“We have plans for sure,” said Cannes regular and Sentimental Value actress Elle Fanning about reteaming with her sister Dakota Fanning in a future project.
Fanning fielded the question today at the Cannes presser for the Joaquim Trier movie.
The sisters previously starred together in the 2001 Sean Penn-Michelle Pfeiffer movie, I Am Sam, playing the older and younger version of the character Lucy. They also provided the voices of the sisters in the English-language version of Hayao Miyazaki’s 1988 title My Neighbor Totoro.
The Fannings were originally set to star in Sony’s feature take of the Kristin Hannah bestseller The Nightingale with Melanie Laurent directing about two sisters during WWII dealing with the German Occupation in France. However, the project was halted during Covid.
In Trier’s latest, Fanning plays a young Hollywood star who scores a part in an esteemed filmmaker’s movie (Stellan Skarsgård) after his daughter Nora (Renate Reinsve) passes on the part. The pic deals with the complexity of estranged family dynamics.
Fanning said that working with Trier was on her “bucket list”. She was sent the script, read it quickly, which is always a sign of her passion, and hit it off with the Danish-born Norwegian director on zoom.
“I was floored. You don’t come by scripts like this that are moving and nuanced,” said Cannes’ once youngest jury member of the 2019 edition.
Prior to shooting the next Predator movie in New Zealand, Fanning made a pitstop in Oslo, Norway to go through a rehearsal process with Trier. “We were doing rehearsal scenes, of rehearsal scenes.”
“There was a meta-ness of an actor playing an actor,” she added.
“He creates a space to be open, and gets things out of you; you’re surprising yourself every day. It was creatively fulfilling.”
Sentimental Value received a mindboggling 19-minute standing ovation last night at its Cannes premiere.
The pic reps the fourth premiere for Trier at Cannes. The director himself has yet to receive any prizes here, however, Worst Person in the World took home Best Actress for Reinsve. That movie also went on to be nominated for two Oscars including Best International Film and Original Screenplay.
