The Congress

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The Congress

Studio: Drafthouse Films
Directed by Ari Folman

Sep 08, 2014 By Zach Hollwedel Web Exclusive

Robin Wright plays herself (and an animated version of herself) in The Congress, director Ari Folman’s trippy, half cartoon, half live-action mind-bender. After her slew of cinematic flops and the death knell of turning 44, the head of fictional studio Miramount (played wonderfully by Danny Huston) offers Wright one final chance to salvage her career—he wants to scan her. The process entails recording every expression and inch of Wright for future, digital insertion into any Miramount film. In exchange, she must never act again.

The Congress is the acid-loving child of a three-way between Heavy Metal, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and The Triplets of Belleville. Folman’s film (he also directed the Oscar-nominated, animated Waltz with Bashir) features profanity, violence, and is surprisingly sex-charged—it might offer the only animated phallic fish committed to screen this year. It’s also fun, surreal, and brilliantly self-referential. Analysis of Wright’s actual filmography, homage to decades of Hollywood history, and an animated Jon Hamm make The Congress one of the oddest movies about movies in a long time.

www.thecongress-movie.com