Atom Egoyan’s Opera-Inspired ‘Seven Veils’ Starring Amanda Seyfried Sets TIFF Premiere
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Toronto New Wave filmmaker Atom Egoyan has set a Toronto Film Festival world premiere for his newest feature, Seven Veils, reteaming him with Oscar nom Amanda Seyfried following their work together on the 2009 thriller Chloe.
Inspired by Egoyan’s experiences mounting the opera Salome for the Canadian Opera Company, both all the way back in 1996 and earlier this year, the film is set for a TIFF Special Presentation bow on Sunday, September 10, though it will first screen two days prior at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts. The Avant-première, presented in partnership with the Canadian Opera Company, will take place at 7 p.m.
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Joining Seven Veils in making a TIFF world premiere, as previously announced, is Taika Waititi’s soccer comedy Next Goal Wins with Michael Fassbender. Further details on the festival schedule will be released next month.
A two-time Academy Award nominee, Egoyan’s 18th feature set for TIFF stars Seyfried as Jeanine, an earnest theatre director tasked with remounting her former mentor’s most famous work, Salome. Haunted by dark and disturbing memories from her past, Jeanine allows her repressed trauma to color the present as she re-enters the opera world after so many years away.
Also starring Rebecca Liddiard, Douglas Smith, Mark O’Brien and Vinessa Antoine, as well as Ambur Braid and Michael Kupfer-Radecky, who appeared together in Egoyan’s most recent stage adaptation of Salome, Seven Veils is an Elevation Pictures and XYZ Films presentation, produced by Rhombus Media and Ego Film Arts, with the participation of Telefilm Canada and Ontario Creates, in association with IPR.VC, Cinetic Media, Crave and the Canadian Opera Company. Elevation Pictures is set to distribute the film in Canada, with XYZ Films handling sales in other global territories.
“We are honoured to premiere Atom Egoyan’s extraordinary film at this year’s Festival,” said TIFF CEO Cameron Bailey. “Egoyan’s cinematic works are unmatched, and we’re excited to bring Seven Veils to our TIFF audiences and to the city of Toronto, his home.”
Stated Egoyan, “Amanda is a phenomenal actress, and here she brilliantly plays a woman dealing with complex and explosive relationships in her past, present, and future. To have the world premiere of this film at TIFF and to be partnering with the Canadian Opera Company really brings my two great passions together in such a beautiful way.”
Added producer Niv Fichman of Rhombus Media, “Atom’s production of Salome electrified the stage when it debuted in 1996 and has evolved with each remounting. The opera explores themes that resonate through Atom’s body of work, and Seven Veils is an exciting and provocative next step in this ongoing evolution.”
The 48th Toronto Film Festival is set to take place from September 7–17. Tickets for this year’s edition go on sale to TIFF Members by level beginning on August 18. Those looking for tickets to the Avant-première screening of Seven Veils, meanwhile, can make their purchase at this link starting on August 15.
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