The production outfit behind the upcoming feature debut of “Wannabe” of Copenhagen-based monolith film Catlin Brocks’ 2022 San Sebastian premiere “The Great Silence” and “Bad Bitch” director Patricia Bang Bang Buck, “Wannabe”, continues to grow Slate with new films from emerging Danish director Christian Benton and Mads Mangel.
Monolit producer and co-founder Victor Kuna has announced that his company is preparing Benton’s follow-up for 2022 drama “chrysanthemum,” in the post-production of Mengel’s debut feature “The Guest.” Mengel, best known for his work behind the cameras in the Danish miniseries “My Another Way” and “Suplex”, will be presenting his work ongoing in the Finnish Film Incident, an annual industry event alongside Helsinki INTL. Film Festival – Love & Anarchy will be held from September 24th to 26th.
“Guest” will be available at a beach hotel over the weekend. There, new parents, Carl and Emily, invited friends and family to celebrate their son’s naming party. However, their hopes for an intimate gathering are shattered by the unexpected arrival of Vibeque, Carl’s estranged mother, who is meant to rejoin the family and prove herself as a grandmother.
Eventually tensions rise, old patterns resurface, and long-standing family dynamics emerge again. What begins as a slow celebration of the conflict with the past, which filmmakers describe as “a keenly observed drama about the people we are trying to inherit, the people we are about to come, and the inability to escape completely to where we came from.”
Speaking to Variety ahead of the Finnish film incident, Mengel co-written the script with Christian Benton – said he “want to make a film about family dynamics and dysfunctional families.” “On a deeper level, I wanted to make a film about forgiveness and letting go of the past,” he added.
The director said that “guest” was “a long journey,” and was first thought when he and producer Victor Cunya were first stolen about the concept as a film school student. Over the years that followed, not only did it bring professional success to both men, but it was an experience that helped fatherhood inform Mengel’s approach to his subject.
“I realized that if I didn’t let go of the grit and pain that I had been bored with as a child, I would have to repeat the pattern in some way,” he said. “I also realized how difficult it is to be a parent, and when my parents had me, I realized they were the only parents.”
Also, the coming soon of Monolit’s Slate is a follow-up of writer-director Benton on his 2022 drama “chrysanthemum.” “Immigration,” co-authored with Nikolaj Arcel, follows the change in the fate of a sheep-burning family when the wolves return to the Danish countryside two centuries after the loss of disappearance, and divides what the filmmakers describe as “the mythical tale of humanity and the struggle for survival.”
In a statement from the director, Benton described the actual fallout in his hometown in his countryside when the wolves first appeared in 200 years in 2012, sparking what was called “a longtime, highly sensitive conflict that severely divides rural and urban communities.”
“For me, conflict is not really about the wolves themselves, nor about what the wolves represent. It ignites powerful and accumulated feelings among the working class. “Conflict is simple, but this setting reveals a glimpse into the underbelly of the nation and the working class that have long been seen in urbanization, reform and centralization.
“The “immigrants” see people living on the margins of our country and work in occupations that are disappearing or threatened in a rapidly changing world,” Benton added.
“Guest” and “The Migrants” are the latest ventures in production costume monolit, co-founded by Cunha in 2019 with Pernille Tornøe and Emily Nicoline Quist. The director’s groundbreaking television series, “Bad Bitch,” was the first Danish show to boast an ensemble cast of black actors. Also, early developments include “After the Sun.” This is a feature in Jonas Eika’s debut story collection and is directed by Danish Iranian filmmaker Anitá Beikpour.
“In Monolit, we defend filmmakers from a personal perspective. It’s a story rooted in a singularity open to something universal,” says Cunha. “The “guest” examines the vulnerable bonds of families as their son faces an estranged mother, and “immigration” portrays a community that is working to change and survive in the wake of political decisions.
