. As for her trio of suitors, Schoenaerts make the strongest impression as the smouldering, plain-spoken Oak (sturdy like the tree, really). From the yearning in his eyes as he watches Bathsheba gallop past him, we know his destiny will be intertwined with hers. He’s quite eloquent, even as he stays silent while we wait for the sparks to fly once more ignited by his true passion. Sheen as Boldwood is a most endearing rival for Bathsheba. He’s also somewhat flustered by her, but continues to charm with his hesitant pursuit and sense of humor (he may have the funniest lines in the film). But Sheen also shows us his nearly hidden melancholy, as Boldwood believes that she may be his very last chance for happiness. As the fourth wheel, Sturridge is convincing as the pompous, preening poseur, who literally appears out of nowhere (deep in the forest) and upends Bathsheba’s life. He looks dashing in his military garb and swagger, but it seems improbable that this strong, independent woman could be so taken by him. She turns these two good men down for this peacock? Sturridge can’t elicit any empathy for him, no matter how many tears stream down his perfectly trimmed mustache. Unfortunately the talented Ms. Temple has little to do here as his dim-witted, tragic first fiancée.
The story glides along at a lesiurely pace thanks to the assured direction of Thomas Vinterberg, working from the screen adaptation by David Nicholls. The film could be tightened a bit, but this gives us more than ample time to drink in the gorgeous cinematography by Charlotte Bruus Christensen, augmented by Craig Armstrong’s lush score. The rolling green hills seem to go on forever, while all the interiors, from Oak’s spartan cottage to Boldwood’s opulent estate, also dazzle the eyes. Unfortunately the film adheres perhaps too slavishly to romantic formulas. Early on, we know who should be together. From there we’re just waiting for each new obstacle to be swept aside. But as far as lush, bodice-rippers go, they don’t come much more beautiful or satisfying than FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD.
4 Out of 5
FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD opens everywhere and screens exclusively in the St. Louis area at Landmark’s Plaza Frontenac Cinemas
Coming to theater on April 3rd is the film EFFIE GRAY.
The film explores the fascinating, true story of the relationship between Victorian England’s greatest mind, John Ruskin, and his teenage bride, Euphemia “Effie” Gray, who leaves him for the Pre-Raphaelite painter John Everett Millais.
EFFIE GRAY is the first original screenplay written by Oscar-winning screenwriter Emma Thompson. In this impeccably crafted period drama, Thompson delicately and incisively probes the marital politics of the Victorian Era, and beyond.
Dakota Fanning stars as Effie Gray Ruskin. The cast includes Emma Thompson, Julie Walters, Tom Sturridge, David Suchet, Greg Wise, Claudia Cardinale, James Fox, Sir Derek Jacobi and Robbie Coltrane.
The film is produced by Andreas Roald (Terrence Malick’s VOYAGE OF TIME) and Donald Rosenfeld (Malick’s TREE OF LIFE and VOYAGE OF TIME).
Producer Donald Rosenfeld spent 1987 to 1998 as President of Merchant Ivory Productions, in charge of the financing and production of such titles as James Ivory’s “Mr and Mrs Bridge” (1990), Simon Callow’s “The Ballad of the Sad Café (1991), James Ivory’s “Howards End” (1992) and “The Remains of the Day” (1993), Christopher Menaul’s “Feast of July” (1995) and James Ivory’s “Jefferson In Paris” (1995), and “Surviving Picasso”, among others.
He produced Chris Munch’s “Color of a Brisk and Leaping Day” (1996), which won Best Cinematography at the Sundance Film Festival, for which he recreated the Yosemite Valley narrow Gauge Railroad. Rosenfeld produced Ric Burns’ “New York: A Documentary Film” (1996-2003) and was executive producer of Taran Davies’ film about the people of Chechnya, “Mountain Men and Holy Wars” (2003).
He produced the romantic drama “Forty Shades of Blue”, which won the Grand Jury prize at Sundance in 2005. He produced Ric Burns’ first feature film, the four hours long “Andy Warhol” (2006), and he made “Anton Chekhov’s The Duel”, directed by the Georgian director Dover Kashashvili.
In-between, he was the executive producer of “Jodorowsky’s Dune”, the story of the Chilean director’s doomed attempt at bringing Frank Herbert’s seminal sci-fi novel to the screen.
EFFIE GRAY marks Rosenfeld’s third collaboration with Emma Thompson.
I spoke with the producer about EFFIE GRAY and what went into making this beautiful film with modern feminist themes.
WAMG: EFFIE GRAY is such a gorgeous, visceral movie. It’s magnificent.
Donald Rosenfeld: Thank you. We did strive for beautiful production values and we tried to do it at a low cost. I’ve been doing this for 30 years and I hope we will continue for another fifty more.
WAMG: What is the film about?
DR: It’s the story of a marriage out of a horror movie. John Ruskin was a child genius who turned into a major thinker in the Victorian Era. He marries a girl two decades younger than him. She is placed in a house with nothing to do while he does his work. His parents psychologically abuse her. It’s the story of a failed marriage and her escape. It’s the story of an early divorce because in Victorian England it was pretty rare. I think there are two divorces on record.
