By Russell Contreras
LOS ANGELES (AP) --Post-apocalyptic productions have proliferated in recent years just like the cliches around them. A human-made disaster occurs, survivors turn on each other and audiences go on dark journeys with little hope.
"The Rain," a new, original young adult series released Friday by Netflix, certainly adopts some of these motifs but it tells the story of an environmental catastrophe through the eyes of Danish teens and other young people in Scandinavia where, unlike the United States, high-powered weapons are a rarity. The expanding threat to humanity involves other countries, making the fear truly a worldwide scare.
The series follows a Danish sister and her younger brother who are ushered into a bunker by their father and mother as they prepared for a coming storm that brought rains that mysteriously caused cause people to suffer violent deaths. The father, we learn, is a scientist of some kind who knows why the rains are so deadly and abandons the family to find a cure.
There, safe in the high-tech bunker, the children remain for six years until food runs out and they seek to find their father. The sister has become a young woman and the boy morphs into an edgy teen. The water, viewers find out, remains contaminated and the rains still are deadly.
And there are few survivors.
Co-creators Christian Potalivo and Jannik Tai Mosholt said it was important to set this story in Scandinavia to explore the region's self-perception that the system is always there to pick up those facing hard times. Using the most extreme situation, the series allowed them to peel away "everything we as Scandinavians find as being specifically Scandinavian."
But Mosholt said the post-apocalyptic drama through the eyes of young people should have appeal to audiences around the world.
"We believe that the core themes and basic questions we're trying to ask are universal," Mosholt said. "What is it being human and who are we really? We find these questions to be important in this day and age."
Potalivo said the creators felt it was important to tell the saga through the eyes of youth because the drama would hit multiple levels.
"We found it interesting to meet these characters in a time of their lives where they're supposed to find out who they really are, and now have to do this in a world where everything they would normally mirror themselves has been stripped away," Potalivo said.
"The Rain" is Netflix's first original, foreign language young adult series. The streaming service says more like it are coming.
For example, later this year, Netflix will release "Baby," a coming-of-age story that explores the unseen lives of high school students in Rome, Italy. Netflix also will release later this year "Elite" — a series that follows students at an exclusive school in Spain that attracts the children of the privileged and those from working-class homes.
And next year, Netflix will unveil "Quicksand," a series out of Sweden that is based on the best-selling novel by Malin Persson Giolito. The show is about a mass shooting at a prep school in Stockholm's wealthiest suburb.
“Heretic” and “Maria” Set As Red Carpet Premieres At AFI Fest
The American Film Institute (AFI) has announced that Heretic, the psychological thriller starring Hugh Grant, and Maria, based on the life of opera singer Maria Callas starring Angelina Jolie, will round out the Red Carpet Premieres section at this year’s AFI Fest. The Heretic Gala Screening will take place on Thursday, October 24, and the Maria Gala Screening will be held on Saturday, October 26. The complete Red Carpet Premieres section includes the world premieres of Music By John Williams, Robert Zemeckis’ Here, Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl and Clint Eastwood’s Juror #2. All Red Carpet Premieres will take place at the historic TCL Chinese Theatre. The full lineup for AFI Fest 2024 will be unveiled on October 1.
“At the heart of AFI Fest is an unwavering dedication to celebrating the best in global cinema--together,” said Bob Gazzale, AFI president and CEO. “We look forward to uniting artists and audiences once again to be inspired by the art form in a powerful sense of community.”
Heretic follows two young missionaries (Sophie Thatcher and Chloe East) who are forced to prove their faith when they knock on the wrong door and are greeted by a diabolical Mr. Reed (portrayed by Grant), becoming ensnared in his deadly game of cat-and-mouse. The film is directed by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods and produced by Stacey Sher, Beck, Woods, Julia Glausi and Jeanette Volturno. The film will be released nationwide by A24 on November 8.
Directed by Pablo Larraín, Maria presents a tumultuous and beautiful depiction of one of the world’s most renowned artists and reimagines the legendary soprano in her final days in Paris, as Callas (Jolie)... Read More