This Promising Sci-Fi Film Ambition Has Purposely Flown Under The Rader
This article is more than 2 years old
As much as I love trailers, I do sometimes get frustrated with all the hype that precedes the release of a movie, especially when it tells viewers all they need or want to know about what happens in the film. It’s like what happens with presidential campaigns—they start stumping so early that you’re sick to death of all the candidates before you even stepped in the voters’ box. Godzilla and Guardians of the Galaxy are two recent films that, while totally enjoyable, lost elements of surprise and wonder for me before I had the chance to see them. Interstellar —another film I look forward to seeing—is approaching that status for me. I’ve seen the trailer so many times that I honestly don’t want to read or see anything else about the movie until I sit down with my popcorn. But it’s a big and wonderful surprise to hear about a movie that sounds pretty awesome, but that has somehow managed to remain almost totally unknown. The somewhat ambiguously titled Ambition is such a movie.
The first footage of the movie was just released, and suddenly folks are paying attention. But the movie has flown so far under the radar that there’s not even anything about it on the IMDB. Ambition has an Instagram (with a mere 12 followers) and a Twitter account (with 577 followers), both counting down to the movie’s premiere this Friday at the British Film Institute during its science fiction week, but that’s about all.
Discover the world of AMBITION this Friday… pic.twitter.com/mZkToXquUU
— Ambition (@AmbitionTheFilm) October 20, 2014
There’s not all that much to know about the film. The synopsis is one sentence: “The story of a young apprentice struggling to sculpt the geology of an alien planet.” Other information suggests that the this geological sculpting will be done via nanotechnology, and is the apprentice’s attempt to prove herself to her teacher. We also know that the movie stars Aidan Gillen, who you’ll recognize as Littlefinger from Game of Thrones, as well as Mayor Carcetti from The Wire. It also features Aisling Franciosi, a young and relatively unknown (at least in this country) Irish actress who, because of her age, I’m guessing plays the apprentice.
TTomek Baginski, a Polish animator and director who received a best animated short film Oscar nomination for The Cathedral, directed the film. His style is eerie and mesmerizing, and alien landscapes seem to be among his fortes. Ambition shot in Iceland, and after watching The Cathedral, you can easily see how the location blends with Baginksi’s style.
According to Gizmodo, Ambition’s marketing manager prefers to call the movie a “special film project,” and says mum’s the word until it screens on the 24th. Interested viewers have a few days to decide just how much they want to know about the movie before it—hopefully—becomes available to audiences.
