'Sacramento' will screen at the Mill Valley Film Festival. The film festival runs 3-13 October.
Longtime best friends Glenn (Michael Cera, Molly’s Game, MVFF40) and Rickey (cowriter-director Michael Angarano) could not be more different. Glenn is organized and anxious; Rickey is unpredictable and laid back. Glenn lives a quiet life with his wife preparing for the birth of his first child, while Rickey just got kicked out of a convalescent home and has nowhere to go. Despite their divergent paths, the pair have maintained a tight bond over the years. So, when Rickey suddenly appears in Glenn’s backyard, it’s not surprising that this unannounced visit leads to the two taking a spontaneous road trip to Sacramento to spread the ashes of Rickey’s father. Throughout the journey, the two explore the bonds of their friendship and finally learn to process their emotions. Kristen Stewart (Seberg, MVFF42) and Maya Erskine costar in this heartwarming and emotional comedy. —Bri’anna Moore
Dylan Meyer: "We’re Nevermind and we produced our first movie The Chronology of Water. It was a real wild experience! Jen Dunlap took this picture of us."
The first look at Kristen Stewart‘s feature directorial debut, “The Chronology of Water,” is finally here.
The Oscar-nominated actor is pictured above on set with star Imogen Poots, who portrays author Lidia Yuknavitch in the film adaptation of her 2011 bestselling memoir of the same name.
According to the film’s official synopsis, it’s “about turning trauma into art” and follows Lidia “from her earliest childhood memories in the Pacific Northwest, through explosive misfires and mistakes, children that almost-were, toxic relationships, art heroes, wins and losses.”
The film “drifts in the water of Lidia’s memories on her journey to become a professional writer, repossessing her own story by writing one she can live with,” the description continues. “‘The Chronology of Water’ is an in-depth exploration of sexuality, of creativity, an unflinching stare at all the gory details of having a female body and a sensitive depiction of the emotional vocabulary of youth.”
In addition to directing, Stewart co-wrote the film’s screenplay alongside Andy Mingo. The cast also includes Thora Birch, Earl Cave, Michael Epp, Susannah Flood, Kim Gordon and Jim Belushi.
“The Chronology of Water” has long been a passion project for Stewart, with the actor first announcing its development in 2018. In her Variety cover story in January, she revealed that she would refuse to make another movie until “The Chronology of Water” was finished.
“I’m going to make this movie before I ever work for someone else,” she said. “Yeah, I will quit the fucking business. I won’t make a-fucking-nother movie until I make this movie. I will tell you that, for sure. I think that will get things going.”
It sure did. “The Chronology of Water” wrapped in July after filming for six weeks in Latvia and Malta.
WME Independent is handling North American sales for “The Chronology of Water,” while Les Films du Losange has international sales and French distribution.
Stewart is repped by WME, and Poots is repped by WME, Entertainment 360 and B-Side Management.
Based on Lidia Yuknavitch’s autobiographical bestseller “The Chronology of Water”
Lifelong swimmer and Olympic hopeful Lidia Yuknavitch (Poots) accepts a college swimming scholarship in Texas to escape her abusive father and alcoholic, suicidal mother. After losing her scholarship due to drugs and alcohol, Lidia moves to Eugene and enrolls at the University of Oregon, where she is accepted by Ken Kesey as one of thirteen graduate students who collaboratively write the novel Caverns with him. Drugs and alcohol continue to dominate, accompanied by bisexual promiscuity. The discovery of S&M helps Lidia cope with her inner demons. Ultimately, her career as a writer and teacher, along with the love of her husband and son, replaces the earlier chaos of her life.
