original title:
The End
directed by:
cast:
screenplay:
cinematography:
Mikhail Krichman
editing:
Niels Pagh Andersen
set design:
Jette Lehmann
costume design:
producer:
production:
Final Cut for Real, Wild Atlantic Pictures, Match Factory Productions, Dorje Film, Moonspun Films, Anagram Sweden, supported by Ministero della Cultura, with the support of Danish Film Institute, Den Vestdanske Filmpulje, FilmFyn, Film- und Medienstiftung NRW, MDM Fund, Screen Ireland , UK Global Screen Fund and SFI and Film i Skåne, Nordisk Film & TV Fond. Creative Europe -MEDIA programme, Eurimages, Sicilia Film Commission
distribution:
Provzglyad [Armenia], Mubi [Austria], Provzglyad [Azerbaijan], Provzglyad [Belarus], Elevation Pictures [Canada], Scandinavian Film Distribution [Denmark], Scandinavian Film Distribution [Finland], Provzglyad [Georgia], Mubi [Germany], Scandinavian Film Distribution [Iceland], Provzglyad [Kazakhstan], Provzglyad [Kyrgyzstan], Scandinavian Film Distribution [Norway], Provzglyad [Russia], Scandinavian Film Distribution [Sweden], Provzglyad [Ukraine], Mubi [United Kingdom], Neon [United States], Provzglyad [Uzbekistan]
world sales:
country:
Denmark/Germany/Ireland/Italy/UK/Sweden
year:
2024
film run:
148'
format:
colour
status:
Ready (01/07/2024)
festivals & awards:
A wealthy family survives in a palatial bunker, two decades after the world has ended.
There is a mother, father, and their twenty-year-old son – he was born in the bunker and has never seen the outside world. There is a friend, with whom the son has his only honest relationship. There is also a doctor, a butler – and finally a young woman who, having barely survived, manages to find her way in. The film is a musical, and the title is THE END.
Before the young woman arrives, the family celebrates their survival as confirmation of their success and righteousness, but unspoken blame over leaving loved ones behind has come between the parents, hollowing out whatever intimacy they once shared. They struggle to repress the guilt they feel for this – as well as a more diffuse regret for contributing to the world’s end. (The Father was an oil tycoon.)
The music is inspired by Broadway’s Golden Age – the unearned optimism of the classic American musical embodies the bunker’s desperate delusions. In THE END, it is an optimism born of fear. They are afraid to face their guilt, and it is this fear, more than the inhospitable conditions outside, that prevents them from leaving. Were they to leave, they’d be confronted by the truth of what they did to the world – and the fate to which they abandoned their families.