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The 355 (2022)
Worth creating a new thread for this - very awesome-sounding idea.
‘355’: Jessica Chastain, Marion Cotillard, Penelope Cruz, Fan Bingbing, Lupita Nyong’o Form Spy Sisterhood
http://deadline.com/2018/05/female-spy-film-355-jessica-chastain-marion-cotillard-penelope-cruz-fan-bingbing-lupita-nyongo-simon-kinberg-cannes-market-1202380078/
‘355’: Jessica Chastain, Marion Cotillard, Penelope Cruz, Fan Bingbing, Lupita Nyong’o Form Spy Sisterhood
http://deadline.com/2018/05/female-spy-film-355-jessica-chastain-marion-cotillard-penelope-cruz-fan-bingbing-lupita-nyongo-simon-kinberg-cannes-market-1202380078/
Hard to imagine there will be a hotter film package unveiled at Cannes next week than 355, a large-scale espionage film that Simon Kinberg will direct with an all-star international spy cast of Jessica Chastain, Marion Cotillard, Penelope Cruz, Fan Bingbing and Lupita Nyong’o. They’ll play international agents in a grounded, edgy action thriller that aims to alter a male-dominated genre with a true female ensemble, in the style of spy franchises The Bourne Identity, Mission: Impossible and James Bond. The script is by Theresa Rebeck. The hope is to launch a franchise.
Kinberg just directed and Chastain starred in X-Men: Dark Phoenix. The idea for 355 came from Chastain, and she pitched it to him while they worked on that superhero film on which Kinberg made his feature directing debut. It didn’t take long for Chastain to get commitments from the filmmaker, and the actresses.
“I had so much fun working on The Help that I always wanted to do another female ensemble film,” Chastain told Deadline. “I love the Bourne movies, the Mission: Impossible films, and wondered why, except for Charlie’s Angels, there hadn’t been a true female ensemble action-thriller spy film. That got my wheels going, along with the idea of casting actresses from all over the world to truly make it an international project. I realized the incredible creative freedom we would have with that. I brought the idea to Simon, told him about the actresses I was thinking of, and he was so sweet. He said, ‘I want to do it with you.’
“Then I called all the women, told them what I was envisioning and that I wanted it to be a collaborative process, and how we would all create this together,” Chastain said. “The one thing that felt important is that we all show up at Cannes, because that would be the beginning of our journey together. Every single actress I called said yes, on the phone call. They committed to Cannes and to everything. So far it has been a very wonderfully easy process.”
The film involves these top agents from organizations around the world uniting to stop a global organization from acquiring a weapon that could plunge an already unstable world into total chaos. They have to overcome cultural and political differences to form a bond and work together.
“What we can say is, they come up against an organization larger than the established spy organizations we’ve known up to this point,” said Kinberg, long the creative spine of the X-Men franchise and who’s separately writing and producing a Star Wars film. “We are hoping to create a franchise with this, and the first film will be the agents coming together.”....
...The other thing that was important was to broaden the opportunities and expectations for women in this #MeToo moment, something that means a great deal to Chastain and her co-stars.
“The action genre has long been dominated by male heroes, and it’s so exciting to be part of a film that will allow for not just one female action hero but a whole ensemble of very capable, fierce female characters that reject tired stereotypes,” she said. “Characters that liberate from the confines of stereotypical traits. That is something that excited me about this, the opportunity to create different types of female heroes.”
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Comments
'The film involves these top agents from organizations around the world uniting to stop a global organization from acquiring a weapon that could plunge an already unstable world into total chaos. They have to overcome cultural and political differences to form a bond and work together.'
As Pierce once said 'How original.'
Is this formulaic rubbish being greenlit because it is a genuinely fresh and innovative story? Or is there another reason (which I feel is staring us all in the face but I can't quite put my finger on...) why studio execs think this is a goer?
Try pitching the same idea but replacing the agents with men and see if you make it through security at any major studio. Who needs a script when you have a cast entirely made up of women?
By all means make spy films with strong female roles but at least come up with something interesting; I really enjoyed Atomic Blonde and Red Sparrow but this sounds like something P&W knocked up in their lunch hour.
If you had an all-male cast of that caliber, probably, although odds are lower than here as the market and the world in general from a social POV is crying out for a female-led ensemble action project like this.
“I had so much fun working on The Help that I always wanted to do another female ensemble film,” Chastain told Deadline. “I love the Bourne movies, the Mission: Impossible films, and wondered why, except for Charlie’s Angels, there hadn’t been a true female ensemble action-thriller spy film.
She seems to have forgotten the one that begat them all. I love you Jessica but that's an unacceptable oversight on your part if I may say so.
You know, even if I think that sometimes political correctness can go too far ("cultural appropriation", whatever that may mean), reading some commenhts on this and other forums, I also think that anti-political correctness can go too far as well.
It's just that... we, men, don't brag about the all-male cast whenever we make something, so it'd be better if the opposite gender of the species drops it as well and make a film for its story, not for the ideology. And yes, I love Charlie's Angels, too. Not the films, though.
At least they're trying this with a fully original property.
Isn't that what most people have been complaining about re: female Bond/Ocean's/Ghostbusters?
Exactly. The issue is when it becomes a political stunt first, and a film second.
I will concede that is its one virtue.
Yeah. "Why not make an original film with an all female cast", then they do, and it gets this reaction because PC gone mad bloody feminists ruining everything.
No the plot doesn't sound very original but I think it's the same as something like Expendables where the appeal is meant to come from the big cast.
Because an all male cast for an action film of this scale isn't much of a novelty while this is.
As Chastain and co rightly mentioned in the announcement, Charlie's Angels is the only one with the level of star power and high profile as 355 would have.
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/amp/news/jessica-chastains-female-led-spy-film-355-lands-january-2021-release-1233336?__twitter_impression=true
Production is currently underway in London, after kicking off in Paris last month. Diane Kruger has replaced Marion Cotillard (who dropped out), plus Sebastian Stan and Edgar Ramirez round out the cast.
Loads of production updates on the film's official Instagram (likely run by Chastain's team)
My agenda is to quash your agenda. Nothing wrong with that, is there?
That depends on what you consider my agenda to be.