“Sophie and the Rising Sun” has found a home, Deadline reports. Monterey Media has acquired the U.S. and Canadian rights to the period romance, starring Julianne Nicholson (“August: Osage County,” “Masters of Sex”) and Takashi Yamaguchi (“Letters From Iwo Jima”). Written and directed by Maggie Greenwald, the film made its World Premiere at Sundance earlier this year. Monterey is planning a theatrical release in early 2017.
Set in small Southern town in 1941, “Sophie and the Rising Sun” centers on a lonely woman (Nicholson) whose life is forever changed when a wounded Asian man (Yamaguchi) moves to her town under mysterious circumstances. The two form a close bond that evolves into a romance. “When Pearl Harbor is bombed, a surge of misguided patriotism, bigotry, and violence sweeps through the town, threatening [the man’s] life,” Deadline writes.
The film is based on Augusta Trobaugh’s 2001 novel of the same name. “I fell in love with the powerful and compelling women characters, and the deep, complex relationships between them,” Greenwald told Women and Hollywood. “I was also very interested in the way we see women fighting for their beliefs on their own terms.”
It’s great to see an interracial romance on the big screen. According to Pew Research Center, in 2013, 12 percent of newlyweds in the U.S. married someone of a different race. As anyone who watches films and TV series can observe, the number of interracial couples portrayed is scarce — certainly far from 12 percent of romances. Greenwald emphasized that she’d like audiences who see the movie “to think about how unfortunately relevant this story is.” She explained, “Despite the intense racism that still pervades our society, we’ve become more accepting of interracial relationships. However, as a society we are still afraid of outsiders or people we believe are different. Our government did horrible things to Japanese-Americans seventy years ago, yet the same conversation is going on today about Muslim-Americans.”
Greenwald’s credits include “The Kill Off,” a noir thriller recognized as one of the “100 Best American Independents” by the British Film Institute, “The Ballad of Little Jo,” a Western that won an Independent Spirit Award, and “Songcatcher,” a music-based drama that received a Special Jury Award at Sundance.
