Fingernails director explains how film is a metaphor for dating apps
Jessie Buckley, Riz Ahmed and Jeremy Allen White star in the new Apple TV+ film.
The director of new Apple TV+ film Fingernails has explained how the movie is a metaphor for dating in the 21st century.
The film – which stars Jessie Buckley, Riz Ahmed and Jeremy Allen White – is set in a Black Mirror-esque world where couples can determine whether they are truly in love by taking a test at a state-of-the-art institute.
The test involves each of them removing a fingernail and putting it in a machine that vaguely resembles a microwave, before it reveals whether their connection is genuine or not.
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Speaking during an exclusive interview with RadioTimes.com, director Christos Nikou revealed that the idea for it stemmed from both his own experiences finding love and those of others he knew who were using dating apps.
"The first starting point was when I was trying to understand what is love, and why love is so difficult nowadays - I mean, personally," he said.
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"And then I was looking around with so many people, and they were dealing with all these dating apps and everything, and they were swiping right or left with their fingers and their nails in order to find love.
"And they were letting just an algorithm decide about them and suggesting them people, when I think that love is something really instinctive and we just need to follow our instincts and our heart."
He explained that, at the beginning of the writing process, one of his co-writers, Sam Steiner, had suggested that the couples should remove part of their heart in order to take the test – before they landed on the fingernails idea instead.
"I told him that I wanted fingernails, because I think that, first of all, I don't know how you can take something from the heart," he said.
"I think that, for me, as we're trying to make a comment about the dating apps and we're trying to make a comment about technology, I feel like right now our cell phones are the extensions of our fingers, they're there all day on our hands."
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Nikou added that the love certificate that successful couples are given in the film was somewhat akin to a wedding certificate – because it's "like you're trying to prove to somebody that you are in love".
And he continued: "Whereas, as I said, love is something very instinctive, and love is something that you need to work on every day. And we're putting our wedding ring on our fingers, so we wanted to take something from the fingers.
"The nails are the only thing that protects our fingers, and we wanted to make equal the pain of love with the physical pain by losing and sacrificing something.”
Fingernails is released on Apple TV+ on Friday 3rd November. Check out more of our Film coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on.
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