If you read our feature on the films we’re most anticipating in this year’s Cannes line-up, you know we’re intrigued by Ryan Gosling’s directorial debut, Lost River. Formerly known as How To Catch A Monster, the film promises surreal mystery and, from the looks of this first image, Mad Men’s Christina Hendricks in a tricky situation.
Hendricks stars as Billy, a single mother of two who has to journey into a macabre, dark fantasy world even as her eldest son Bones finds a secret road leading to an underwater town. They’ll both have to figure out the mystery if they’re to help their family survive… Cryptic, definitely, and for certain the off-centre, not-so-commercial fare you imagine from a man who has worked with the likes of Nicolas Winding Refn.
When we spoke to Hendricks’ co-star, Iain De Caestecker last year, he also shed a little more light on that plot. “There's my character, Bones, his mother and his younger brother. There's also a girl next door played by Saoirse Ronan, called Rat. It's about this family living in a town called Lost River, which is perhaps a place that was once full of family and happiness and love, and is now this town that's slowly descending into a place without any hope. This family is holding onto the foundations of their house and everything they think they need to hold onto."
Boasting the likes of Matt Smith, Ben Mendelsohn and Eva Mendes in the cast, **Lost River **is premiering in the Un Certain Regard section of Cannes, but hasn’t yet received a release date here or in the US.