THE FORBIDDEN ROOM
by Guy Maddin and Evan Johnson
Canada 2015 119 min. English original version
fri 20 nov 10:00 pm Caligari FilmBühne
Script: Guy Maddin, Evan Johnson, Robert Kotyk, DoP: Stephanie Weber-Biron, Ben Kasulke, Editor: John Gurdebeke, Production: Phi Films, Buffalo Gal Pictures, National Film Board of Canada, Producers: Phyllis Laing, Guy Maddin, David Christensen, Phoebe Greenberg, Penny Mancuso, Cast: Roy Dupius, Clara Furey, Louis Negin, Mathieu Amalric, Charlotte Rampling, Geraldine Chaplin, Maria de Medeiros, Jacques Nolot, Udo Kier
THE FORBIDDEN ROOM is Guy Maddin’s ultimate epic phantasmagoria, honoring classic cinema. He shows a crew of a doomed submarine in a desperate attempt to breathe the oxygen within. Suddenly, a lost woodsman wanders into their company and tells his tale of escaping from a clan of cave dwellers. From here, we are taken high into the air, around the world, and into dreamscapes like skeleton women and vampire bananas.
"We just have too much narrative in our heads, so much we feel our brains are going to explode. With this film, we set out to create a controlled setting, an elaborate narrative network of subterranean locks, sluice gates, chambers, trap pipes, storm sewers and spelunking caves where all the past, present and future films in our large heads might safely blow! (…) Stay safe and enjoy!" (Guy Maddin)
Biography: Guy Maddin is an installation and internet artist, instructor at Harvard, writer and filmmaker, the director of eleven feature-length movies and innumerable shorts. He has also mounted around the world over 70 performances of his films featuring live elements – orchestra, sound effects, singing and narration.
Evan Johnson is a writer and filmmaker living in Winnipeg. He studied film and philosophy at the University of Manitoba and worked at Winnipeg’s Rug Doctor chemical bottling plant before being discovered there by Maddin in 2009.
Filmography: Guy Maddin (selection): 2003 THE SADDEST MUSIC IN THE WORLD (ex 17), 2006 BRAND UPON THE BRAIN! A REMEMBRANCE IN 12 CHAPTERS, 2011 KEYHOLE, 2015 THE FORBIDDEN ROOM (co-director: Evan Johnson)
Evan Johnson (selection): 2014 ELMS; COLOURS; COLD (all short films), 2015 THE FORBIDDEN ROOM (co-director: Guy Maddin)
Awards (selection): Prize for Best Director (Bildrausch Filmfest Basel, Switzerland 2015)
