New feature film wraps up production

A new Maltese language feature film directed by Peter Sant wrapped up on the 6th February after an intense 18 day shoot on the unrelenting North-West coast of Malta.

Maneland is an experiential film about stasis and slow change. A crippled man and his two daughters live in a subterranean house, situated on the edge of a harsh land. The youngest is forced to build rubble walls. The eldest wears a uniform and does the housework. They fear visitors.

In this psychological state they live a life where physicality and memory have merged to create an ethereal and bizarrely harmonious world. A world mysteriously devoid of animal life where the inhabitants are forced to live off microwave meals.

The story of Maneland was first conceived in the rock and the wind of Malta, before finally finding expression in cinema.

Shot in the Park tal-Majjistral, where the rocks and stones, as well as the folding light and the sea, seem to carry within them the weight of millennia, the landscape is very much a protagonist and features heavily throughout.

Searching for financing the script was rejected for pre-sales with one sales agent describing it as “starting off as a cross between Cinderella and The Tempest and ending in deep arthouse”, an inadvertently encouraging response for both writers.

A truly fascinating and unique project, the film promises to position Malta and the filmmakers as serious contenders in the world of experimental art house cinema.

Maneland is made through the support of the Malta Film Fund.

Shot in the Park tal-Majjistral, where the rocks and stones, as well as the folding light and the sea, seem to carry within them the weight of millennia, the landscape is very much a protagonist and features heavily throughout.