Rotting in the Sun

Director: Sebastian Silva
Screenwriters: Pedro Peirano, Sebastian Silva

Institute History

  • 2023 Sundance Film Festival

Description

Sebastián Silva is depressed. When he's not sleeping, the filmmaker is taking absurd amounts of ketamine and searching the internet for painless suicide methods. In an attempt to snap him out of it, his manager sends him on vacation to a nude gay beach. There, he almost dies trying to save social media influencer Jordan Firstman from drowning. The over-the-top Jordan wants to collaborate on a series, but Sebastián is resistant until a network shows interest. When Jordan arrives in Sebastián's Mexico City studio to get to work but can't find him anywhere, he begins to suspect that the put-upon housekeeper, Vero (Catalina Saavedra, The Maid, World Cinema Special Jury Prize for Acting, 2009 Sundance Film Festival), knows more than she's letting on.


Sebastián Silva returns to Sundance playing a derisive version of himself in his latest black comedy, skewering not only the business of filmmaking, but also our modern solipsistic culture. Darkly funny, refreshingly audacious in its depiction of sex, and with pitch-perfect performances, this wildly unconventional quasi-detective story adds to the unpredictable Silva's eclectic body of work.



This film contains graphic sexual content.


Audiences must be 18 or older.


Screening Details

Credits

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