Jennifer Lawrence hits Venice with horror story 'mother!'

Director Darren Aronofsky says his film "mother!" — a delirious nightmare starring Jennifer Lawrence — is a "roller-coaster ride."

Fittingly, it thrilled some viewers at the Venice Film Festival, and left others a bit queasy.

Actors Michelle Pfeiffer, from left, Jennifer Lawrence and Javier Bardem pose for photographers at the premiere of the film 'mother!' at the 74th edition of the Venice Film Festival in Venice, Italy, Tuesday, Sept. 5, 2017. (Photo by Joel Ryan/Invision/AP)

A horror story that travels from menace to mind-bending mayhem, the movie was greeted with a mix of applause and boos from journalists Tuesday at the Italian festival, where it's one of 21 movies competing for the Golden Lion prize.

Lawrence and Javier Bardem play a couple — identified only as Mother and Him — living in that horror-flick staple, an isolated old house. He's a poet with writer's block, while she devotes herself to restoring the house after a devastating fire.

Director Darren Aronofsky poses for photographers at the premiere of the film 'mother!' at the 74th edition of the Venice Film Festival in Venice, Italy, Tuesday, Sept. 5, 2017. (Photo by Joel Ryan/Invision/AP)

Mysterious houseguests, played by Ed Harris and Michelle Pfeiffer, trigger unsettling events that get progressively weirder. Imagine a cross between "Rosemary's Baby" and the teeming hell-scapes of medieval artist Hieronymus Bosch.

Actress Michelle Pfeiffer poses for photographers at the premiere of the film 'mother!' at the 74th edition of the Venice Film Festival in Venice, Italy, Tuesday, Sept. 5, 2017. (Photo by Joel Ryan/Invision/AP)

Aronofsky, who won the Golden Lion in 2008 for "The Wrestler," acknowledged the movie was "a very, very strong cocktail."

"Of course there are going to be people who are not going to want that type of an experience. And that's fine," he told reporters.

"I've been making it clear that this is a roller-coaster ride: only come on it if you are really prepared to do the loop-the-loop a few times."

Actress Jennifer Lawrence poses for photographers at the premiere of the film 'mother!' at the 74th edition of the Venice Film Festival in Venice, Italy, Tuesday, Sept. 5, 2017. (Photo by Joel Ryan/Invision/AP)

Some critics were impressed by what a review in the Hollywood Reporter called the "madhouse bacchanal" of the film's final stretch. Others wondered what it all meant. Variety found it impressive but empty, a "baroque nightmare that's about nothing but itself."

Aronofsky said the point of the film "is that it's a mystery."

"It's constantly surprising the audience," he said. "You don't know where it's going to go. And we didn't want to make the audience ever feel safe, because Jennifer's character in the movie never feels safe."

It's easy to see an environmental allegory in the film, about a house that is invaded, besieged, flooded and set on fire.

Actress Jennifer Lawrence poses for photographers upon arrival at the press conference for the film 'mother!' at the 74th edition of the Venice Film Festival in Venice, Italy, Tuesday, Sept. 5, 2017. (Photo by Joel Ryan/Invision/AP)

Aronofsky said the movie is his "howl to the moon," provoked by anguish at the state of society and particularly the environment.

He said that while most of his films take years, he wrote the first draft of the script in just five days.

"It just sort of poured out of me," he said.

"It came out of living on this planet and sort of seeing what's happening around us and not being able to do anything," the director added. "I just had a lot of rage and anger and I just wanted to sort of channel it."

Actress Jennifer Lawrence poses for photographers at the photo call for the film 'mother!' at the 74th edition of the Venice Film Festival in Venice, Italy, Tuesday, Sept. 5, 2017. (Photo by Joel Ryan/Invision/AP)

Viewers expecting naturalism should probably stay home. Aronofsky said the film is an allegory. Before becoming "mother!" the movie's working title was "Day Six" — the day in the book of Genesis on which God created humanity and gave it dominion over the Earth.

That makes the characters as much archetypes as people — a challenge for the cast. Lawrence, who has portrayed a string of strong women, here plays a meek helpmeet who seems destined to suffer.

"It was a completely different character from anything I've ever done before, but it was also a different side of myself that I wasn't in touch with and I didn't really know, yet," said Lawrence, who is in a real-life relationship with Aronofsky. "There is a part of me that Darren really helped me get in touch with.

"It was difficult. It was the most I've ever had to pull out of myself," she said.

Like Aronofsky's ballet movie "Black Swan," the film depicts creative artists as in some ways monstrous, using and consuming those around them. And it touches on the way success and fame can be devouring, in bloody and disturbingly literal images.

Lawrence — who drew crowds of fans in Venice, as she does everywhere — said she tries in her life to "find the balance in myself" between being accessible and protecting her private space.

She said the film spoke "to the insatiable need that we all have now, especially with the internet. We just want more and more and more."

Though the movie is dark and disturbing, Aronofsky says he is an optimist about the fate of the planet.

"America is schizophrenic," he said. "We go from backing the Paris climate (accord) to eight months later pulling out.

"It's tragic, but in many ways we have revealed who the enemy is and now we can attack it."

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Tennessee teachers and staff will be allowed to carry concealed handguns on public school grounds under legislation signed into law by Gov. Bill Lee on Friday.

Lee, a Republican, had announced his support for the proposal just the day before while flanked by top Republican legislative leaders who had helped shepherd the bill through the GOP-dominant General Assembly.

“What’s important is that we give districts tools and the option to use a tool that will keep their children safe,” Lee told reporters.

As the idea of arming teachers began to gain support inside the General Assembly, gun control advocates and families began swarming to the Capitol to show their opposition. During the final vote, protesters chanted “Blood on your hands” and many members of the public who oppose the bill harangued Republican lawmakers after the vote, leading House Speaker Cameron Sexton to order the galleries cleared.

According to the statute, which becomes effective immediately, parents and other teachers will be barred from knowing who is armed at their schools.

A principal, school district and law enforcement agency would have to agree to let staff carry guns, and then workers who want to carry a handgun would need to have a handgun carry permit and written authorization from the school’s principal and local law enforcement. They would also need to clear a background check and undergo 40 hours of handgun training. They couldn’t carry guns at school events at stadiums, gymnasiums or auditoriums.

The legislation is the biggest expansion of gun access in the state since last year’s deadly shooting at a private elementary school in Nashville where shooter indiscriminately opened fire and killed three children and three adults before being killed by police.

Lee initially asked lawmakers to keep guns away from people deemed a danger to themselves or others in response to the shooting, the Republican supermajority ignored that request.

Many of the Covenant families had met with Lee and lawmakers hoping to persuade them to drop the idea of arming teachers. In the final days of the legislative session, Covenant families said they had collected nearly 4,300 signatures from Tennesseans against having public school staffers carry weapons on school grounds.

"There are folks across the state who disagree on the way forward, but we all agree that we should keep our kids safe,” Lee said Thursday.

It’s unclear if any school districts would take advantage if the bill becomes law. For example, a Metro Nashville Public Schools spokesperson, Sean Braisted, said the district believes “it is best and safest for only approved active-duty law enforcement to carry weapons on campus.”

Gov. Bill Lee attends a news conference at the close of the 2024 legislative session Thursday, April 25, 2024, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)

Gov. Bill Lee speaks during a news conference at the end of the 2024 legislative session, Thursday, April 25, 2024, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)