U.S. director Tanya Wexler says her comedy "Hysteria," about the Victorian-era invention of the vibrator, is all about empowering women — and having fun.
In the film screened Friday at the Rome Film Festival, one woman complains she's always hungry, another is anxious, a third has bouts of crying. They pour their problems out to Dr. Joseph Mortimer Granville, a doctor in 1880s London who along with a hysteria specialist and an inventor friend develop the cure for what ails them.
Wexler told reporters Friday that the point of the romantic comedy, starring Maggie Gyllenhaal, Hugh Dancy and Rupert Everett, was to have a bit of fun.
"I think in many ways the point of the movie is to say, 'don't take yourself so seriously. It doesn't have to be a medical condition,'" she said. Wexler said she wanted to empower women, though not in the "worthy, self-serious way."
"We are supposed to be able to enjoy the enjoyable parts of life," she said.
Gyllenhaal, who plays Charlotte, the love interest in the film, said she got a kick out of being in a movie that made her audiences flush.
"It is true that we are way more embarrassed and shy and stuck in this sort of Victorian way of thinking than we like to admit," she said.
"Hysteria" is one of the 15 in-competition films screening at the Rome festival, which runs through Nov. 4.
Other films being shown out of competition during the festival include the latest in the Twilight saga, "Breaking Dawn." Steven Spielberg's new animated film "The Adventure's of Tintin" is also being presented, as is Martin Scorsese's new 3D children's film "Hugo Cabret."