Antebellum filmmakers Gerard Bush and Christopher Renz on the movie’s big twist (SPOILERS)
weren’t worried about pushing the envelope too far with “Antebellum,” their twisty tale of a contemporary Black woman, a slave living on a brutal Southern plantation and the way their fates are intertwined. In fact, one could argue that was their intention.
“The fact that it was current day was really the point of what we were trying to say in the movie,” Bush explained, pointing to the film’s title and its direct reference to the period before the American Civil War. “It’s so funny to see those reactions from the test audiences,” Renz recalled. “Because you get some folks that say, ‘I knew what was going on from the first quote on the screen.’ And then others who figured out later than we thought that they thought they would. But it was important in that first act to kind of ground the viewer in that world, but also pepper some Easter eggs throughout it — the movie is very different obviously on the second watch.
Explaining why they wanted to shepherd the film — and its filmmakers, who make their feature directorial debut with “Antebellum” — Mansfield said, “What we’re always looking for is original voices, different perspectives and films we haven’t seen before. And, we hadn’t seen that movie yet. And to provide an opportunity for someone like Janelle to embody that, felt important and powerful and something we wanted to be a part of.
He continued: “What we were really looking for was that partner that was willing to go the distance. So, we were interviewing them in as much as they were interviewing us.”
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