Saint Laurent will produce Pedro Almodòvar's next film

Strange Way of Life is the name of Pedro Almodòvar's next film that will boast a cast consisting of Ethan Hawke, Pedro Pascal and Manu Rios - the mega-influencer who recently also became an actor in Spanish productions on Netflix, including Élite. The short film, produced by Saint Laurent for the Self project, will be a Western, will be shot this summer around Almería (the same location used by Sergio Leone for the legendary The Good, the Bad and the Ugly), and will follow the lines of Brokeback Mountain. The inspiration for the short comes from a story by Annie Proulx and will include, according to what Almodòvar said, quite explicit sex scenes. All outfits will, of course, be designed by Anthony Vaccarello and the Saint Laurent team who, we can assume, will test their skills in creating Western-inspired silhouettes that, on the brand's runways, have often translated into pointy boots, workwear shirts and belts.

Almodòvar's upcoming project is just the latest and (so far) most popular chapter in the Self project that has clutched Saint Laurent to the world of cinema: before the Spanish director, it was Gaspar Noè who had tried his hand at producing a medium-length film presented at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival named Lux Aeterna, and also in the same year it was Wong Kar-Wai who directed A Night in Shanghai with the brand's production. The project, however, does not stop at the cinema alone. In April 2019 it was writer Brett Easton Ellis (author of American Psycho) who had directed the short film The Arrangement, and in December 2018 it was artist Vanessa Beecroft who had signed her chapter of the Self project. Other prominent figures involved in the project were photographer Daido Moriyama and director Abel Ferrara.

The Self project is just the tip of the iceberg of the identity Anthony Vaccarello has been cultivating for Saint Laurent in recent times - tying the brand's name to that of cultural players who become the face of the brand's campaigns. The very recent FW22 campaign video, for example, includes Zoë Kravitz, Hailey Bieber, Dominic Fike, Finn Wolfhard from Stranger Things, Rosé from Blackpink, LaKeith Stanfield, Romeo Beckham, and Charlotte Gainsbourg. While also this year, the brand launched the SMOKING podcast featuring Catherine Deneuve, Gaspar Noah, Charlotte Gainsbourg, and Laetitia Casta.