It's been five years since "Nightwatching," the last feature length effort from Peter Greenaway. And for a guy who declared "cinema is dead" right around the same time, he certainly has a lot left to say within the art form. Screen Daily reports that not only is Greenaway embarking on "Food For Love" an adaptation of Thomas Mann's classic "Death In Venice," he's got a plan that could seem him make a movie per year for the next decade.
The director is currently finishing up "Goltzius and the Pelican Company" starring F. Murray Abraham which is being readied for Cannes, after which he'll tackle "Food For Love" with shooting to start in November. Given the director's own unique style which of late has reserved his movies strictly for hardcore arthouse buffs, his producer Kees Kasander reveals that "Food For Love" could be his most accessible film in nearly two decades. “It’s partly shot in Venice. Most will be shot in a studio,” Kasander told the trade. “This film is coming closer to 'The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover' than any (other) films we have made so far.”
The film is now casting and after that, Greenaway has an ambitious slate. “Peter is close to 70 and he wants to make at least 10 more films. For the next 10 years, that means we have to go back to one film a year,” Kasander said. Damn. So what has he got on the slate? A film about visionary painter Hieronymus Bosch, another movie about legendary Russian director Sergei Eisenstein titled "Eisenstein In Guanajuato" centering on the helmer's time in Mexico in the 1930s and we presume "4 Storms and 2 Babies" is on there too. This was a "romantic comedy" announced last year about a woman who gets pregnant after a night of three-way sex with two men. The plan was to make it after 'Goltzius' but obvoiusly that has changed.
Either way, one helluva busy time for Greenaway, who doesn't plan to slow down any time soon.