Exit Movie - News RSS Feed http://www.exit-movie.com The latest news from exit-movie.com English WELCOME NEWS http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=3 Welcome to EXIT.

We all feel like we've been making this movie for so long that it should be showing up on late night TV just before the infomercials kick in - but now, as it's only inches from completion, we thought it was time to let people see a little of what's to come.

A massive thanks to everyone who has helped the film so far: cast, crew, friends, strangers with a superhuman knack of glancing at the camera at exactly the wrong time - and to you for reading this, too. While we always joked that we'd be happy for just, say, two Norwegian art-film critics to see the film and love it, we'd be more than happy for others to join them. Norwegian or otherwise.

Poke around, watch the trailer, and check back here for updates on the film. Better still, you can find us on facebook or subscribe via the buttons just below.

We've enjoyed fighting over possible taglines throughout filming, but here's one of the director's favourites:

"Did you think it was just a door?"

]]> EXIT EXPLAINED http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=19 No, this isn't the trailer to EXIT - although perhaps it should be...

]]> exit editor interviewed http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=20 Here's Patrick McCabe, EXIT's editor, interviewed by the AFI as one of Australia's emerging editors.

AFI: What is it about editing that you love? What’s your favourite thing about it?
 
Patrick McCabe: I think it’s just really remarkable when you see a scene come together and start to work. It’s quite amazing how you can manipulate the footage to get what you want out of it. That’s really rewarding when it works well.
 
AFI: Can you give us a specific example of that?
 
Patrick McCabe: Hmm....well, with this feature that I’m working on right now, Exit,the script is really quite dense and the writer was really working to do a lot in every scene. In every scene there are things happening on quite a few different levels, not only in the dialogue and the way the dialogue fits into the overall narrative, but there’s a certain weirdness happening in the background. What we found with a few of the scenes is that when we’ve stripped them back and pulled certain parts out of them, then it kind of distils the parts that are working and allows them to really shine.

Read the rest.

]]> EXIT AT TWITCHFILM http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=21 EXIT is featured over on the excellent TwitchFilm, who focus on international, independent and cult cinema. They write:

"Vague, abstract, but definitely a tease, the first footage for Australian, well, existentialist drama, EXIT is online. The filmmakers, who seem more like a collective of thinkers than a typical production crew, cite David Lynch, Darren Aronfosky, and Hal Hartley as influences, however for some reason this reminds me more of a low-fi sci-fi indie like Primer."

We certainly can't argue with that.

]]> RADIOLAB: PROBLEMS WITH GRAVITY http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=22 "In early April, I began to move in a different world. I was conscious of a new plane. I had a new relationship to space."

Recently the must-listen science podcast RadioLab examined the case of Rosemary Morton and her so-called "problems with gravity". The account is read by actor Hope Davis (from TV's In Treatment) from Morton's original 1958 essay in the New Yorker.

So why are we mentioning this here?

One word: 'labyrinthitis'.

]]> Entra en el laberinto http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=23 It's enjoyably surreal to see people talking about EXIT around the world. Here is a great piece - or so we're assured by our Spanish-speaking producer - about EXIT's teaser trailer.

]]> OTHER EXITS http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=24 There was never any real discussion about what our film would be called. It was always EXIT; nothing else made sense.

'Exit' isn't exactly an unpopular title in cinema, though. There's a Swiss documentary on euthanasia from 2005, a Swedish thriller starring Alexander Skarsgård from 2006, and at least a dozen short films from around the world - often horrors, thrillers, maybe science fiction - all called Exit.

(And now, of course, the massive success of Bansky's documentary Exit Through the Gift Shop has ruined any chance we had of showing up on the first page of an internet search for the immediate future.)

The best other Exit, though, is a direct-to-video erotic thriller from 1996 about a burglary of a strip club. Its IMDB keywords are as follows:

Stripper; Strip Club; Female Nudity; Erotica; Beautiful Woman; Independent Film.

How can we compete with that?

]]> ASYLUM CONGRATULATIONS http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=25 Kylie Trounson – EXIT’s own Alice – is an accomplished playwright as well as actor. We’d like to offer belated congratulations to Kylie for the Green Room nomination for her most recent show The Lost Story of the Magdalen Asylum. It’s up for Best Site-Specific Production for its effectively eerie use of Melbourne’s Abbotsford Convent. Winners will be announced later this month. We’re sure it’ll kick ass.

