‘Empire Of Light’: Read The Screenplay For Sam Mendes’ Film About The Movies And Mental Illness
deadline.comEditors note: Deadline’s Read the Screenplay series debuts and celebrates the scripts of films that will be factors in this year’s movie awards race.
Sam Mendes has directed nine movies, but Searchlight Pictures’ Empire of Light is only the second he has written, after 2019’s 1917 which was nominated for three Oscars including for original screenplay (written with Krysty Wilson-Cairns).
His latest movie reflects on Mendes’ youth growing up in England, going to the movies amid social turmoil and remembering his mother’s real struggle with mental illness.
In 1980, the Empire Theater shows movies like All That Jazz and The Blues Brothers. Hilary (Olivia Colman) manages the theater including ushers and ticket takers; she’s also having an affair with the owner, Donald Ellis (Colin Firth).
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