The Silent Twins is a 2022 internationally co-produced biographical drama film directed by Agnieszka Smoczyńska from a screenplay by Andrea Seigel, based on the book of the same name by Marjorie Wallace. It stars Letitia Wright and Tamara Lawrance as twin sisters June and Jennifer Gibbons, as the film follows their strange tragic lives.
The Silent Twins | |
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Directed by | Agnieszka Smoczyńska |
Screenplay by | Andrea Seigel |
Based on | The Silent Twins by Marjorie Wallace |
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Starring |
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Cinematography | Jakub Kijowski |
Edited by | Agnieszka Glinska |
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Running time | 113 minutes[1] |
Countries | United Kingdom[2] Poland[2] United States |
Language | English |
Box office | $205,135[3][4] |
The film had its world premiere at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival, under the Un Certain Regard section, on May 24, 2022.[5] It was released in the United States by Focus Features on September 16, 2022,[6] and is scheduled to be released in the United Kingdom by Universal Pictures on December 9.
Feeling isolated from that unwelcoming community, June and Jennifer Gibbons turn inward and reject communication with everyone but each other, retreating into their own fantasy world of artistic inspiration and adolescent desires. After a spree of vandalism inspired by an American boy they both idolize, the girls, now teenagers, are summarily sentenced to Broadmoor Hospital, an infamous psychiatric hospital, where they face the choice to separate and survive or die together.
In February 2020, it was announced that Letitia Wright and Tamara Lawrance has been cast as twin sisters June and Jennifer Gibbons in the film The Silent Twins, based on the 1986 book of the same name by Marjorie Wallace, with Agnieszka Smoczyńska set to direct and Andrea Seigel set to write the screenplay, it marks Smoczyńska's English-language film debut.[8] On April 8, 2021 it was announced that Focus Features acquired US distribution rights to the film while parent company Universal Pictures took international distribution rights.[9] Principal photography wrapped in Poland.[10][11]
The Silent Twins had its world premiere at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival, under the Un Certain Regard section, on May 24, 2022.[5] It was released in the United States by Focus Features on September 16, 2022,[6] and is scheduled to be released in the United Kingdom by Universal Pictures on December 9. It also screened in the 'World Cinema' section of 27th Busan International Film Festival in October 2022.[12]
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 67% of 63 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 6.3/10. The website's consensus reads, "Although it struggles to really get inside the true story that inspired it, The Silent Twins is still a well-acted and poignant dramatization of actual events."[13] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 60 out of 100, based on 22 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[14]
Films directed by Agnieszka Smoczyńska | |
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