]]> EXIT ORIGINS http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=27 One side effect of the strange genesis of EXIT is the trail of material left in its wake. Discarded characters, unused monologues, too-weird ideas and – even further back – stuff like A Perfect Empty Street.

It's a short story containing the idea that’s at the heart of EXIT; an idea that first appeared in a series of readings called Here: Secret Histories of Melbourne. Those readings then formed the basis of the exhibition Melbourne and Other Myths at the (sadly now defunct) City Museum.

For written proof that we’ve been thinking about EXIT for far, far too long, you can download A Perfect Empty Street over at the writer’s site.

]]> EXIT ON TWITTER http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=28 There's some big news looming for EXIT, so we thought it was time we finally embraced twitter. Feel free to follow us for updates, links, and the occasional bad joke. We're also on facebook if you're not into the whole brevity thing.

]]> EXIT DOUBLE FEATURES http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=31 Just out of curiosity, we quizzed some of the crew on what film they thought would best complement EXIT if watched as a double feature in a single sitting. (The first answer – “What about watching EXIT twice?” – was ignored.) Here are some of the suggestions so far...

Editor Patrick McCabe: Darren Aronofsky's Pi.

Writer Martyn Pedler: Hal Hartley’s Fay Grim.

Composer Shaun Keyt: Andrei Tarkovsky's Stalker. (Stalker first, EXIT second, in case you were wondering.)

And director Marek Polgar: Joshua Marston's Maria Full of Grace.

]]> EXIT WORLD PREMIERE http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=32 We’re pleased as hell to finally be able to announce that the world premiere of EXIT will be at the upcoming Fantasia Festival in Montreal!

Fantasia has been described by Quentin Tarantino as “the most important and prestigious genre film festival on this continent.” (And would Quentin Tarantino lie to you?) This is their 15th year, and a quick look at the first wave of announcements shows we’ll be in excellent cinematic company.

Here’s how they describe EXIT:

“Taking place in a labyrinthine city where many individuals are looking for a mystical door that could lead them to a better world, this promising genre film from a visionary director explores the theme of urban alienation while remaining a poignant piece of cinema that will leave audiences breathless. Splendid and cerebral, EXIT opens the door for a distinctive new voice in fantastic cinema.”

We’d like to especially thank Fantasia programmer Simon Laperrière, who's been a big supporter of EXIT ever since seeing an early draft of the film months ago.

]]> EXIT IN DIGITAL MEDIA WORLD http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=33 For the technically-minded out there, EXIT was just featured in a long piece over at Digital Media World. It tracks how technology changed over the three years of shooting, and how how "future proof" the RED camera turned out to be. Inspiration Studios' Cail Young and director Marek Polgar discuss VFX, colour science, and more.

Read it here.

]]> EXIT TO CLOSE CAMERA LUCIDA http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=34 The full programme for Montreal’s Fantasia Festival has gone live, and with it details of EXIT’s world premiere as part of their Camera Lucida spotlight.

Programmer Simon Laperrière has said that the first Camera Lucida was based on a question. “What is genre cinema today? And to answer it, I said we have to look at genre film in its most iconoclastic form, in all its differences.”

Last year – the first of the programme – included Quentin Duplex’s killer tire movie Rubber and Hirokazu Koreeda’s poetic, absurd Air Doll. This year, it opens with William Eubank’s avant-garde sci-fi Love...

...and we’re pleased to say EXIT has been chosen to be Camera Lucida’s closing night film.

The festival’s outline of EXIT begins like this: “According to legend, there exists at the heart of the city a door that opens upon a parallel universe. No one knows its origin or where it leads.” And they go on to call it “one of the best science fiction films of the year, merging a small budget with big ideas.”

You can read Fantasia’s full description of EXIT here, as well as watch our trailer and buy tickets for the premiere in Montreal on August 4. If you're in the northern hemisphere, you have no excuse but to come, right?

]]> CEREBRAL SCI-FI http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=35 Over at Spectacular Optical, Kier-La Janisse writes a great piece about three examples of "cerebral sci-fi" showing at this year's Fantasia Festival: Mike Cahill’s Another Earth, William Eubank’s Love, and EXIT. They're films that share an interest in "psychedelic space" and parallel worlds.

