Story of movie The Virgin Suicides Film :
The Virgin Suicides is a 1999 American drama film written and directed by Sofia Coppola, co-produced by Francis Ford Coppola, and starring James Woods, Kathleen Turner, Kirsten Dunst, and Josh Hartnett. The film also features Scott Glenn, Michael Paré and Danny DeVito in minor roles, and a voice narration by Giovanni Ribisi.
| The Virgin Suicides | |
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Theatrical release poster | |
| Directed by | Sofia Coppola |
| Produced by |
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| Written by | Sofia Coppola |
| Based on | The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides |
| Starring |
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| Music by | Air |
| Cinematography | Edward Lachman |
| Edited by |
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Production company |
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| Distributed by | Paramount Classics |
Release date |
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Running time | 97 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $6.1 million |
| Box office | $10.4 million |
Based on the 1993 best selling debut novel of the same name by American author Jeffrey Eugenides, the film tells of the lives of five teenage sisters in a middle-class suburb near the outskirts of Detroit during the 1970s. After the youngest sister makes an initial attempt at suicide, her sisters are put under close scrutiny by their parents, eventually being confined to the home, which leads to their increasingly depressive and isolated behavior. Like the novel, the film is told from the perspective of a group of adolescent boys in the neighborhood who are fascinated by the girls.
Shot in 1998 in Toronto, the film was director Sofia Coppola's debut feature. It features an original score by the French electronic band Air. The film premiered at the 1999 Cannes Film Festival, and received a limited theatrical release on April 21, 2000 in the United States, later expanding to a wide release in May 2000. It was met with largely positive critical reception, with both the performances and Coppola's direction receiving note. The film marked the beginning of a working relationship between Coppola and star Dunst, whom Coppola would cast as the lead in several films in the following years.
The film ranked number 39 on Entertainment Weekly's list of the "50 Best High School Movies".
Screenplay
In the suburbs of Grosse Pointe, Michigan, during the mid-1970s, a group of neighborhood boys—now grown men—reflect upon their memories of the five Lisbon sisters, ages 13 to 17. Unattainable due to their Catholic and overprotective parents, math teacher Ronald and his homemaker wife, the girls—Therese, Mary, Bonnie, Lux, and Cecilia—are an enigma that fill the boys' conversations and dreams.
During the summer, the youngest sister, Cecilia, slits her wrist in a bathtub, but survives. After her parents allow her sisters to throw a chaperoned basement party intended to make her feel better, she excuses herself and jumps out of her second story bedroom window, dying when she is impaled on an iron fence below. In the wake of her act, the Lisbon parents watch over their four remaining daughters even more closely. This further isolates the family from the community and heightens the air of mystery surrounding the girls, to the neighborhood boys in particular.
At the beginning of the new school year in the fall, Lux forms a secret and short-lived romance with Trip Fontaine, the school heartthrob. Trip comes over one night to the Lisbon residence in hopes of getting closer to Lux and watches television with the family. Trip persuades Mr. Lisbon to allow him to take Lux to the upcoming Homecoming Dance by promising to provide dates for the other sisters. After winning king and queen, Trip persuades Lux to ditch the group and have sex on the football field. Afterwards, Lux falls asleep, and Trip abandons her. At dawn, Lux wakes up alone and has to take a taxi home.
Having broken curfew, Lux and her sisters are punished by a paranoid Mrs. Lisbon by being taken out of school and confined to the house. The sisters contact the boys across the street by using light signals and sharing songs over the phone.
During this time, Lux rebels against her repression and becomes overtly promiscuous, having anonymous sexual encounters on the roof of her house late at night; the neighborhood boys spy from across the street. After weeks of confinement, the sisters leave notes for the boys. The boys call the girls and reach them by phone, and the two groups take turns playing songs over the line. When the boys arrive that night, they find Lux alone in the living room, smoking a cigarette. She invites them inside to wait for her sisters, while she goes to start the car.
Curious, the boys wander into the basement after hearing a noise and discover Bonnie's body hanging from the ceiling rafters. Horrified, they rush back upstairs only to stumble across the body of Mary in the kitchen. The boys realize that the girls had all killed themselves in an apparent suicide pact: Bonnie hanged herself; Mary died by putting her head in the gas oven; Therese overdosed on sleeping pills; and Lux died of carbon monoxide poisoning after she left the car engine running in the garage.