Effie conspires with a local, aristocratic lady whose husband runs the Royal Academy that employs Ruskin. Lady Eastlake, played by Emma Thompson, orchestrates her escape and the divorce. It’s an intriguing, suspense film. A little bit of horror, but it’s also a period marriage.
The film is filled with so much beauty as it was shot in Venice, Scotland and England.
WAMG: When did you get involved in the movie?
DR: I had previously worked with Emma on HOWARD’S END and REMAINS OF THE DAY. I cast her in HOWARD’S END – she was an unknown then and then went onto win the Oscar. On REMAINS OF THE DAY, the financers wanted Anjelica Huston because at the time she was the bigger star. I fought for Emma. I said look at Emma Thompson and Anthony Hopkins. It will be looked at by the audience as sort of a sequel – from HOWARD’S END to REMAINS OF THE DAY.
In the end, Emma was cast. Then we went onto to make another movie in Chile eight years later about the Pinochet regime and the Chilean singer, Víctor Jara, but in the end because of various actual death threats from the Chilean Junta that were still in power, we had to get out of there. We were even threatened in Paraguay on the way home. We decided not to make that movie – it was a life or death decision. I said, one day we’ll do something else.
She called me one day, five years ago and said she had written a script set in Victorian England. I told her I had written my college thesis on Victorian England, let’s do this. It was set in 1851 and we went onto make it.
WAMG: It looks like a period film, but it doesn’t feel like the viewer is in Victorian England. It has more of a modern vibe to it and it segues between the two.
DR: Exactly. It’s the beginning of the modern age. All these ideas that we formed about art and life seemed to have started there. When Mr. Ruskin talks about his new carriage or the money that he’s made and what it can buy, he sounds like a person from today. It’s a kind of post-war materialism, it’s incredible. I think you’re right and it’s totally relevant.
I think Emma wrote the female characters with the mind of today too because I think she wanted them to have, in a sense, the vision that women do today of both their rights and empowerment that weren’t really available to women then.
Effie is a great exception that she was able to take this, and generally she would have either been sent to an insane asylum or she would have been locked away. That’s how they dealt with a difficult wife, not like today. We gave her her freedom and in reality Effie falls in love with John Everett Millais at the end of the movie. They had eight children together.
WAMG: 20 year old actress Dakota Fanning carries the film and her portrayal will resonate with women. She’s superb as Effie.
DR: She is unbelievable. The casting director called me one day and we were looking for women around 20 years old and ideally English because of the accent. Celestia Fox who did HOWARD’S END and REMAINS OF THE DAY with me suggested Dakota Fanning. I had just seen her in a film where she was seven years old and that was ten years ago. Now she was seventeen. I met her and offered her the part immediately. The director, Richard Laxton, asked me later, “don’t I have anything to say?” I said no, not in this case. (laughs)
She went to work on the movie and we cast her little sister, Elle Fanning, as the little sister Sophie Gray six months before we started. But two months before we started, Elle had grown four inches taller than Dakota, so we couldn’t make her the little sister in the film. We had to recast it, but Elle and I are going to make another movie called OLIVE’S OCEAN. It is sad, but sometimes you have to recast based on things like that when people are young and they change rapidly.
WAMG: Emma Thompson writes the unemotional Ruskin (Thompson’s real-life husband Greg Wise) with some sense of sympathy.
DR: She says it was very hard to get used to Greg when they first got married because he was from the north of England, right at the border of Scotland and he’s very Victorian. She said it was hard to communicate with him in the beginning, but eventually warmed him up. It was in his nature to be that character – it was sort of going back to their beginnings. He was kind of this cold fish from Newcastle. Who knew that Newcastle created this lack of warmth, it was very funny.
WAMG: How was composer Paul Cantelon (THE OTHER BOLEYN GIRL and THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY) chosen for the movie? His score, with the piano motif, is both haunting and simply lovely.
DR: I had just done a movie the year before where the composer lived in Florida. I kept having to go down there and I literally said, “I want somebody next door.” We were editing on 12th Street and this agent called and said there’s this guy Paul Cantelon and he’s about a block away from you. I went to see him and realized he did THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY and I loved that score.
His music for EFFIE GRAY is breathtaking and I thought he did a great job.
WAMG: It’s perfect with cinematographer Andrew Dunn’s (“Gosford Park”, “The Madness of King George”) scenes of the Scottish Highlands, London, and Venice, Italy.
DR: It’s wonderful. I think it all comes together in a real depiction. We wanted to make those paintings come to life and match the landscape to them. Andrew Dunn is a genius and I’m so glad we got him. He was such a voice of reason. The Scottish train – we didn’t have more than one shot. He operated his own camera and he’s just a lovely guy.
WAMG: What’s your next project?
DR: The next one is called THE TUNNELS OF CU CHI written by Gary Trudeau who wrote “Doonesbury.” It’s set in 1968 Vietnam and it’s a war movie.
