Meryl Streep and Carey Mulligan Fight For Their Rights in 'Suffragette' Trailer
Carey Mulligan discovers that well-behaved women seldom make history in the first trailer for Suffragette. The emotionally charged political drama is set in England at the turn of the century, when working-class women banded together to demand their right to vote. Mulligan stars as the fictional Maud, an ordinary housewife who becomes a militant activist, planting bombs and risking custody of her children to fight for women’s voices. The film also stars Meryl Streep as the suffragette leader Emmeline Pankhurst — though from the trailer, it’s hard to tell if she appears in more than one scene. (She does give a big, inspiring speech in that scene — with an accent and everything! — so either way, we wouldn’t rule out a twentieth Oscar nomination.) Helena Bonham Carter, Brendan Gleeson, Ben Whishaw (Skyfall), and Anne-Marie Duff (Showtime’s Shameless) round out the cast.
Suffragette, which will open the BFI London Film Festival in October, has already made movie history: It’s the first film ever to obtain permission to shoot in the United Kingdom’s Houses of Parliament. It’s also notable for the number of women working behind the camera, including director Sarah Gavron (Brick Lane), screenwriter Abi Morgan (The Iron Lady), and producers Faye Ward and Alison Owen (Saving Mr. Banks). And of course, it’s the first feature film about the British suffragette movement. (Sorry, Mary Poppins doesn’t count.)
“The mere fact that it’s taken 100 years for this story to be told is hugely revealing,” Mulligan said in an interview last spring. “This is the story of equal rights in Britain. It took years of struggle and women being tortured, abused and persecuted, and it’s never been put on screen. It’s such a reflection of our film industry that that story hasn’t been told yet.”
Suffragette opens in limited release in the U.S. on October 23.
