'Sign Gene', the first superhero film featuring deaf mutants with supernatural powers through the use of sign language, will be presented in Cannes at the Italian Pavillon, in the Hôtel Barrière Le Majestic on Friday, May 18th. 

​

“Sign Gene,” written, produced, directed and starring Emilio Insolera, deaf actor with a long list of authentic deaf actors, centres on a secret agent, Tom Clerc, deaf from a multi-generational deaf family and is descendant of Laurent Clerc, 'the Father of the Deaf in America', that brought the sign language to the States two centuries ago. Tom is the carrier of SGx29 a powerful Sign Gene mutation but he lost a significant portion of his powers during a fierce fight some years back against his main villain, his own deaf brother Jux Clerc, the leader of 1.8.8.0. an evil organization dedicated to exterminating Sign Gene mutants.

​

Hugh Denison, the head of the Q.I.A. (QuinPar Intelligence Agency), an agency affiliated to The Pentagon composed of hand-selected agents with Sign Gene mutation, sends Tom Clerc and his colleague Ken Wong from New York City to Osaka to investigate various intriguing crime scenes.  They end up in a fight with a Japanese gang led by Tatsumi Fuwa and learn that they can win the game only by playing it the Japanese way. Tom Clerc also learns that his powers are not lost forever.

​

The film was shot between Japan, USA and Italy, has a James Bond plot with a touch of Grindhouse and makes several references to deaf culture and history and sign language linguistics. ​

​

The producer and actor Emilio Insolera, is a well known activist, profoundly deaf since birth, polyglot, lived in various continents, each for more than a lustrum,  from North and South America, Europe and Asia. He is a Fulbright-Wirth scholar, with a bachelor degree in film and linguistics from Gallaudet University and a master in Science of Communication with summa cum laude from University of Rome La Sapienza. Insolera is also one of the authors of the first  Italian Sign Language multimedia dictionary. 

​

..................

​

Contact:

Andrea Palazzo

andrea@signgene.com

Linda Hansen

linda@pluin.com

​

..................

​

Key points about the film:

•  it is a $25k film shot with a Sony 3CCD

• it was shot between US, Japan and Italy

• six languages are spoken in the film (English, Japanese, Italian, ASL, JSL, LIS) 

• it maintains its authenticity by hiring deaf actors (#deaftalent instead of #deaffaker)

•  it is edited touché of Grindhouse (vintage effects) by Tarantino and Rodriguez

• it makes several references to deaf culture, deaf history and sign language linguistics (please check blog "Deconstructing Sign Gene" 

•  it opens the first generation deaf superheroes (its impact is compared to  Black Panther from the deaf core's perspective). While other superhero movies and comics often depict hearing aids as superhero gadgets, Sign Gene bases the heroes' superpowers  entirely on their own potentials, particularly their linguistic and visual abilities. Portraying the power of “hearing” by a sophisticated hearing aid unconsciously sends out a message that being "deaf" remains a problem, a weakness, which is typical for the hearing perspective, and does not apply to real-life deaf superpowers

• It acts as an introductory film with the purpose to create a synergy of collaboration with one of the Big Six majors (from Warner Bros to Paramount Pictures). 

• written, directed and produced by profoundly deaf, native signer, Emilio Insolera

• Several deaf actors in the film are well known activists of the deaf community, to name a few: Ben Bahan (Gallaudet University's ASL and Deaf Studies professor, Humberto Insolera (Vice-president of the European Union of the Deaf), Carola Insolera (Supermodel).