Following its acclaimed world premiere at the 2023 Venice Film Festival and recent showcase at the London Film Festival, Vertigo Releasing has confirmed the UK and Irish theatrical release date for Bertrand Bonello‘s (Nocturama, Zombi Child) provocative and thought-provoking The Beast, inspired by Henry James’s evocative 1903 novella, The Beast in the Jungle.
Directed by Bonello, who wrote the screenplay with Guillaume Bréaud, Benjamin Charbit, the film stars BAFTA-nominated actors Léa Seydoux (No Time To Die, Crimes of the Future) and George MacKay (1917, Femme), this visionary sci-fi feature spans three time periods: In a near-future world dominated by artificial intelligence, where human emotions are perceived as a threat, Gabrielle (Seydoux) embarks on a journey to purify her DNA by revisiting her past lives. During this process, she reconnects with Louis (MacKay), her great love. However, a sense of foreboding and fear grips her as she anticipates an impending catastrophe.
An exploration of the pressing issues of artificial intelligence and the persistent phenomenon of incel culture, the film offers a shattering vision about fate, self-discovery and the ever-evolving nature of the human condition.
Talking with Deadline about the genesis of the film, Bonello said, “The first idea was to do a melodrama, which is something I’ve never done before, and that drove me to a short novel by Henry James called The Beast in the Jungle. For me, it’s one of the most heart-breaking, beautiful, and awful stories you can imagine. I wanted to mix this with some genre [elements], because, in James’s novel, love and fear are so related. So I wanted to have some ‘fear’ scenes, and there is almost a slasher movie inside this film. The other thing, that came quite quickly, was the desire to do a film, for the first time in my life, in which the main character is female.”
Vertigo Releasing have confirmed that The Beast will be released in UK and Irish cinemas on 19th April 2024.
