White Noise is a 2022 absurdist comedy-drama film written for the screen and directed by Noah Baumbach, adapted from the 1985 novel of the same name by Don DeLillo. It is Baumbach's first directed feature not to be based on an original story of his own. The film stars Adam Driver, Greta Gerwig, and Don Cheadle.[3] Set in the 1980s, the story sees the life of a family following an air contamination accident where they reside.
White Noise had its world premiere at the 79th Venice International Film Festival on August 31, 2022, and was released in select cinemas on November 25, 2022, before its streaming release on December 30, 2022, by Netflix. The film received generally positive reviews from critics, with particular praise for Driver's and Gerwig's performances, and Baumbach's screenplay and direction.
Plot[]
Set in 1984, Jack Gladney, is a professor of "Hitler studies" (a field he founded) at the College-on-the-Hill. Despite his specialism, he speaks no German, and is secretly taking basic lessons to prepare for a speech he is due to give at a conference. Jack is married to Babette, his fourth wife. Together, they raise a blended family with four children; Heinrich and Steffie from two of Jack's previous marriages, Denise from Babette's previous marriage, and Wilder, a child they conceived together. Denise spies on Babette, finding her secret prescription stash of Dylar, a mysterious drug not in the usual records. Jack experiences a dream of a mysterious man trying to kill him, alluding to an earlier conversation with Babette about their fear of death. Jack's colleague, Murray Siskind, a professor of American culture, wishes to develop a similar niche field, "Elvis studies", and convinces Jack to help him. Both briefly compete with each other as competition between their courses arise.
Their life is disrupted, however, when a cataclysmic train accident casts a cloud of chemical waste over the town. This "Airborne Toxic Event" forces a massive evacuation, which leads to a major traffic jam on the highway. Jack drives to a gas station to refill his car, where he is inadvertently exposed to the cloud. The family and numerous others are forced into quarantine at a summer camp. Murray supplies Jack with a small palm-sized pistol, to protect himself against the more dangerous survivalists in the camp. One day, chaos ensues when families desperately try to escape the camp. The Gladneys are almost able to make it out, but end up with their car floating in the river. After nine days, the family is able to leave the camp. However, since Jack was briefly exposed to the chemical waste, his fear of death becomes exacerbated.
Later, everything has returned back to normal except for Babette, who has become pale and distant from Jack. Soon afterward, Jack begins having hallucinations of a mysterious man following him around. Denise shares her concerns regarding Dylar, and Gladney confronts Babette. She admits to having joined a shadowy clinical trial for a drug to treat death anxieties, and that she was accepted in exchange for sex with "Mr. Gray". Intrigued by the idea, Jack asks Denise for the Dylar bottle, but she reveals she threw them away earlier. While digging through the garbage, Jack finds a newspaper ad for Dylar, prompting him to retrieve his pistol and get revenge on Mr. Gray. Jack tracks him down at a hotel, where he discovers that Mr. Gray was the man in his hallucinations. Jack shoots him and puts the gun in his hand so as to make it look like suicide. Babette unexpectedly shows up and sees a still-alive Mr. Gray, who manages to shoot them both. Jack drives all three to a hospital run by German atheist nuns, where they heal and reconcile with each other.
The movie ends with the Gladneys shopping at an A&P supermarket, where the family participates in a music video-like dance.
Differences with the novel[]
Siskind was Jewish in the novel, but is African American in the movie.
Wilder is not Gladney's child in the novel.
The Gladney children in the movie are about five years older than in the novel.
The gun was given to Gladney by his father-in-law in the novel.
In the novel, Gladney steals his neighbor’s car to travel to the Mink’s motel. In the film, he borrows Murray Siskind’s.
Gladney does not discover Mink’s whereabouts through a phone call as shown in the film. In the novel, Gladney drives aimlessly in search until he stumbles upon the Mink’s motel.
Babette did not show up at the hotel in the novel.
An extended car chase scene was devised for the purposes of the film and does not appear in the book.
Cast[]
- Adam Driver as Prof. Jack Gladney
- Greta Gerwig as Babette Gladney
- Raffey Cassidy as Denise
- André Benjamin as Elliot Lasher
- Jodie Turner-Smith as Winnie Richards
- Don Cheadle as Prof. Murray Siskind
- Lars Eidinger as Arlo Shell
- Sam Nivola as Heinrich
- May Nivola as Steffie
- Chloe Fineman as Simuvac Technician
Production[]
TBA
Music[]
- Main article: White Noise (soundtrack)
The film score is composed by Danny Elfman, which was released into a soundtrack album on November 18, 2022.[4][5] LCD Soundsystem reunited to record their first new music in over five years for the film. Titled "New Body Rhumba", the song was released as a single on September 30.[6][7]
Release[]
White Noise had its world premiere as the opening film of the 79th Venice International Film Festival on August 31, 2022,[8] and also served as the opening film for the 2022 New York Film Festival on September 30.[9] It also screened at the 31st Philadelphia Film Festival in October 2022.[10] The film was theatrically released in the United States by Netflix on November 25, 2022, before its streaming release on December 30.[11]
Reception[]
TBA
See also[]
- Postmodernist film
- Postmodernist literature
References[]
- ↑ [TBA Lol Crawley BSC].
- ↑ Gleiberman, Owen (August 31, 2022). [TBA White Noise Review: Noah Baumbach Turns Don DeLillo's 1985 Novel Into a Domestic Dystopian Period Piece Top-Heavy with Big Themes].
- ↑ [TBA Noah Baumbach will adapt DeLillo's "White Noise"; Adam Driver and Greta Gerwig to star] (en-US) (January 14, 2021).
- ↑ Jones, Abby (2022-11-18). [TBA Danny Elfman unveils soundtrack for Noah Baumbach's White Noise: Stream] (en-US).
- ↑ Massoto, Erick (2022-11-18). [TBA Listen to Danny Elfman's Complete 'White Noise' Soundtrack] (en-US).
- ↑ Davis, Clayton (August 26, 2022). [TBA LCD Soundsystem's First New Song in Five Years Set for Netflix's 'White Noise' Soundtrack].
- ↑ Hudson, Alex (September 30, 2022). [TBA LCD Soundsystem Have a Dance-Punk Workout on "new body rhumba"].
- ↑ [TBA Biennale Cinema 2022 | White Noise] (July 25, 2022).
- ↑ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Gonzalez, Shivani (August 2, 2022). [TBA "'White Noise' to Open the New York Film Festival"] Check
|url=value (help). The New York Times. Retrieved August 2, 2022. - ↑ [TBA Jonás Cuarón Will Direct Bad Bunny in Sony's 'El Muerto,' First Marvel Superhero Film with Latino Lead – Film News in Brief] (October 4, 2022).
- ↑ Ntim, Zac (August 31, 2022). [TBA Noah Baumbach On Crafting His Venice Opener 'White Noise' And Creating A Community While Shooting In Ohio — Venice].
External links[]
- Please use a more specific IMDb template. See the documentation for available templates.
- [TBA Official screenplay]
Template:Noah Baumbach Template:Don DeLillo