I think it is so fascinating how Sofia Coppola has gone from being one of the primary aspects of The Godfather Part III detractors immediately point to as one of the film’s major flaws, to a writer/director we anxiously await what she’s going to deliver next. Between The Virgin Suicides, Lost in Translation, Marie Antoinette and Somewhere, I’ve yet to see a film from Coppola I have not enjoyed on some level.
Last year Coppola delivered Somewhere, which was a film I described in my review as “minimalism at Sofia Coppola’s most extreme.” The script for the picture was only 42-pages long and yet she delivered a 98-minute movie. It turned some people off, I wasn’t entirely blown away, but it is nevertheless fascinating and it appears we may not have to wait long to be fascinated all over again.
“Being flown to the U.S. to meet Sofia Coppola is really exciting,” she said. “I was freaking out. I’m a little nervous as I don’t want to muck it up I want to do my best.”
This is hardly confirmation of anything, but The Playlist‘s Simon Dang immediately turns to news from February 2010 when Coppola optioned Francine Prose’s coming-of-age novel [amazon asin=”B003STCNI2″ text=”Goldengrove”]. The book is described at Amazon as such:
At the center of Francine Prose’s profoundly moving new novel is a young girl facing the consequences of sudden loss after the death of her sister. As her parents drift toward their own risky consolations, thirteen-year-old Nico is left alone to grope toward understanding and clarity, falling into a seductive, dangerous relationship with her sister’s enigmatic boyfriend.
Over one haunted summer, Nico must face that life-changing moment when children realize their parents can no longer help them. She learns about the power of art, of time and place, the mystery of loss and recovery. But for all the darkness at the novel’s heart, the narrative itself is radiant with the lightness of summer and charged by the restless sexual tension of teenage life.
The young girl at the center of the story is 13-years-old and with De Jonge being 14 things certainly do seem to fit. So far De Jonge’s only work is in the Australian short film The Good Pretender. Just below is a show reel of the young actress at work uploaded by Good Pretender director Maziar Lahooti.