Cast
Imogen Poots
Thora Birch
Michael Epp
Earl Cave
Susannah Flood
Jim Belushi
Kim Gordon
Tom Sturridge
Directed by
Kristen Stewart
Written by
Andy Mingo
Kristen Stewart
Director of Photography
Corey C. Waters
Produced by
Charles Gillibert, Yulia Zayceva, Max Pavlov, Svetlana Punte, Michael Pruss, Rebecca Feuer, Kristen Stewart, Maggie McLean, Dylan Meyer, Andy Mingo
Imogen Poots has an exciting update about her upcoming starring role in The Chronology of Water. The film will be Kristen Stewart's feature directorial debut. Poots spoke to Collider's Perri Nemiroff while promoting her new film All of You at the Toronto International Film Festival. Says Poots of Stewart, who she calls "one of the greatest directors I've ever worked with in my life." She continued singing Stewart's praises, saying:
"She's really something. She was born to do it. I'm so proud of her. We'd like shout at each other on set like sports coaches. We were both incredibly passionate about the project and had the same energy around it and the stakes were very high for both of us all the time. She has just cared about this for so long, and she did it. I think it was so hard to get it made because the subject matter and I think at several moments along the way, anyone would think 'Is this even worth it?' She kept going. She found the right financiers for the project. We didn't have to censor any of the story because that would have been pointless. She's done it her way and it's the only way. I think she's punk-rock and authentic, and she's my favorite girl. I think she's amazing."
On Friday at Vidiots, a 35mm screening of Paul Verhoeven’s “Showgirls” featured Max Minghella previewing his own next film and unannounced introductions from Kristen Stewart and Elizabeth Berkley, star of the evening’s film.
At the Egyptian Theatre on Saturday, filmmaker Michael Mann was a surprise guest on hand to speak about his 2006 movie “Miami Vice” following a 35mm screening.
Minghella had been announced as introducing the Vidiots screening of “Showgirls” but he also presented the opening scene from his upcoming film “Shell,” which is having its world premiere at next week’s Toronto International Film Festival and features Berkley in a small role.
Then Stewart, who along with director Rose Glass spoke about the influence of “Showgirls” while promoting “Love Lies Bleeding” earlier this year, came out to extoll the virtues of the film and Berkley’s performance. A notorious flop when it was first released, Berkely saw her career derailed for many years by the response to the film, in which she plays Nomi Malone, an ambitious dancer in Las Vegas.
“How can you even know what this movie has done for everyone?” Stewart said of Berkley’s performance and the film’s reclamation as an empowerment anthem.
“Imagine being the girl that thrusted that f— hard in the movie,” said Stewart in reference to one of Berkley’s more notorious scenes. “And not having any homies to be like, ‘You’re right. Every decision that you have made is the right one and you’re the best thing about this movie. And yes, it was somebody else’s idea, but you’re the reason it has lived.”
Stewart added, “The nights that we’ve gone too hard and gone home and had doubt — ‘Maybe I shouldn’t have, maybe I should never have been anything.’ — this movie f— barrels through that.”
Then Berkley came out to a riotous ovation from the crowd.
“If my 21-year-old self had known that this would be possible at any point in my life, that people would continue gathering and enjoying and drawing inspiration from this,” Berkley said, “whether it’s entertainment to you or rite-of-passage or permission to be your most authentic self, whatever you draw from Nomi and this movie, I would hope it gives you exactly what you need.”
She addressed Stewart when she said, “Kristen, that was such a surprise and so beautiful, from an actress who is so bold. You are so bold in your work, fearless, vulnerable. And I didn’t have women at the time when this movie came out championing me in any way. It was a very lonely time when it first came out.
“Think about the ’90s, we didn’t have that support,” Berkely added. “It didn’t make any sense to me because I grew up when women had each other’s backs. So it was a very strange, isolating time. So again, my 21-year-old self, to have an introduction like that in the form that is you is very healing.”
Berkely added, “I didn’t go to film school, I went to Vidiots,” noting that before she first met with Dutch-born director Verhoeven, she rented his international films from the original Vidiots location in Santa Monica.
Kristen Stewart in an interview about “Love Lies Bleeding” and her role as Lou.
What a love story: Lou, the daughter of the local gang boss, runs a gym in the dullest backwater of New Mexico. When the aspiring bodybuilder Jackie ends up there - confident, ambitious and damn sexy - the two fall in love and dream of escaping together. But they haven't reckoned with Lou's father, played brilliantly nasty by film veteran Ed Harris. He'll stop at nothing, even his own daughter's dead bodies if necessary. The young British director Rose Glass ("Saint Maud") sends Kristen Stewart and martial artist Katy O'Brian on a crackling trip full of pitch-black humor, unbridled violence and a pulsating Eighties soundtrack: "Love Lies Bleeding" is the most uncompromising film of the summer and a whole new chapter in Kristen Stewart's impressive career. We met her in Berlin for a chat.
