Genre
Synopsis
In a near-future Los Angeles, where the sky is streaked with a shimmering, permanent atmospheric river, Herman—a sensitive, androgynous poet from Slovenia—arrives to claim the mysterious legacy of his estranged father, Ben Carter, a once iconic Hollywood director. Carter has left Herman not only a stylish house in Laurel Canyon but also a mountain of surreal manuscript pages and a locked office door that no one dares open.
Herman, who grew up believing Carter was a fictional character his mother invented, slowly uncovers a deeper truth: he was born from an encounter his Slovenian mother wishes to forget.
As he settles in with Mina, a hopeful actress and romantic partner, the two form an uneasy partnership marked by affection and mutual ambition. Their relationship begins to fray when Herman meets Selma, a magnetic, gender-fluid photographer and social media provocateur, who sees in Herman the perfect subject—and perhaps a way to reclaim her artistic edge. His introspective character with old-world roots clashes with the performative frenzy of American self-invention.
What begins as artistic flirtation quickly spirals into obsession, manipulation, and identity confusion, echoing the ancient myth the story draws from. Meanwhile, the manuscript—Carter’s cryptic opus—morphs from poetic rambling to psychological haunt, blurring the lines between reality and hallucination.
As the pages begin to vanish, secrets surface: Mina sells her half of a symbolic gemstone Herman had gifted her, and Selma pursues Herman with both passion and possessiveness. The once-inert house comes alive with ghosts of the past—real, metaphorical, and media-fed hallucinations.
In this hypnotic narrative, where ecological disaster mirrors internal collapse, PERMANENT RAINBOW explores the inheritance of trauma, the instability of gender and identity, and the fine line between artistic creation and emotional manipulation. A visual, psychological, modern myth.
Bio
Nataša Prosenc Stearns is a Slovenian-born Los Angeles-based visual artist and filmmaker working in the field of Expanded Moving Image, dissolving the boundaries between film, video, print, and installation. Her work explores subconscious worlds, the materiality of the body, contemporary alienation, and the elemental force of water. She received her BA from the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Ljubljana and moved to Los Angeles on a Fulbright Grant to pursue an MFA at the California Institute of the Arts.
Nataša represented Slovenia at the 48th Venice Biennale and has exhibited internationally at institutions including the Doulun Museum of Art, ARCO Madrid, Tel Aviv Museum of Art, and the Museum of Modern Art Ljubljana. Her films and videos have screened at SXSW, Films de Femmes, and the Brooklyn Film Festival, among others.
Her immersive installations seek to reconnect viewers with the “life-world” — experience prior to analysis — creating sensorial environments where body, perception, and nature converge. Balancing physical intimacy with transcendence, her work invites audiences into spaces where the boundaries between self and world begin to dissolve.
Credits
Writer / Director - Nataša Prosenc Stearns
Producer - Pamela Moriarty
Cinematographer - Dragan Popović
Composer - Milko Lazar
