What would the end of the world look like through a female lens?
Director Patricia Rozema explains why she wanted to create a realistic apocalypse in Into the Forest
When you think of apocalyptic movies, films like War of the Worlds, Armageddon and other hyper-masculine explosion-fests come to mind.
Patricia Rozema took a different direction with Into the Forest. The film explores an alternate version to an end of the world scenario: an apocalypse that happens slowly and quietly, without any explosions or superheroes to save the day.
Watch a clip from Patricia Rozema's interview on The Filmmakers:
I wanted to create an apocalypse that could happen.- Patricia Rozema
Into the Forest follows the story of a small family surviving in their cabin during a worldwide power outage. Two sisters, played by Ellen Page and Evan Rachel Wood, experience the insidious dangers of surviving in the woods as the power blackout stretches on for months.
Ellen Page made her debut as a producer after acquiring the film rights to the book Into the Forest. She brought on Rozema to direct and Evan Rachel Wood to star as her sister in the film.
Shot against the landscapes of Vancouver and Vancouver Island, the film captures what she calls the "accidental beauty" of nature. Rozema's work highlights the gentle underlying sense of humanity that is often ignored in Hollywood blockbuster survival-apocalypse films.
Working as a journalist at CBC's The Journal program back in the early 1980s, Rozema transitioned into film with her first Canadian feature I've Heard the Mermaids Singing. She went on to make Jane Austen's Mansfield Park and the children's film Kitt Kittredge. Into the Forest is one of the most powerful examples of her filmmaking placing women in the forefront. And if you can't get enough of her work, look out for her new film Mouthpiece premiering at TIFF in September.
Stream the film and watch the interview and panel discussion on Into the Forest only on The Filmmakers.
The Filmmakers airs Saturdays at 8:30pm ET/CT/MT, 9:30pm AT, 10PM NT and 11pm PT on CBC TV and cbc.ca/watch.