Archive of films Keyhole / Keyhole

Canada
2011, 94 min

Section: Another View
Year: 2012

A mysterious house holds onto the traces of long forgotten characters and scenes. Gangsters, relationship anomalies, beautiful wallpaper…. Isabella Rossellini and Udo Kier star in another imaginative journey guided by the irrepressible fantasy of the Canadian master of the subconscious.

Synopsis

An old house holds on to memories just like people do. Every room, every object in the house has a story to tell – about gangsters, forgotten children, and traumatic relationships. But memories must be organized every so often, the bad ones safely tucked away and the heady ones relived. Navigating the past, however, can be a tricky business, and the road to catharsis is a bumpy one indeed. In his latest film, Guy Maddin once again takes us on a trip to the subconscious with all its attendant obstacles and surprises, and he wraps his narrative in enchanting black-and-white photography that honors old-style cinematography while transforming it. The movie draws the viewer in by means of broad ambiguity but also through intoxicating visuals, in their "tainted opulence” sometimes reminiscent of the work of photographer Joel Peter Witkin. When universal emotions are involved, it hardly matters that tracing their causes is often difficult. Sometimes blatant psychology must simply yield to esthetics.

About the director

Guy Maddin (b. 1956, Winnipeg, Canada) is the most distinctive personality of contemporary Canadian cinema. Archangel (1990) took the US National Film Critics Award for Best Experimental Film, while the "ballet horror flick” Dracula: Pages from a Virgin’s Diary (2002) won an Emmy and screened for Karlovy Vary audiences. The Saddest Music in the World (2003) and the nontraditional documentary My Winnipeg (2007) were also shown at KVIFF after premiering at the Berlinale. In his movies, Maddin works with the subconscious and with the esthetics of silent film. In February 2012 at the Centre Pompidou in Paris he organized The Séances Project during which he and actors Charlotte Rampling, Udo Kier, Geraldine Chaplin, and others sought to summon the spirit of lost films.

Contacts

Entertainment One Films International
175 Bloor St. East, Suite 601, North Tower, M4W 3R8, Toronto
Canada
Tel: +1 416 646 2400
Fax: +1 416 979 5824
www: www.eonefilms.com

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About the film

Black & white, 35 mm

Section:	Another View

Director:	Guy Maddin
Screenplay:	George Toles, Guy Maddin
Dir. of Photography:	Ben Kasulke
Music:	Jason Staczek
Editor:	John Gurdebeke
Producer:	Jean du Toit, Jody Shapiro
Production:	Buffalo Gal Pictures, Everyday Pictures
Cast:	Jason Patric, Isabella Rossellini, Udo Kier
Contact:	Entertainment One Films International