“In EXIT, an age-old legend holds that there is a secret door somewhere in the middle of the city that opens into a parallel universe, and the demoralized citizens of our world spend copious amounts of time searching for the door that will bring them happiness. But in Calvino-esque fashion, the city keeps changing and growing, making their quest more impossible by the day. Maps and magic alike are consulted in the hope that the fabled door is real and that their depressing existence isn’t all there is.”

You can read the rest here.

]]> EXIT AT FANTASIA http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=36 EXIT was finished only a few days before we stuffed it into our carry-on luggage and began the long journey from Melbourne to Montreal for the 15th annual Fantasia Festival. And we had a blast while we were there, beginning with the certifiably insane Thai action movie Bangkok Knockout and ending with 1925’s Phantom of the Opera complete with a live score from a 30-piece orchestra.

As for EXIT’s premiere? Do you remember that bit in Inception when the car fell very, very slowly off the bridge? That’s exactly how it feels to sit in a sold-out screening of your own movie. Luckily, our second screening saw time return to normal, and the movie felt like its ninety minutes again rather than seventeen hours of slow motion. We had a great response from the crowd in the following Q&As, and director Marek Polgar managed to speak in public without unexpectedly combusting.

EXIT is an arthouse sci-fi drama with no famous actors made by first time filmmakers - and both its screenings at Fantasia were sold out. This is a testament to the awesomeness of the festival and the audience it attracts. We can’t thank Simon Laperrière, Mitch Davis, and everyone else who believed in the film and invited us to premiere it with them in Montreal.

]]> EXIT INTERVIEWS AT SCREENHUB http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=37 Just before EXIT's premiere at Fantasia, Anne Richey from Screenhub got some of the people behind the movie on the phone to explain its long, winding evolution.

"One of the stories was about 'a cult of people thinking [the city] was a maze and no-one was looking for the door anymore.' When Martyn and Marek were later throwing around ideas for a movie, Marek commented on how much that particular concept had struck him."

Read the rest here.

]]> TALKING TO THE CAMERA http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=38 While we’re in the awkward twilight zone between premiering the movie and being able to announce some upcoming exciting news, let’s talk about the fourth wall.

In EXIT, characters speak directly to the camera. It’s something that began in very early versions of the film. In fact, we were once considering making EXIT as a mockumentary, as someone followed the search of believers throughout the city. Once that was abandoned we had to decide if talking straight to the audience was still useful – and admittedly, we didn’t realise quite how divisive some find this technique.

While EXIT’s characters talk to the audience, they still don’t know they’re in a movie – they won’t be telling you to leave the cinema after the credits a la Ferris Bueller or anything. It’s more like how Bergman’s cast in Persona draw you closer by speaking straight at you; more like a thought bubble appearing overhead, giving quick bursts of access to internal lives. And given that EXIT’s dialogue can be a little cryptic and its logic can be a little alienating, it seemed more important than ever to keep it.

]]> EXIT AT SCI-FI-LONDON http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=40 At the end of last year, Quiet Earth – the self-proclaimed “UHF of the film world” – saw the trailer to EXIT and were inspired to write an article about it. In fact, they contacted us directly and asked if they could see a copy of the movie.

The good news is that they liked it so much they asked if they could present the UK premiere of EXIT at the SCI-FI-LONDON festival in May.

We wish we could be there – if only for the selfish reason that many of the films playing sound great. Like the dreamscape story Cycle: “It’s as if Stanley Kubrick had directed Tron.” Or weird experiment of True Love: “Are they being tortured by a psychopath or is their love being put to the ultimate test?”

SCI-FI-LONDON’s synopsis of EXIT is one of our favourites, too. Here’s how they describe it:

If a film ever deserved the description of enigmatic and atmospheric it is EXIT.

The film follows Alice, one of a growing number of people who believe that the city is a maze and there is a door, a hidden exit that will take them to a better place. If you don’t find the exit you will become trapped into a comfortable, domestic existence.

Tonally it is like the world of The Matrix before taking the red pill. Visually stunning, it is made up of abstract fragments of lost corners of cityscapes backed with hypnotic soundscapes and fragments of conversations looking for answers to life’s mysteries.

Part sci-fi, part psychological drama: existentialism has never looked and sounded so good.

We’d like to thank Don Neumann, editor in chief of Quiet Earth, and Louis Savy, festival director of SCI-FI-LONDON, for all their support.

EXIT screens on Monday May 7th, 5:45pm, at Apollo Piccadilly Circus. Tickets are on sale now. If you're in London, why not go and applaud obnoxiously on our behalf?

