A year after its Toronto International Film Festival premiere, Daniel Barber’s The Keeping Room will finally arrive in theaters. The female-centered, Civil War-set drama finds the characters portrayed by Brit Marling, Hailee Steinfeld, and Muna Otaru in the last days of the war. The trio are soon victim to two Yankees (Sam Worthington and Kyle Soller) terrorizing the area and they fight back.
Written by Julia Hart, with her screenplay landing on the 2012 Black List, and directed by Daniel Barber (Harry Brown), the first trailer sells an intense drama with its strong trio of actresses at the center. Looking to tell a story in a genre so often occupied by the male viewpoint, this seems to be a necessary watch come next month. Check out the trailer and excellent poster below, courtesy of Drafthouse Films.
In this radically reimagined American Western set towards the end of the Civil War, Southerner Augusta (Marling) encounters two renegade, drunken soldiers (Worthington) who are on a mission of pillage and violence. After escaping an attempted assault, Augusta races back to the isolated farmhouse that she shares with her sister Louise (Steinfeld) and their female slave Mad (newcomer Muna Otaru.) When the pair of soldiers track Augusta down intent on exacting revenge, the trio of women are forced to take up arms to fend off their assailants, finding ways to resourcefully defend their home––and themselves––as the escalating attacks become more unpredictable and relentless.
The Keeping Room will open on September 25th.