PODCAST | Matt Micucci interviews Ruth Mader, director of the film Life Guidance.
Ruth Mader presented her vision of a not-so-distant future, Life Guidance, at the 74th Venice International Film Festival at the Giornate degli Autori. In this interview, conducted at our FRED studio in Venice, the filmmaker talks about her interest in making films in the future (and, specifically, the not-so-distant one), the Kubrick influence in her film, the screenwriting process, and how she is able recreate the atmosphere she intends to have in her final work on the set during the filming stage.
Life Guidance: the film is set in the near future, in a world of perfect capitalism. Society is sustained by a class of top achievers; meanwhile, so-called minimum recipients live under sedation in Fortresses of Sleep. The great majority of top achievers view themselves as happy. An outsourced agency has been established for the rest: Life Guidance is charged with turning these individuals into optimal people as well. Alexander has internalized the system but one wrong word to his child triggers Life Guidance. He starts to rebel and encounters the horror of the system in all its brightness and affability.
For the official page of the film in the festival website, click here.