Re: World Premiere at TIFF

The LA Times

Toronto International Film Festival: Fresh start for stars, directors


Even the medium of movies is getting a new spin thanks to Ned Benson's "The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby." A Black List screenwriter making his feature debut, Benson has crafted an unusual romantic drama. More specifically, he's created two romantic dramas: a full-length movie subtitled "Him" and another subtitled "Her" that will be shown in sequence.

The two films, which each star James McAvoy and Jessica Chastain as a young couple in and out of love, focus on the relationship from their respective points-of-view. There are both divergent scenes and overlapping scenes in the two pictures, but even in the overlapping scenes meaning is shaded toward the perspective of the person to whom the subtitle belongs. Toronto will screen the two films on one bill with a 15-minute intermission,

"I guess reinvention feels like a big word," Benson said, when asked how he sized up his formal innovation. "But I was trying to do something different, to start a discussion about the subjective experience of both relationships and watching movies."

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/envelope/moviesnow/la-et-mn-toron to-slate-20130724,0,73578.story