Paris-based Reservoir Docs has acquired worldwide gross sales rights excluding Italy to “A Sudden Glimpse to Deeper Issues,” a theatrical documentary by Scottish-Irish director Mark Cousins, that includes the voice of Tilda Swinton.
The movie, described by the producers as “visually ravishing,” explores the artwork of the twentieth century Scottish painter Wilhelmina Barns-Graham.
Swinton will voice the artist’s innermost ideas, studying from her personal diaries and notebooks, which have by no means earlier than been made public.
The movie is in late post-production for launch in 2024. It’s produced by Mary Bell and Adam Dawtrey for BofA Productions, and co-funded by the Nationwide Lottery by way of Display Scotland, with the assist of the Wilhelmina Barns-Graham Belief. I Surprise Footage has acquired Italian rights from the producers.
“A Sudden Glimpse to Deeper Issues” is the story of an uncommon inventive mind, and a powerful lifelong obsession. At some point in Could 1949, Barns-Graham, then 36 years previous and an rising determine within the modernist St. Ives group of artists, climbed the Grindelwald glacier in Switzerland. She skilled an aesthetic and non secular epiphany which rewired her mind and remodeled her artwork. She spent the remainder of her life portray the glacier. By means of a cinematic immersion into her artwork and life, the movie explores themes of gender, neurodiversity, local weather change, and the character of creativity from youth to previous age.
Born in 1912, Barns-Graham died in 2004, creating vivid and dynamic new artworks proper to the very finish of her life.
Wilhelmina Barns-Graham
Cousins mentioned: “At college I used to be enthusiastic about each artwork and maths. My heroes had been visible individuals who appeared to see geometry and engineering of their work – Orson Welles, Paul Cezanne, and many others. Within the early 90s I found one other one in every of that tribe, Wilhelmina Barns-Graham, whose work analyzed glaciers like Cezanne’s analyzed mountains. A long time later, on the Barns-Graham Belief, I found how prolific she was, how unstoppable, and fell in love along with her work in a brand new method. Her visible considering, her wanderlust and her dynamism excited me. Add in her synaesthesia and the close to disappearance of the Alpine glaciers and also you’ve bought a topic that’s excellent for cinema. I needed to make this movie. Barns-Graham’s work feels very up to date to me.”
Dawtrey mentioned: “Mark is a phenomenon, doubtless probably the most prolifically profitable U.Ok.-based filmmaker of the previous decade, whose work has been lauded at extra main festivals than every other, and offered extensively worldwide. All of this by staying true to his personal distinctive inventive imaginative and prescient – simply as Willie did along with her work. That’s why they’re a really perfect match. We’re delighted to work with Reservoir Docs to deliver this excellent marriage to audiences around the globe.”
That is the fifth collaboration between Cousins and BofA, following “A Story of Youngsters and Movie” (2013), “Stockholm My Love” (2016), “The Eyes of Orson Welles” (2018) and “The Story of Wanting” (2021).
Mark Cousins
Anaïs Clanet of Reservoir Docs negotiated the worldwide gross sales take care of BofA. Clanet will launch pre-sales at IDFA, after assembly the producers in Amsterdam two years in the past, and pursuing the venture ever since.
She mentioned: “Creation, cinema and high quality, that is actually what attracted us to the venture nearly two years in the past now and I couldn’t be happier to share the movie around the globe. Mark is a superb filmmaker who has a phenomenal perception into Wilhelmina’s creativity. It’s a movie concerning the ingenious and weird inventive course of from a rare artist who deserves to be extra well known. Mark has created a one-of-a-kind venture that we will’t wait to promote worldwide.”
The movie is edited by Timo Langer, with an unique rating by Glasgow-based composer Linda Buckley, and animations by Danny Carr. Govt producer is Mark Thomas on behalf of Display Scotland. Rob Airey of the Wilhelmina Barns-Graham Belief, based mostly in Edinburgh, acted as guide.
In November 2022, Cousins staged a four-screen set up at Fruitmarket Gallery in Edinburgh about Barns-Graham’s encounter with the Grindelwald glacier, titled “Like a Enormous Scotland.” Extracts from this set up additionally characteristic in “A Sudden Glimpse to Deeper Issues.” The intention is that the 2 works may tour globally collectively in appropriate multi-arts venues, alongside exhibitions of Barns-Graham’s work.
Different current movies by Cousins embody “My Identify Is Alfred Hitchcock,” “The March on Rome,” “The Story of Movie: A New Era” and “Ladies Make Movie.” In 2020 he obtained the European Movie Academy’s inaugural Innovation Award, and in 2022 he was given the Excellent Contribution to Cinema Medal on the Telluride Movie Pageant.
In 2023, he obtained the Persistence of Imaginative and prescient Award from the San Francisco Movie Pageant; the Maverick Award on the Dublin Intl Movie Pageant; the Excellent Contribution to Movie and Tradition Award from the Ismailia Movie Pageant in Egypt; and the Honorary Coronary heart of Sarajevo Award from the Sarajevo Movie Pageant in recognition of his excellent contribution to the artwork of movie.
