Rumours (2024)

Cate Blanchett as: Hilda Ortmann

Directed by: Guy Maddin, Evan Johnson, Galen Johnson
Selected Cast: Alicia Vikander, Roy Dupuis, Charles Dance, Takehiro Hira, Denis Ménochet, Zlatko Buri?, Rolando Ravello
Written by: Guy Maddin, Evan Johnson, Galen Johnson
Release Year: 2024
Genre: Horror | Comedy
MPAA Rating: R

IMDb | Photos | Videos | Official Site

At their annual G7 summit, the seven leaders of the world’s wealthiest liberal democracies get lost in the woods at night while attempting to draft their provisional statement.

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Quotes from Cate Blanchett

“I was an enormous fan of Guy’s [Maddin]. I’ve been speaking to Ari Aster about one thing and another. He called one day and said, “Guy and Evan and Galen have this script,” and would I read it? I’d seen The Green Fog, which is a movie that I think every single film student should watch. So, I went, “Yeah, of course.” And I just loved the script. I love their irreverent take on things. They’re so deliberately perverse. Just when you think they might be tackling a serious subject, they run in the opposite direction. I thought it was a really great way of dealing with global anxiety and the monumental failure of leadership, through their lens.” (Vulture, October 2024)
“I’m a huge fan of Guy’s oeuvre. I had seen all his films and I particularly loved The Green Fog, which he’d made with Evan and Galen Johnson. And then I found out that Ari Aster was producing. That’s how it came to me and how it came to you. So as soon as I read the script, I laughed out loud. I think all good scripts have the sense that they have to be filmed to make sense. And so, the chance to work with them and with an international cast, it was unturndownable. I knew it was funny. It was awkward. And the way they assemble their films is so unique in particular. So I wanted to be part of that.” (ScreenRant, October 2024)

Quotes from Others

Guy Maddin:
— “I feel a lot of pride about Rumours. I feel it pulls off a lot of things a conventional, mainstream Hollywood movie can’t. And yet it stands a chance of being watched. It’s exactly the movie we wanted to make. I’m not saying we had Kubrickian control at every step. But it had the rhythms, logic, and performances we foresaw. The only surprises were pleasant ones.”
Galen Johnson:
— “We were very reluctant to cast a non-German as the chancellor. But Cate [Blanchett] made it easier. In addition to her comedic talent, she is very precise in her acting technique, she is able to adopt any accent while being credible.”
Ari Aster:
— “Rumours is stupid and hilarious and wonderful, and it features the best cast ever assembled. The spirit of Buñuel and Monty Python and overwrought ’70s television is alive and strange.”
Rolando Ravello:
— “She [Cate Blanchett] is a special woman. After a few days on the set we found ourselves one evening drinking wine and talking about beautiful, profound things, for five hours. She is politically engaged, we are on the same side, and she gives herself for what she believes in. Even for this film: they all came for much less than they normally earn and in the markets, with the other actors, Rumours is like “the film with Cate Blanchett”.”

Trivia & Facts

Filmed in Hungary and Canada.
The film premiered Out of Competition at the 77th Cannes Film Festival on 18 May 2024.
The directors specifically told Charles Dance to use his natural English accent even though he plays the US president in the film, the scene where his character explains why he has British accent was cut in the film.
The runtime when the film screened in Cannes is 109 minutes, 5-minutes has been cut when it screened in the following festivals and theatrical release.
The film secured SAG-AFTRA Interim Agreement that allows independent productions with no direct ties to members of the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers to proceed with filming during the actors strike in the US.
When Cate Blanchett visited The Criterion Closet in 2022 while promoting TÁR (2022), she picked up Guy Maddin’s 2008 film, My Winnipeg, when Guy Maddin found out he thought that they should try to reach out to her. They were introduced together by Ari Aster who is a producer on the film.
Even though many viewers think that Cate Blanchett’s Hilda Ortmann is based on the former German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the directors and Cate said they did not base the character on anyone in particular.