Take Elisabeth Moss as a down-on-her-luck actress and Kate Hudson as the ultra-glamorous CEO of a wellness company who may be harboring a monstrous secret and have them trade scathing one-liners. Add a long-haired henchman. Top it off with some old-school energy from the likes of Kaia Gerber (Saturday evening, Royal palm), Arian Moayed (Succession), East-Haim (Licorice Pizza), and Elizabeth Berkley (Dancers, Saved by the Bell). And then director Max Minghella mixes it all together into a 100-minute, genre-bending mashup that’s simultaneously scary, thrilling, funny, and wild. What you get is Shellwhich will have its world premiere as part of the Toronto Film Festival Special Presentations.
Described as a “dark comedy and horror film about society’s obsession with youth and beauty,” Moss and Minghella hope his second feature as director will be a rollercoaster ride for audiences. “One of the goals for Max and I was just to make something entertaining, to make something fun,” the star explains. THR during a brief break from his work on the final season of THE The Handmaid’s Tale in Toronto. “Sometimes people need a little break and just want to go to the movies and be entertained. But this is really well-made entertainment.”
The director agrees. “I was really excited to make something that was for the public and was a real popcorn movie,” Minghella says. THRtelling him about his mother telling him bedtime stories based on the plots of films she had seen as part of her work for the British Board of Film Classification. “It was a period when they were making a very specific type of film,” he says. “So this film is a love letter to that period of studio cinema.”
The two creatives, who starred opposite each other in The Handmaid’s Tale For years I have enjoyed the change in working dynamics on Shell. “We are so used to collaborating, because on The Handmaid’s Tale“Even though I’m both a director and an executive producer, it feels like it’s very collaborative,” Moss says. “We’re used to talking about scenes and scripts and shots.” With Minghella ultimately taking charge of the project Shell“There was definitely a lot of trust between them,” she adds. “And he gave me a lot of confidence to try different things. I was able to think outside the box a little bit. We really transitioned into this different relationship very easily.”
Minghella calls the experience “very energizing for both of us,” calling Moss and her “innate” talent “a filmmaker’s dream.” He also notes, “We had an incredibly busy schedule for this film, and she was able to deliver these extraordinary performances so quickly and with such precision.”
Both are ecstatic at the list of other names appearing in Shellwith Moss speaking of a “murderer’s row” of talent. “Working with Kate [Hudson] It was so cool. He’s someone who…
