The first image for director Drake Doremus’ Equals, starring Kristen Stewart and Nicholas Hoult, has been released.
Alongside Stewart and Hoult, the film will star Guy Pearce and Jacki Weaver. Writer Nathan Parker penned the script, with Ridley Scott on board as producer.
“The story has been compared to ‘1984,’ but it’s not that at all,” said producer Ann Ruark to Variety. “It’s a love story –it’s not dystopian, it’s Utopian.” Filming took place in Japan and Singapore to emphasize the minimal architecture, which according to Ruark, “expresses that Utopian vision.”
The sci-fi love story is set in the future where emotions have been eliminated, however a disease can cause them to begin again. Those infected are then sent away and never heard from again.
Below is the film’s full synopsis:
A futuristic love story set in a society where emotions have been eradicated. “Equals” tells the story of Silas (Hoult), who lives in a future society called The Collective. The inhabitants of this modern world are a new breed of humans called Equals. Equals are peaceful, calm, fair and polite. Life in The Collective is perfect; there is no greed, no poverty, no violence and no emotion but a new disease is threatening everyone. SOS, or Switched On Syndrome, is activating in its victims everything they thought they had escaped: depression, sensitivity, fear & love. Once a person is overtaken with SOS, they are sent away to The Den and never seen again. When Silas is infected, he becomes an outcast but he notices one person who seems to understand what he’s going through. Nia (Stewart) has feelings, but she seems to be able to hide them. When he confronts her, they discover a connection that quickly takes over everything. They feel love and intimacy for the first time in their lives but the only way for them to ensure their survival is to escape.
Equals hits theaters sometime in 2015.