I completely blanked when the Toronto International Film Festival announced their Canadian features so I didn’t realize American Psycho helmer, Mary Harron’s, latest film, The Moth Diaries, would be playing at the fest, but thanks to a Twitter heads-up from the fest’s co-director on Twitter and a couple of other helping hands I’ve been set straight and taken to the Festival’s media site and now have a batch of stills for you to peruse as well as some information on a film you may not have known about.
The Moth Diaries is described as “a sinister and sensually modern film about dark pasts, the circulation of desire and the fragile line between the real and imagined.” The story centers on Rebecca (Sarah Bolger), haunted by her father’s suicide, she begins her junior year at an elite all-girls’ boarding school, hoping for a fresh start. Her friendship with sunny Lucy (Sarah Gadon) is shattered by the arrival of Ernessa (Lily Cole), a mysterious girl. As Ernessa consumes more of Lucy’s attention, the latter’s body grows pale, thin and weak. Judy Parfitt and Scott Speedman co-star
If the names in the cast aren’t immediately recognizable they will be soon enough. Lily Cole played a major role in Terry Gilliam’s The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus and will be playing the role of Greta in Universal’s Snow White and the Huntsman. Sarah Gadon is getting a big career boost from another Canadian helmer as David Cronenberg has cast her in not only A Dangerous Method, which will also be screening in Toronto, but alongside Robert Pattinson in his next film Cosmopolis.
I have added a second preview image below along with a lengthy plot synopsis, but you can browse my entire gallery of 13 images from the film right here.
Rebecca, a young girl haunted by her father’s suicide, begins her junior year at an elite girls boarding school, hoping for a fresh start. From the outset, her friendship with sunny, innocent Lucy is shattered by the arrival of Ernessa, a mysterious, dark and beautiful girl from Europe. As Ernessa consumes more and more of Lucy’s attention, the latter’s healthy young body grows pale, thin and weak – as if being drained of life itself.
Her friendship with Lucy slipping away, Rebecca develops a crush on her handsome English professor, Mr. Davies, who is teaching a course on supernatural literature. Obsessed with “Carmilla”, the vampire story that inspired Bram Stoker’s “Dracula”, she grows increasingly suspicious of Ernessa’s odd behavior and Lucy’s wasting illness, and when mysterious deaths shock the school, becomes convinced that Ernessa is a vampire. Rebecca finds herself isolated when the other girls dismiss her suspicions as mere jealousy and Mr. Davies betrays her trust. As Lucy’s inexplicable illness turns deadly, Rebecca is left alone to battle with Ernessa for the life of her friend.
The supernatural elements in The Moth Diaries are rooted in the real experience of a young girl faced with her emerging sexuality and caught in a web of obsessive friendship, jealousy and betrayal. A powerful emotional drama where eroticism and death are entwined.
