ANOTHER EARTH is a film that sets the synapses firing with its consideration of identity, reality, and redemption as it posits a reality where the sky is suddenly filled with a duplicate of our home planet. When I spoke with co-writer and co-star Brit Marling on July 14, 2011, the conversation reflected that as it flowed from the confluence of physics and metaphysics, the individual universes of perception, and the synchronicity of the number four. A soft-spoken woman, Marling has an infectious sense of wonder when speaking of the malleable nature of reality, and the artistry of her collaborator, director and co-writer Mike Cahill.
ANOTHER EARTH is set in a reality where a second Earth has suddenly appeared in the sky, Rhoda Williams, played by Marling. makes one tragic mistake when she looks at the new blue star in the sky while driving and accidentally kills the wife and son of John Burroughs, a music professor and composer. Four years later, after serving prison time she returns home still unnerved by the accident. She seeks out John, but loses her nerve when going to apologize and through a series of miscommunications, becomes his maid, and then his lifeline to the world he had shut himself away from. As the second earth comes closer, their relationship deepens, and the question comes up about what their counterparts on that other world are doing and if it’s the same as what is transpiring down here. The film co-stars William Mapother as John. Cahill directed from a script he co-wrote with Marling. They previously collaborated on the documentary, BOXERS AND BALLERINAS, about the eponymous artists as seen in Havana, Cuba and Miami, Florida.
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