“The end”, interview with director Joshua Oppenheimer

July 1, 2025

Joshua Oppenheimer “My work is always about rehumanizing the people that we would be tempted to dismiss as monsters. They're humans, these characters are nameless because they are us”

“The end”, interview with director Joshua Oppenheimer Chiara Nicoletti

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“The End“, Joshua Oppenheimer’s first fiction film, will be released in italian cinemas with I Wonder Pictures from July 3, 2025.

The two-time Oscar nominee for the documentaries “The Act of Killing” (2012) and “The Look of Silence” (2014) brought, with the help of I Wonder, an exclusive group of italian journalists right on the salt mine in Sicily where the film was shot.

We watched the film there and right after that, we had an exclusive interview with both Oppenheimer and actor George McKay playing in the film along with Tilda Swinton and Michael Shannon.

The film is set in a post-apocalyptic world where only one family is living underground trying to survive and live a “happy” life and it is, without doubt, a metaphor for the process of dehumanization we’re all experiencing right now.

About that, Joshua Oppenheimer comments: “My work is always about rehumanizing the people that we would be tempted to dismiss as monsters. They’re humans, these characters are nameless because they are us”.

“The End” is a mix of thriller, dystopian future drama and musical and its themes such as climate change resonate with today’s world.

Plot

Twenty-five years after the Earth’s environmental collapse, Mother, Father and Son cling to a sense of normalcy while confined to a palatial bunker. But when a Girl turns up at their doorstep, with her own past and perspective, the family’s blind optimism begins to unravel.

Written by: Chiara Nicoletti

George Mckay Michael Shannon Tilda Swinton