Award-winning director and screenwriter Michael Haneke is apparently about to begin production work on his next film, Flashmob. The two-time Palme d’Or recipient – who mounted the Cannes Film Festival podium for both The White Ribbon in 2009, and Amour in 2012 – will begin shooting the movie this summer, sparking expectations of a triumphant return to La Croisette in 2015.
While details are sketchy, it seems that Flashmob is a multi-character drama, featuring a story set partly in the US and focusing on the “fragile relationship between media and reality.” The plot will apparently involve a variety of different people who connect on the internet, before their individual stories come together for the titular flashmob.
Those details certainly sound like a Short Cuts for the digital age, but this type of story is something Haneke has been exploring in different ways for decades. The distancing effect of the trappings of modern society are regular themes in his work, with discontent featuring widely, as part of a broader social commentary. Back in 2002, while promoting his film The Piano Teacher, Haneke discussed his views on the relationship between reality and the media with BOMB Magazine during an interview:
“We take reality in the media for reality, which naturally is not reality, but only images of a reality. When we take the news that comes on TV as reality, it creates a state of derealisation. It has nothing to do with reality. It’s completely manipulated, and it’s false. We’re actually deprived of reality. That’s the theme of all my movies, and that’s the danger.”
Since The Piano Teacher in 2002, the rise of the internet has certainly provided an entirely new layer of “derealisation” to explore in a film that will, presumably, address the illusion of a world becoming smaller, while we as individuals drift further apart. With financial commitments to the film reportedly coming together some time ago, and production now gearing up, we will hopefully hear some Flashmob casting announcements soon – ahead of what may be one of next year’s most fascinating films.
