The anthology featured shorts filmed by some of the world's most acclaimed filmmakers while in lockdown.
Now that we're coming out of lockdown, can you say you spent your time wisely? Some of the world's most renowned filmmakers didn't let quarantine stop them from creating new films, and a new Netflix anthology gathers their work.
Homemade features shorts filmed by dozens of filmmakers in the confines of their homes and immediate surrounds, and using whatever equipment they happened to have on hand.
Filmmakers involved include:
Ladj Ly; Paolo Sorrentino; Rachel Morrison; Pablo Larraín; Rungano Nyoni; Natalia Beristáin; Sebastian Schipper; Naomi Kawase; David Mackenzie; Maggie Gyllenhaal; Nadine Labaki & Khaled Mouzanar; Antonio Campos; Johnny Ma; Kristen Stewart; Gurinder Chadha; Sebastián Lelio; and Ana Lily Amirpour.
Homemade premieres on Netflix June 30th.
Check out the trailer and quotes from some of the featured filmmakers below.
Paolo Sorrentino: Homemade was a great challenge for those who want to tell a story. Finding a story and characters at my own place, with nothing else available, made me feel like when, as a kid, I dreamed of doing this job.
Rachel Morrison: Making a short for Homemade was a catharsis for me because it inspired me to re-engage creatively and to work through some of the emotional trauma resulting from the virus and quarantine.
Pablo Larraín: Extremely proud and excited to be part of this wonderful work, which we all did from home. Very curious to know the people’s reaction.
Rungano Nyoni: A challenge but an exciting challenge which pushed me to tell a story in a way I wouldn't have thought of without the time / space restrictions.
Natalia Beristáin: Homemade gave me the opportunity to reconnect with my craft during these peculiar times, so even though I still don't have a rational explanation to what we're experiencing globally, having the privilege to watch my kid so close and attentively for this past weeks enable me to start understating this whole situation in a more intuitive and sensorial way. Spaces is a reflection of this.
Sebastian Schipper: Most private film I ever did. Terrifying. Thank God it will only be available on this little internet site…
Naomi Kawase: Today, many are forced to create distance between one another from the terror of a small virus. Historically, generations that experience the threat of a pandemic have been tragically subject to discrimination or division. However, art is always a beacon of hope for our souls. As the new leader of digital entertainment, Netflix has created Homemade, an incredible project bringing 20 filmmakers together from around the world. There is great significance in putting proceeds from this project to supporting those suffering from the coronavirus. One day, I hope we can live in a world where human beings prosper together across borders, and grow to see oneself in one another.
David Mackenzie: I have long been interested in trying to make intimate film portraits of people, so I took the opportunity to do so with my daughter who had just turned 16 under lockdown. No true portrait is made without an intense interplay between the subject, who has to deal with what of themselves to present and expose, and the portrait maker - so over seven days in May, Ferosa and I (with the help of the rest of the family) went through a turbulent dance to try to capture the waves of mixed emotions that were washing over her and to express it to a camera that was closer and more present than any film-making I have ever done.
Nadine Labaki/Khaled Mouzanar: This question has been tormenting us as parents for a while : How are our children perceiving or living the confinement? What goes on in their minds? When the producers of Homemade contacted us to be part of this project it was the perfect occasion for us to explore this dimension.
Antonio Campos: There were eight of us living together for two months outside New York City in a place called Springs, NY. When we were proposed this project, we immediately got excited, developed an idea, wrote the script and were shooting a few days later. Homemade is an appropriate description of the short. It’s rough around the edges and made with a lot of love and excitement just to be working together on something during this pandemic.
Johnny Ma: The experience of making Homemade during quarantine has given me a chance to discover a new creative voice, but what I couldn’t foresee was how the experience has brought my family together.
Kristen Stewart: Art that is born of restriction has a way of becoming itself in a surprising and cosmic sort of way and short films by nature don’t have to abide by any rules which really opens up the idea of what a movie can do. I was so grateful for and liberated by this idea. It was a huge gift to be encouraged to make something out of this strange nothingness. I hope this series inspires people to do the same.
Gurinder Chadha: It was great to record this particular moment in our collective history for me as a filmmaker and a mother. Despite the international sorrows we have endured, no one could have imagined the unexpected gifts that have emerged from this lockdown experience.
Sebastián Lelio: It was very challenging to conceive an audiovisual piece that somehow speaks about the experience of isolation, anxiety, madness and absurdity in times of COVID- 19 in such a short time (Two weeks from writing to delivery) and all done within confinement. It was interesting to try to find the right vehicle to explore this subject and in the end, the mixture of genres was what seemed more exciting to me, Algoritmo is somehow a combination of Low budget Musical, Urgent Chronicle, and Personal Manifesto.
Ana Lily Amirpour: When I was asked to make a film during the time of quarantine in Los Angeles I couldn’t think of writing a fictional script when reality itself felt more like science fiction. So my only thought was to go on a bike ride and see my city in this rare sleeping state. And film it.
Watch Five New Clips From Netflix Action Movie THE OLD GUARD, Starring Charlize Theronhttps://t.co/Nu3KCIVUDA#Netflix #TheOldGuard #CharlizeTheron #Movies #Film pic.twitter.com/F373EQX7AP— The Movie Waffler (@themoviewaffler) June 24, 2020