”Backrooms” became one of the year’s biggest box office surprises this spring, outgrossing both ”Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu” and Steven Spielberg’s ”Disclosure Day.”
A sequel is now reportedly moving forward, with 21-year-old Kane Parsons expected to return as director. But Renate Reinsve, who starred in the first film, has yet to hear whether there is a place for her in ”Backrooms 2.”
Speaking to MovieZine during a press junket in Gothenburg for ”If Love Should Die,” Reinsve said she has only seen the reports about the sequel so far.
”I have only seen the news, I haven’t… yeah. But also, going into genre is something I want to do with care, and I really think Kane has something amazing. But I have no idea what he will do with it. Yeah. That’s all I can say.”
It has already been quite a year for the Norwegian actress.
Reinsve received an Academy Award nomination for her performance in Joachim Trier’s ”Sentimental Value” and also stars in Cristian Mungiu’s ”Fjord,” which won the Palme d’Or at Cannes earlier this year.
She can also be seen in Itonje Søimer Guttormsen’s Norwegian drama ”Butterfly,” playing Lily, a former model living in Hamburg’s art world who is reunited with her half-sister following their mother’s death.
Next comes another major change of pace.
Reinsve will play Mary Wollstonecraft in ”If Love Should Die,” the new film from ”Bergman Island” director Mia Hansen-Løve. Wollstonecraft was an English writer and philosopher whose work made her one of the key early figures in the history of feminism.
Asked by MovieZine about the strikingly varied roles that have come her way, Reinsve says it sometimes feels as though the characters are finding her rather than the other way around.
”It seems to me like these roles are finding me, in a way. I think how it works is also… of course you have your values as an actress or an actor and the way you like to work.”
She continues:
”I feel like I have been so lucky to be invited into all of these amazing movies, and I feel such… I don’t even have a good word, but to be asked to do a character like this, I feel a deep gratitude. Not just that someone has the faith that I can do this, but also to learn so much from the characters that I do and the directors that I work with.”
For Reinsve, that variety has become part of the reward.
”It actually enriches both my life and my professional life, what I learn as these characters. That’s a very complicated answer. Is it possible to understand what I just said?” she laughs.