Disgrace movie to hit the screens this month!

Adapted by Anna-Maria Monticelli from the Booker Prize Winning novel by Nobel Laureate J.M. Coetzee, Disgrace is directed by Steve Jacobs and features Academy Award® nominee John Malkovich as Professor David Lurie. The film was partly funded by the SAFC and did its sound post production in Adelaide.

In 1999, Disgrace won the second Booker Prize for Nobel laureate J.M. Coetzee. The novel, set in post apartheid South Africa, struck a chord around the world as a powerful work, dealing with complex characters, emotions and sexual encounters. The film won the International Critics Award at the Toronto Film Festival.

Writer/Producer Anna-Maria Monticelli sees the novel as "extraordinary, brave and real". Having been born in Morocco herself, Anna Maria always wanted to make a film in Africa, and read widely among African writers. Her response to Disgrace was "organic and immediate".

Director Steve Jacobs enthuses "Anna-Maria felt this would make a powerful film, and I agreed it was a fantastic novel, so we set about securing the option and rights".

Born in Tangier, Morocco. Anna-Maria migrated with her family to Australia from Rome in the early sixties and grew up in Whyalla (her family now live in Adelaide). She started her film career as an actress and appeared extensively in film and television, winning the Best Actress AFI Award for Silver City in 1984. She then moved on to writing and producing and this is her second collaboration with director Steve Jacobs: their first feature was La Spagnola in 2001.

Disgrace will be released throughout cinemas on June 18, 2009.

Disgrace  by J M Coetzee -Film Edition - 9780099526834