]]> SCI-FI-LONDON REVIEWS http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=41 Back in May, EXIT played to a packed cinema at the SCI-FI-LONDON film festival. We wish we could have attended in person, but were hugely pleased with everything we heard about the film's introduction and reception. Here are some reviews that appeared after the screening:

Eye For Film: "Whether the exit leads to another physical world, a new dimension or an enlightened, meta-physical plane remains tantalisingly unexplained throughout this impressively written, performed and shot slow burner. [...] Exit has the feel of an urban riff on Stalker, with the long sought after exit door promising much the same as the room at the heart of The Zone in Tarkovsky’s peerless science fiction classic. Charlie Kaufman, Jean-Luc Godard and the Davids Cronenberg and Lynch come to mind as well, though Polgar and Pedler are no mere imitators as Exit is possessed of its own clear style."

TwitchFilm: "The world of the film feels very unnatural, and you almost wish you could go inside and help them find their salvation. This is a quiet, deliberately somewhat uncomfortable, and engaging film, meant for rainy afternoons when you can leave the theatre and walk the streets and wonder. Heavy, most definitely, but not unbearably so. It's the kind of film that will make you start to look for your own camera, following you as you walk through the streets, randomly trying doorknobs."

Empire: "Persuasively scripted by Martyn Pedler, this is fascinating exercise in superstition and supposition that will have everyone wondering as they approach the next unfamiliar doorway. Strikingly photographed by Sasha Whitehouse and edited by Patrick McCabe to prevent the audience from settling, the action benefits considerably from production designer Esther Justin's evocative ephemera and perturbing cityscape models. The performances are equally consternating, as the characters become increasingly desperate and untrustworthy. [...] But what most impresses is Polgar's measured direction and confident use of locations across Melbourne..."

Quiet Earth: "Marek Polgar’s Exit focuses on its characters’ Ballardian psychological makeup, exploring their rationalizations and obsessive motivations. [...] It’s an incredible film in its own right, which is in dire need of an explanatory sequel."

Thanks to everyone who attended, and to all who were moved to write something about it afterwards. It's always fascinating to hear others' theories - and sometimes disappointments - about EXIT.

]]> EXIT GOES UNDERGROUND IN ARIZONA http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=42 We’re happy to announce that EXIT has been selected to screen at the 5th Annual Arizona Underground Film Festival – the “biggest underground film festival in the country!”

It’ll play alongside recent festival hits Davide Manuli’s The Legend of Kaspar Hauser and Babis Makridis’ L, as well as plenty of intriguing lesser-known titles. The festival looks fantastic and we wish we could be there. (Besides, you have to love an event that has not only a great selection of films but plenty of afterparties and its own limited edition vinyl sticker, right?)

EXIT screens on September 24 at 6PM. Tickets are on sale now.

]]> EXIT AT WHERE?HOUSE FOR MELBOURNE MUSIC WEEK http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=43 There is a giant, disused building in the middle of the city. Its location is a carefully guarded secret, but right now it's being covertly transformed into a unique performance space for Melbourne Music Week. Inspired by Melbourne's early rave scene, Where?House will be open day and night, "playing host to some of Australia and the world’s most legendary, innovative and up-and coming bands, artists and DJs."

And it will also hold a special, one-off screening of EXIT on November 23, introduced by the film's composer and sound designer, Shaun Keyt aka Viridian. An EXIT screening in a secret, abandoned warehouse? It might be as close as you'll get to stepping inside the movie.

Here are the screening details, and here's a teaser for what to expect when Where?House is finally revealed.

]]> WATCH EXIT NOW VIA VIDEO ON DEMAND http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=44 If you've been curious to see EXIT but haven't caught it at its festival appearances, it's finally available via the wonders of video on demand. (Well, available in the US and Canada, anyway. We're still working on the rest of the world.)

You can rent or buy it right now, in HD, from iTunes and Amazon Instant. It's also available through many cable providers for the next few months.

Big thanks to those who've seen it already and took the time to write to us - or write reviews on IMDB, good or bad. And feel free to emotionally blackmail any US or Canadian friends you might have into watching it, too.

]]> EXIT ALSO NOW ON HULU http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=45 Along with iTunes and Amazon Instant, EXIT is now available to watch on Hulu if you're in the USA. (Why not watch it on all three?)

If you're somewhere else in the world? We'll have some exciting news very soon about a wider release!

