Shock rocker to direct movie
2006-02-13 09:20
Berlin - Gothic United States rocker Marilyn Manson announced at the Berlin Film Festival on Sunday that he plans to direct a film based on the diary of Lewis Carroll in which he will play the part of the writer of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.
Manson, his hair jet-black and his face painted a deathly white, said he wanted to show the dark obsessions of the Victorian author rather than make a period film because that would be "boring".
"It is very much about his obsessions, not so much about the Victorian era. There will be sex," he said.
Manson, a bete noire of moralists who fear he is corrupting the youth with his blood-stained lyrics, said he identified with Carroll and wanted to focus on the dark side of his most famous work.
"I have many things in common with him. He was very much linked to his childhood.
"I want to take the children's story that we all know and discover the horrifying roots that grow beneath every one of its childish metaphors," he said.
'Complex' person
Through Manson's looking glass, Carroll's story becomes that of a haunted writer living in an isolated castle, tormented by sleepless nights and visions of a girl named Alice.
"He finds himself becoming a symptom of his own invention. He is Lewis Carroll. Terrified of what waits for him each night," the script synopsis presented to journalists reads.
"Lewis Carroll is far more complex than the world's narrow perception of him as a quiet deacon, mathematician and a loner, simply obsessed with photographing young girls," Manson said.
"He was possibly one of the most divided souls living in his own hell that the world has overlooked."
Jolie keen on Carroll movie
Alice Liddell, the young girl who inspired Carroll's greatest work and with whom he had a controversial friendship, will be played by the model Lily Cole, who has done catwalk work for fashion houses like Christian Dior and Hermes.
Manson will not only play Carroll, whose real name was Charles Dodgson, but compose the sound track for the film.
"People assume I am going to make an hour-and-a-half video but it is not the case," he promised.
He said other actors he has been considering for roles in the film include Julie Christie and Angelina Jolie.
"Angelina liked the idea," said the singer whose albums include Antichrist Superstar.
The film will be titled Phantasmagoria - The Visions of Lewis Carroll and should be completed in 2007.