I’ve just received a trailer, poster and a few stills from the short film The Continuing and Lamentable Saga of the Suicide Brothers featuring Rupert Friend and Keira Knightley, written by Friend along with Tom Mison (who also stars) and directed by Arran and Corran Brownlee.
The film is a fairytale along the same lines as something you’d get if you mashed together The Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Anderson. The story follows the lives of two brothers, Barath (Mison) and Bourbon (Friend), and their daily suicide attempts.
Just prior to posting this I gave the short a watch and it clocks in at just over 8:30 and it’s not half bad. It’s got an amusing stop-motion animated effect going on with its snowy exterior shots as the brothers make their way to a small barn where they attempt to kill themselves every day at two in the afternoon. This includes a failed hanging and a misfiring pistol to the face. It’s all rather darkly comic and it’s more of a mood piece than anything else. Knightley plays a fairy that lives with the boys and is frustrated by their suicide attempts and the fact they pay her no mind. It’s entirely dialogue free.
This serves as the Brownlee brothers second short following Capturing ‘The Libertine’, which was included on The Libertine DVD, a 2004 film that starred Johnny Depp and Rupert Friend. Arran Brownlee was a storyboard artist on the film.
Shorts International will release The Continuing and Lamentable Saga of the Suicide Brothers on iTunes next Tuesday, September 21. You can check out the trailer, poster and additional stills from the film directly below.
