UNITED KINGDOM: LONDON FESTIVAL FILM PREMIERE OF MOVIE "QUILLS" ABOUT THE MARQUIS DE SADE STARRING GEOFFREY RUSH AND KATE WINSLET

Record ID: 390397

  • Title: UNITED KINGDOM: LONDON FESTIVAL FILM PREMIERE OF MOVIE "QUILLS" ABOUT THE MARQUIS DE SADE STARRING GEOFFREY RUSH AND KATE WINSLET
  • Date: 2nd November 2000
  • Summary: LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM (NOVEMBER 2, 2000) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL) SCU (SOUNDBITE) (English) RUSH SAYING: "It was the tonic that Phil kept talking about right from the very early days of rehearsal, he kept saying you know whatever this film ends up being, he said it's our job and our pleasure. He said films for me have to be a transfusion of energy from the screen
  • Embargoed: 17th November 2000 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: LONDON, UK.
  • Country: United Kingdom
  • Reuters ID: LVA1JL471GZMN5HX091HHJJUOCHM
  • Story Text: Set to raise eyebrows and more than a few tongues wagging is film director Philip Kaufman's latest offering, "Quills". Starring Oscar winners Geoffrey Rush and Sir Michael Caine and screen favourites Kate Winslet and Joaquin Phoenix, the period drama about the sensational and sadistic life of France's most notorious writer, the Marquis de Sade, held its world premiere in London last weekend.
    Two hundred years ago, the real Marquis de Sade (nee Donatien-Alphonse-Francoise de Sade) was being persecuted by Napoleon's administration for writing "pornographic literature of a very distasteful nature."
    Having barely escaped death in 1772 for sexual crimes, he became a Revolutionary who dodged the guillotine during the Reign of Terror but was later captured and imprisoned in an asylum at Charenton for publishing his 'erotic novels'.
    It's this period of the Marquis de Sade's turbulent life that playwright/screenwriter Doug Wright initially focussed on for a witty stage play which caught the eye of two independent Hollywood producers Julia Chasman and Nick Wechsler.
    They turned to the award-winning film director Philip Kaufman who is best known for the film "The Unbearable Lightness of Being" to bring the tale of the Marquis de Sade to the silver screen.
    Today, the Marquis de Sade is best known for inspiring the creation of the English word - sadism - deriving sexual pleasure from pain.
    But as the film "Quills" explores the life of the Marquis at the asylum, it's clear there was much more to the Marquis' character than sexual obsession and depravity.
    Oscar-winning actor Geoffrey Rush plays the Marquis de Sade in "Quills" and stars opposite screen siren Kate Winslet who plays the young laundry girl who inspires both the affections of the Marquis de Sade and the man in charge of the asylum, Abbe Coulmier, played by Joaquin Phoenix.
    Although Winslet said she couldn't wait to work with Phoenix after seeing his performance in "To Die For", she revealed he's more than a little self-critical.
    "Working with Joaquin Phoenix was like a rollercoaster because he just is never happy with anything that he does. He walks around saying 'oh my God, I look like a horse, I'm terrible, I shouldn't be here, they cast the wrong guy. He just hates himself, absolutely full of self-loathing and this would make me laugh.
    "Thank God it made me laugh because I think if I took it seriously, I would have been his councillor for the entire shoot. So I was constantly trying to make him lighten up. He just doesn't understand just how brilliant he is. I saw him in "To Die For" I've seen all the films he's done but "To Die For" was just the most amazing performance I think I've seen a young actor give and from the moment I saw that film, four years ago, I thought I definitely want to work with that actor because he is so brave."
    The free-spirited and wild-minded writer, the Marquis, is able to continue writing his 'filth' from within the walls of the asylum thanks to the help of the Abbe who provides the mad man with quills, ink and paper. Yet what the Abbe is not aware of is the strong friendship between Madeleine and the Marquis, nor does he know that Madeleine is in fact helping the Marquis to publish his erotic works by smuggling his novels out of the asylum in her laundry baskets.
    It's not until Napoleon himself gets word of the disgusting nature of the Marquis' novel "Justine" that the writer's habits are curtailed.
    By ordering Doctor Royer-Collard (Michael Caine) to the asylum, the Marquis' days are numbered.
    Week by week, the doctor's presence impacts more and more on the Marquis' lifestyle until eventually, his writing tools are confiscated by the priest along with all of his worldly possessions - including his clothes!! Rush spent many of his days filming in the nude, so how difficult was it for the actor, did it help him get into character? "I think everytime an actor does something naked, they always say but it was right for the character and it wasn't gratuitous nudity, I like to think it was just shameless flaunting because that's an essential part of the Marquis.
    "Not that he wanted that to happen but I think once it did happen it was great .Because the costume designer said, I'd just seen the dailies of the first naked scene that we'd done naked.
    "And she said you're wearing it like another costume and I went ah that's a really informative observation that can be used because part of his weaponry if I can use it in this context is his dangerous and challenging enough even when he's stripped of everything and he's probably at his most truly most vulnerable. he's able to stand in front of the priest and say something like it must be a wonderful feeling to have power over another man and he's using the nakedness as a kind of seduction and a challenge and he's still sticking his tendrils inside the man's head and sort of twisting his brains around, " Rush said.
    A film that explores censorship as well as gratuitous sex could well shock as many audiences today as "Justine" did in the eighteenth century.
    ---ENDS---
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