]]> EXIT IN FILM BIZARRO'S BEST OF 2012 http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=46 Are 'Best Of' lists just "sports for non-sport people", as critic Emily Nussbaum once put it? Maybe. But it's amazing how different they feel when something you made appears on one...

EXIT appears at #14 on Film Bizarro's picks for the Best of 2012. It's alongside big names like Léos Carax's Holy Motors and David Cronenberg's Cosmpolis, as well as many smaller indie and underground pics well worth chasing down. (One of them, in fact, premiered with EXIT in the Camera Lucida program at 2011's Fantasia festival: the Kafkaesque one-man apocalypse Hellacious Acres: The Case of John Glass.)

Thanks to Film Bizarro for helping to spread the word about EXIT!

]]> EXIT ON ITUNES IN AUSTRALIA, NZ, AND THE UK http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=47 After a few months of availability on demand in North America, EXIT has finally expanded its reach to its place of birth. It just seemed wrong somehow that those who walk the same streets as in the movie couldn't see what we've done to the city...

EXIT is now on iTunes to rent or buy in Australia - as well as New Zealand, the UK, and pretty much anywhere not requiring subtitles. Hopefully those other countries are still to come.

It's been pretty amazing getting messages from strangers around the world who've watched it. The novelty of that won't wear off in a hurry.

]]> EXIT AT MELBOURNE'S ROOFTOP CINEMA http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=48 If you're in Melbourne on February 19th, you have the opportunity to see EXIT surrounded by the city that inspired it. Rooftop Cinema is presenting a special screening of the film, and they describe it like this:

"What if city life really was a rat race - a maze, with every ordinary door a possible way out? As a subculture of eccentric true believers obsessively comb the city, rattling doorknobs, one woman reckons she's found the real exit. Filmed in Melbourne, this slow-burning psychological drama explores what we really seek when we embark on a quest."

And EXIT's writer, Martyn Pedler, wrote about the night for Time Out Magazine:

"While Melbourne's never actually mentioned by name – there was a strict ‘no shots of trams!’ policy – we wanted EXIT to make familiar streets look strange again. It’s a movie filled with tangents and questions and dead ends. Hopefully you can get lost in it."

Tickets are on sale now, but seats are limited. It should be pretty magical.

]]> EXIT IN THE BIG ISSUE AND ONYA MAGAZINE http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=49 With its long-awaited - by us, anyway - release in Australia via iTunes, a few local reviews have appeared. First in The Big Issue, where Anthony Morris writes about EXIT and its VOD release:

"This is the first feature film for director Marek Polgar and includes promising performances from some relatively unknown actors. It's a sold idea for a high-concept arthouse thriller, and the film itself is the kind of atmospheric product Australia should be making more of."

It's print only, but why not buy buy a copy and be charitable? And Glenn Dunks writes a review for Onya Magazine:

"Steeped in ambiguous mind games, Exit plays like a combination of science fiction, thriller, and film-noir, without ever dovetailing its unique style. I noticed a particular inspiration in the form of Alex Proyas’ Dark City, which also followed a man who stumbles across the reality of the inescapable world he lives in and goes about finding a way out. That it at times also plays like a sombre version of a Charlie Kaufman (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) and Richard Kelly (Donnie Darko) collaboration only adds to its mystique."

Read the whole thing here - especially for the description of EXIT as a "bleak vision of a world gone morose".

]]> EASY EXIT JOKES http://www.exit-movie.com/news?item=50 We've been quiet lately, huh? News is limited while we inch toward getting our next project off the ground.

(Of course, EXIT remains available to watch right now! Rent or buy it in HD! Recommend it to your friends! You know the drill.) 

But a recent article in The Guardian - "Oz the Great and Powerful proves movies should go for modest titles" - got us thinking. It says movies should avoid self-aggrandising adjectives which will only serve as "fodder for a million 'The Unnecessary Spider-Man', and 'More like The Adequate Gatsby' reviews".

As we've said before, calling it EXIT wasn't much of a conscious decision; it's just what it was always called. It has made us almost ungoogleable - but it also  provides ammunition for anyone who hated the film. It's not exactly 'The Spectacular EXIT', but we did include a line of dialogue about going to the movies and only staring at the EXIT sign. That's the next best thing.

So if you watched the movie and wished you hadn't, please accept all the easy EXIT jokes as our gift to you.

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