Kristen Stewart in an interview about “Love Lies Bleeding”
VOGUE: Lifting, pumping, eating protein – is weight training your thing in real life?
Kristen Stewart: I've always had an aversion to weight training if you do it purely for aesthetic reasons. Going to the gym to be as attractive as possible? I've never been interested. Nevertheless, it's a good feeling to know your own strength, to really be in control of every inch of your body. I can understand that it's like an adrenaline rush and you can be obsessed with it. But that doesn't really affect my character Lou. At the beginning of the film, she tries to take up as little space as possible, almost as if she were going to die out. But then she meets Katy, who comes over the city like a primal force, who is brazen and impudent and, above all, doesn't deny herself. And that sets something in motion in Lou that is beautiful, but also disgusting and terrible. Everything has two sides.
Going to the gym to be as attractive as possible? I was never interested.
In addition to the violence, the focus is also on the amour fou between the two dissimilar women. The topic of queerness is dealt with rather casually.
Lou is allowed to simply exist as a character in this film. She simply lives her life. I was happy to play a queer character who doesn’t lecture others on how to deal with queerness. Our film is of course not the first in which this is the case. But I think that very often the audience's perspectives are to be broadened with a raised index finger. People are encouraged to articulate themselves and create space for alternative points of view. That's good. But at the same time, we work in an industry that is about making money. It's difficult to realize projects that have not yet proven their suitability for success. Being one of the first is always difficult. Many films tick off a kind of checklist in terms of their share of marginal phenomena. According to the motto: Here we have a film in which a woman is the focus. But then she has to at least overcome a nasty argument or have a coming out in the course of the plot. When you pitch a film project, the first question from the financiers is: "What should people take away from the cinema?" I hope that people can just watch our film and absorb it, that they can feel the desire, the curiosity, the love and be inspired by it.
Many films tick off a kind of checklist in terms of their share of marginal phenomena. According to the motto: Here we have a film in which a woman is the focus. But then she has to overcome at least one nasty argument or come out in the course of the plot.
In "Love Lies Bleeding" there is intense love, lies and a lot of blood...
...which is why there is a lot of cleaning. Lou has to clean all the time: clogged toilets, brain matter, pools of blood. Humans are violent by nature, that's how they have opened up the world. You want to love Lou as the main character of the film and be on her side. But people also do bad things to protect and preserve their pleasure, their comfort or even their family. We humans are prepared to do almost anything for that - and we glorify this idea! So it only depends on the context whether an action is bad or good. Instead of going to therapy, Lou tried to go underground and ignore her problems and traumas. At some point everything comes up, her overloaded self-deception system collapses and then the crap really starts. And as for the lies, Lou telling herself that her criminal father is to blame for everything and that she is one of the good guys helps her clean up the mess. But what really scares her is how similar she and her father really are. The flashbacks show Lou as a young woman with her father, at a time when she was very much involved in all the evil, violent dealings. In these scenes I literally look like Bella Swan (Stewart's famous role in the "Twilight" films, editor's note). I have long hair and wear a buttoned-up western shirt. Lou only developed her hairstyle, taste in music and clothing style after she separated from her family. Nobody in this small town looks like her or listens to her music. That was very difficult in the 1980s, a time before the Internet. Back then there were no cool vintage shops where you could find the perfect muscle shirt to match your style. The cigarette thing was very hard for me, by the way, because Lou smokes non-stop. But for every scene in which she smokes in the finished film, there were at least six shots and ten takes in which I had to smoke. If you have to eat cheeseburgers for a scene, at least there's a bucket next to it in which you can spit the food out after each take. But cigarettes?! I almost died, I couldn't breathe.
How did it go for your film father Ed Harris?
Ed is the most emotional and poetic Marlboro Man in the world! A cool guy, a real guy, hot and sweet and attentive to everyone on set. But admittedly he didn't like the script.
And he still went along with it?
He said to Rose and me: "Okay, ladies. I don't really understand what this is supposed to be. But I'll help you do whatever you want to do anyway." Ed Harris is so nice! He sees his job, as he always emphasizes, as a service to the filmmakers. Luckily, he liked the finished film afterwards and said to me: "I'm really blown away. This thing works really well!" What more could you want?