WAMG: You were producer on Terrence Malick’s TREE OF LIFE, one of my favorite movies of the decade. Every time I watch it I find something new.
DR: Thank you. It’s true and I think that’s how he works.
WAMG: And once again on the THE VOYAGE OF TIME.
DR: If you liked TREE OF LIFE you will love THE VOYAGE OF TIME. It’s magnificent. It will come in a forty minute IMAX version and a feature.
THE VOYAGE OF TIME was being worked on before TREE OF LIFE. When I first met Terrence, we were going to make a movie about Che Guevara in Bolivia where he’s executed, but with the other film CHE the field was too crowded. I asked him, “what do you really want to do?” He said, “I want to make this movie about nature and the beginning of the universe.”
We’re making the whole thing for about $20 million and it’s been wonderful. Douglas Trumbull (2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY) has been doing the special effects.
WAMG: Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett are still attached?
DR: Both have always been there. By the way, Emma Thompson did some voice overs at Abbey Studios with Terry, but Cate was much more right for the part. As Terry said, Emma was a little too English.
WAMG: Is there a release date yet for THE VOYAGE OF TIME?
DR: It will come out at Cannes ideally in 2017.
WAMG: What would you like for audiences to take away from EFFIE GRAY?
DR: No matter how bad the world gets, you can fight for your freedom. If you find yourself in a terrible situation get yourself out of it. I think she did and she finds a perfect life for herself. That’s the next movie and we don’t show that here.
One of the distributors early on wanted me to add a text that says she went on to marry Millais. I don’t do that. If I don’t film it, I don’t put a text in. In MR. AND MRS. BRIDGE, Miramax wanted us to put a coda in at the end and my feeling is make the movie you make and let the audience dream a little afterwards. You don’t have to make everything all sealed up, all packed up.
Imagine if we did what one of the minor financers on TREE OF LIFE wanted – to take out the nature footage?
WAMG: There’s definitely an audience out there for EFFIE GRAY.
DR: I think so. You don’t see movies like this too often.
EFFIE GRAY is edited by Emmy nominee Kate Williams (“Empire Falls”, “Anton Chekhov’s The Duel”). Emmy-winner James Merifield (“Little Dorrit”) is the production designer, with Juliana Overmeer (“Anton Chekhov’s The Duel”) and threetime Emmy-winner Paul Ghirardani (“Game of Thrones”, “Little Dorrit”) as art directors. Twice Academy Award-nominated Ruth Myers (“LA Confidential”, “Emma”) designed the costumes and the hair and make-up was designed by Konnie Daniel (“Mr Selfridge”).
The exquisite first trailer has come online for director Thomas Vinterberg’s FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD.
Based on the literary classic by Thomas Hardy, FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD is the story of independent, beautiful and headstrong Bathsheba Everdene (the lovely Carey Mulligan), who attracts three very different suitors: Gabriel Oak (Matthias Schoenaerts), a sheep farmer, captivated by her fetching willfulness; Frank Troy (Tom Sturridge), a handsome and reckless Sergeant; and William Boldwood (Michael Sheen), a prosperous and mature bachelor.
This timeless story of Bathsheba’s choices and passions explores the nature of relationships and love – as well as the human ability to overcome hardships through resilience and perseverance.
Beautifully shot by Charlotte Bruus Christensen (THE HUNT), the film’s score is by Craig Armstrong ( THE GREAT GATSBY, upcoming FRANKENSTEIN).
The book finished 10th on the Guardian‘s list of greatest love stories of all time and in 2003, the novel was listed at number 48 on the BBC’s survey The Big Read
While there are several takes on Hardy’s fourth novel, perhaps the best known is John Schlesinger’s 1967 adaptation starring Julie Christie, Terence Stamp, Peter Finch, and Alan Bates.
From Fox Searchlight Pictures, FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD is scheduled to be released May 2015.
Check out this new trailer for the romantic tale WAITING FOR FOREVER starring Rachel Bilson, Tom Sturridge, Blythe Danner and Richard Jenkins. Jenkins alone is probably worth the price of admission to this movie.
Synopsis:
Who decides what is normal? A unique love story about friendship and a view of the world from different perspectives, WAITING FOR FOREVER explores the connections people make in the face of life’s changes. Best friends while they were growing up, Emma (Rachel Bilson) and Will (Tom Sturridge) lost touch a long time ago—as far as she knows. To Will, Emma never stopped being the most important person in his life. Believing them to be forever linked, he goes wherever she goes. Will doesn’t have a home, a car, or a “real” job. He survives on his talent as a juggler and entertainer—talents honed through years of showing off for Emma. When her father gets sick, Emma returns to their hometown, trying to leave behind her complicated love life and failing career as a TV actress. As its characters face love, death and their own preconceptions, WAITING FOR FOREVER questions the realities of life.
Although it made the festival circuit in 2010, the film will hit theaters this February. WAITING FOR FOREVER is on Facebook HERE and on Twitter HERE.
