“I have a fire in my soul. And I will no longer allow you or anyone else to contain it,” says Elle Fanning in a new trailer for “Mary Shelley.” The “20th Century Women” star plays the film’s titular character, a rebellious teen who pens one of the most iconic novels ever written.
Written and directed by Haifaa Al-Mansour (“Wadjda”), the biopic sees Mary being courted by controversial poet Percy Shelley (Douglas Booth), who eventually becomes her husband. Their unconventional romance isn’t the focus of the film — it’s just one of the events leading up to Mary writing “Frankenstein.”
Told that women aren’t “intelligent enough to form ideas of [their] own,” Mary sets out to prove her detractors wrong. After receiving a prompt to write a ghost story, she produces a tale about an egotistical scientist who creates life. When a man suggests that Mary has chosen “curious subject matter for a young lady,” she doesn’t let him get away with implying the work belongs to Percy. “It is my story and you dare question a woman’s ability to experience loss, betrayal, death,” she says.
“I want people to enjoy the film and hopefully be inspired by Mary’s journey. I also want people to understand the power of the female voice, and the very uniquely feminine perspective that Mary Shelley brought to the genre of science fiction,” Al-Mansour told Women and Hollywood in a soon-to-be published interview. “Her story is a reflection of her life, as a mother, a wife, and a daughter, and ‘Frankenstein’ would not exist without the tragic backstory of her life. It may not seem like a feminist novel, but every beat of the story is an echo of her world and her struggles as a woman.”
Fanning is a three-time Critics Choice Award nominee. She received nods for “Ginger & Rosa,” “Somewhere,” and “Super 8.”
“Mary Shelley” will screen at Tribeca Film Festival later this month and hits theaters May 25 and VOD June 1.
Al-Mansour already has a number of other projects lined up including political drama “The Perfect Candidate” and Netflix romantic comedy “Nappily Ever After.” It was also just announced that she’s teaming up with the producers of “BoJack Horseman” for a new animated series.
According to Deadline, ShadowMachine has acquired Al-Mansour’s “Miss Camel,” a story about a Saudi teen “who will do anything to escape her arranged marriage and fulfill her goal of attending art school outside of Saudi Arabia.” The project took home the $100,000 IWC Filmmaker Award at the Dubai International Film Festival in December.
