Lionsgate has debuted the first trailer for Submergence, the romantic drama from Wings of Desire and Paris, Texas filmmaker Wim Wenders. Based on J.M. Ledgard’s celebrated 2013 novel, Submergence stars Alicia Vikander and James McAvoy as two lovers separated by distance and circumstance. After meeting by chance at a remote hotel where they’re both preparing for dangerous missions — she’s heading to the bottom of the ocean in search of evidence to support her theories about life on earth, and he’s a British Secret Service agent about to embark on mission in Somalia. As she descends into the depths of the sea, he’s taken hostage by Jihadists, neither knowing what’s become of the other.
Wenders has made a career out of pensive, deliberately-paced dramas with winding structures, so it’s safe to say that Submergence looks very on brand for Wenders. He’s got two of the best young actors working from an acclaimed source material, but the trailer gives me the feeling this one might be for Wenders enthusiasts alone (and judging by the TIFF reviews, maybe not even them) because is a slow-going drama,
Penned by Erin Dignam (The Yellow Hankerchief), Submergence also stars Alexander Siddig and is scheduled to arrive in theaters open on April 13 in the US and on May 18 in the UK.
“Submergence is a love story that takes us into the extremely different worlds of our two protagonists, Danielle Flinders (Alicia Vikander) and James More (James McAvoy). They meet by chance in a remote hotel in Normandy where they both prepare for a dangerous mission. They fall in love almost against their will, but soon recognize in each other the love of their lives. When they have to separate, we find out that James works for the British Secret Service. He’s involved in a mission in Somalia to track down a source for suicide bombers infiltrating Europe. Danielle ‘Danny’ Flinders is a bio-mathematician working on a deep sea diving project to support her theory about the origin of life on our planet. Soon, they are worlds apart. James is taken hostage by Jihadist fighters and has no way of contacting Danny, and she has to go down to the bottom of the ocean in her submersible, not even knowing if James is still alive…”
(via Collider)
