Main Cast: Joaquin Phoenix, Claire Danes, Sean Penn, Douglas Henshall, Alun Armstrong
Release Year: 2003
Country: DK/US
Run Time: 105 minutes
MPAA Rating: R
Plot
An estranged couple are brought back together as they run for their lives in a future world where science as well as emotions have gone haywire in this sci-fi drama from director Thomas Vinterberg. In the year 2021, the world seems to have become a very strange place; an unexplained ailment is causing children to drop dead on the streets of New York, ice storms and floods strike major cities without notice, summer is marked by periodic snowfalls, and a strange hole has appeared in the Ugandan sky that causes people to loose the grip of gravity and drift off into space. In the midst of all this, internationally known figure skater Elena (Claire Danes) is getting divorced from her husband John (Joaquin Phoenix) after an 18-month separation. John has arrived in New York City to have Elena sign the divorce papers, but after finally making his way through her entourage, he discovers her to be unhappy and out of sorts, and she asks him to stay. John soon learns that Elena and her staff have a secret -- David (Alun Armstrong), her manager, has had Elena cloned, and now there are three duplicates of her to stand in if she should be killed or injured. John's discovery puts both him and Elena in grave danger, and they are soon on the run from David and his underlings. Meanwhile, Marciello (Sean Penn) ponders the unstable state of the world as he flies from one place to another after a heroic dose of pills designed to combat the fear of flying. It's All About Love received its North American premier at the 2003 Sundance Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
Jette Lehmann - Art Director, Ilene Starger - Casting, Joyce Nettles - Casting, Lars Jönsson - Co-producer, Tomas Eskilsson - Co-producer, Els Van De Vorst - Co-producer, Ellen Lens - Costume Designer, Tim Lewis - First Assistant Director, Thomas Vinterberg - Director, Valdís Óskarsdóttir - Editor, James Wilson - Executive Producer, Paul Webster - Executive Producer, Peter Aalbæk Jensen - Executive Producer, Lars Bredo Rahbek - Executive Producer, Bo Ehrhardt - Executive Producer, Morten Kaufmann - Line Producer, Zbigniew Preisner - Composer (Music Score), Ben Van Os - Production Designer, Anthony Dod Mantle - Cinematographer, Brigitte Hald - Producer, Kristian Eidnes Andersen - Sound/Sound Designer, Ad Stoop - Sound/Sound Designer, Rene Van Dien Berg - Sound/Sound Designer, Signe Jensen - Unit Production Manager, Thomas Vinterberg - Screenwriter, Mogens Rukov - Screenwriter, Peter Hjorth - Visual Effects Supervisor, James Wilson - Co-Executive Producer
The movie was written, directed, and produced by Vinterberg over a period of five years. Unlike his earlier Danish films, this movie was entirely in English and featured among others Joaquin Phoenix, Claire Danes, and Sean Penn. The movie was not very successful, and critics mostly panned it.[2]Richard Roeper called the film "like Kubrick with a talent-ectomy" and Jack Matthews of the New York Daily News declared that "Surely, Vinterberg was high on some inert gas when he embarked on it";[2]. Dennis Lim of the Village Voice, however found something to like in the film:
It's All About Love is, by any measure, a colossal folly – ridiculed at its Sundance '03 premiere (where, to this viewer at least, it seemed like a lone beacon of nutty integrity), supposedly disowned by its stars (rumor has it Claire Danes burst into tears upon seeing the end result) and jettisoned by original distributor Focus. But this $10 million Danish-British-French-U.S.-Japanese-Swedish-Norwegian-German-Dutch co-production is a film maudit for the ages — rapturous and inexplicable in equal measure.[1]
At a certain point during production Vinterberg called up Ingmar Bergman and asked him to come and help him finish the film, as he felt he could not complete it himself. He recalls that:
He roared with laughter and said I had to be out of my mind. There was nothing he was less interested in. And he also said I was an idiot that had not decided fast enough what to do after The Celebration (Festen), which he, by the way, called a masterpiece. It was a very contended conversation.
