A controversial entry at last year’s Cannes, Jessica Hausner’s Club Zero stars Mia Wasikowska as a teacher pushing an extreme diet plan on her students. As long as there are people in the world who feel bad about themselves, there will be nutritional experts around to hook them on a new diet plan that will fix everything. It’s gotten worse in the era of YouTube celebrities and social media, where it’s easy to connect with susceptible people. But what if you’re someone who is in a position of power speaking directly to those under your guidance?
In the new Club Zero trailer, we see Wasikowska as a nutrition teacher who joins the staff at a prestigious boarding school, where she begins pushing her “conscious eating” plan on a new class. But her lessons soon spiral out of control and reach sinister levels, drawing the attention of parents and the faculty.
The film also stars Mathieu Demy, Elsa Zylberstein, Amir El-Masry, and Sidse Babett Knudsen.
Hausner directed and co-wrote the screenplay with Géraldine Bajard. She last directed 2019’s Little Joe with Emily Beecham and Ben Whishaw. Like Club Zero, it also competed for the Palme d’Or.
Here’s the synopsis: At an international boarding school, an unassuming, yet rigorous, Miss Novak (Mia Wasikowska) joins the teaching staff to instruct a new class on “conscious eating.” Her impressionable teenage students each have their own reasons for joining the class – to improve fitness, reduce their carbon footprint, or get extra credit. Although early lectures focus on mindful consumption, Miss Novak’s discussions soon become increasingly disordered and extreme. A suspicious headmistress, concerned parents and the failing health of her students lead everyone to question the inscrutable Miss Novak’s motivations for teaching the class. As a few devoted pupils fall deeper under her cult-like tutelage, they are given a new, even more sinister goal to aspire to – joining the ominous “Club Zero.”
Club Zero opens in theaters on March 15th.