Devastated by the suicides, Mr. and Mrs. Lisbon leave the neighborhood. Mr. Lisbon has a friend clean out the house and sell off the family belongings in a yard sale. Whatever did not sell was put in the trash, including the family photos, which the neighborhood boys collect as mementos. The house is sold to a young couple from the Boston area. The adults in the community go about their lives as if nothing happened. The men acknowledge that they had loved the girls, and that they will never know why the sisters took their lives.
- James Woods as Ronald Lisbon
- Kathleen Turner as Mrs. Lisbon
- Kirsten Dunst as Lux Lisbon
- Josh Hartnett as Trip Fontaine
- Michael Paré as Adult Trip Fontaine
- A. J. Cook as Mary Lisbon
- Hanna R. Hall as Cecilia Lisbon
- Leslie Hayman as Therese Lisbon
- Chelse Swain as Bonnie (Bonaventure) Lisbon
- Jonathan Tucker as Tim Weiner
- Noah Shebib as Parkie Denton
- Robert Schwartzman as Paul Baldino
- Scott Glenn as Father Moody
- Danny DeVito as Dr. E. M. Horniker
- Hayden Christensen as Jake Hill Conley
- Joe Dinicol as Dominic Palazzolo
- Sherry Miller as Mrs. Buell
- Kristin Fairlie as Amy Schraff
- Sally Cahill as Mrs. Hedlie
Conception
Coppola wrote the script for the film in 1998 after the project was already greenlit at another studio, adapting it from the source novel, of which she was a fan. Another script had already been written by Nick Gomez, but the production company that owned the rights at the time, Muse Productions, were dissatisfied with the script. After the rights to the novel lapsed, Coppola pitched her manuscript to Muse executives Roberta and Chris Hanley, the latter of whom signed on to co-produce. Coppola was inspired to write the film after reading the source novel: "I really didn't know I wanted to be a director until I read The Virgin Suicides and saw so clearly how it had to be done," she said. "I immediately saw the central story as being about what distance and time and memory do to you, and about the extraordinary power of the unfathomable."
Casting
Kathleen Turner was the first actor to sign on to the project, playing the Lisbon girls' oppressive mother; Turner had known Coppola after they co-starred together in Peggy Sue Got Married (1986). James Woods was cast opposite Turner as the passive father; Woods was given the script by Coppola's father, Francis, and was so impressed by the script and the character's "dark humor" that he agreed to play the role. For the part of Lux, Coppola auditioned numerous actress, but had a "gut choice" of Kirsten Dunst, who was sixteen years old at the time of her casting. Reflecting on the role, Dunst said: "I was nervous. It was my first role that was more of a 'sexy' thing. I was also unsure about how large the role was gonna be, because a lot of it was without dialogue. When I met Sofia, I immediately knew that she would handle it in a delicate way... really brought out the luminous aspect of the girls; she made them like ethereal angels, almost like they weren't really there."
Filming
The Virgin Suicides was filmed in 1999 in Toronto, Ontario, standing in for suburban Detroit, Michigan, on a reported budget of USD$6 million. The shoot lasted roughly one month.
Coppola was inspired by photographer Takashi Homma's photos of suburban Japan when choosing the filming locations; "I have always been struck by the beauty of banal details," she said, "and that is what suburban style is all about." The film's occasional use of stills and collages was intended to evoke the "fantasia" of adolescence. Cinematographer Edward Lachman shot the film. Coppola's brother, Roman, was the second-unit director on the film.
| The Virgin Suicides | |
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| Soundtrack album by Various | |
| Released | March 28, 2000 |
| Genre | Soundtrack |
| Length | 53:53 |
| Label | Emperor Norton |
Score
Soundtrack
In addition to original score composed for the film by Air, the film features songs by 1970s-era performers and five tracks from the 1990s by Sloan. Sofia Coppola wanted to convey the theme of adolescence in the suburbs in the soundtrack. She found that Air shared many of her suburban memories and experiences even though they grew up in a different country.
A separate soundtrack album was released in 2000 featuring music from Todd Rundgren, Steely Dan, Boston, Heart, Sloan, The Hollies, Al Green, Gilbert O'Sullivan, 10cc, Styx, and two tracks by Air (one previously recorded; one composed for the film).
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