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‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ Digital Release Interview
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Available to purchase on digital June 30th and on 4K Ultra HD, Blu-ray, DVD, and in a collectible 4K Ultra HD SteelBook on October 8th is the box office hit ‘A Quiet Place: Day One,’ which is a prequel to John Krasinski’s ‘A Quiet Place’ and was directed by Michael Sarnoski (‘Pig’).

The film stars Oscar-winner Lupita Nyong’o (‘Black Panther’), Joseph Quinn (‘Stranger Things’), Alex Wolff (‘Oppenheimer’), and reprising his role from ‘A Quiet Place Part II’, Djimon Hounsou.

‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ writer and director Michael Sarnoski.

Related Article: Movie Review: ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’

Moviefone recently had the pleasure of speaking with writer and director Michael Sarnoski about his work on ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’, taking on the franchise, the challenge of directing a movie with little to no dialogue, showing the aliens, Lupita Nyong’o’s performance, Sam and Eric’s friendship, Djimon Hounsou’s return, recreating and destroying New York City, and what it’s like to direct a cat.

You can read the full interview below or click on the video player above to watch our interview.

(L to R) Joseph Quinn as “Eric” and Director Michael Sarnoski in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

Moviefone: To begin with, coming off the success of ‘Pig’, can you talk about taking on a big franchise like this and developing the screenplay based on a story you created with John Krasinski?

Michael Sarnoski: Initially, ‘Pig’ was well received. That was very exciting. It was a very small movie, it very much felt like a piece of my soul, and I think there was a part of me that was like, I don’t want to do the whole jump into a franchise studio project. I want to be very cautious about that. But then this came along. John had loved ‘Pig’ and he really was asking, “Hey, can you bring some of that ‘Pig’ feeling to the ‘Quiet Place’ universe?” He gave me just a lot of freedom to be like, “All we need is New York on day one. What characters do you want? What story do you want? Make this your own.” So, it just felt like a unique opportunity to play in this big sandbox but do it with my own voice. It was kind of scary to jump into something like that, but it seemed like a unique opportunity and something that I would really love. Thankfully, it really worked out and I count myself very lucky. But it was intimidating and exciting and all those things.

(L to R) Alex Wolff as “Reuben”, Lupita Nyong’o as “Samira”, Producer John Krasinski, and Director Michael Sarnoski in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

MF: This is of course a prequel to the first two movies, but in release order is the third in the franchise. In the first movie, Krasinski was careful to not show the aliens too early in the film, but you show them in full very early in ‘Day One’. Did you feel like you had the freedom to do that because as an audience we already know what they look like from the other two movies?

MS: It was a balance that we were always talking about, because even with things like the rules and all of that, everyone knows all the rules already, so you need to show them a little bit, but if you suddenly make that a huge part of the story, it’s just going to be like, “We’ve seen all of this twice before.” So, finding that right balance of feeling like you’re seeing fresh stuff and your expanding things was important. We still tried to space out the aliens properly so that initially, you’re not seeing too much, and then it gradually as it builds and builds, you’re seeing more and more, and part of that comes with this scope of this New York invasion. This isn’t in the farmland with a couple of creatures wandering around. This is a hotbed of where the aliens landed, so you need to carry a heft of that. But we still tried to do it in ways that wasn’t too in your face. I liked this idea of these creature stampedes that just made the ground shake and you’re not as focused on specific things, it’s just these passing shadows. So, we tried to find ways to keep it exciting and keep it feeling like there was a progression to the reveals of these creatures, but you do still have to give a little more because of the scale and because of it being the third movie in the franchise. But it was just always something we were talking about and playing with.

Lupita Nyong’o as “Samira” in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

MF: As a filmmaker, can you talk about the challenges of making a movie with little to no dialogue? Was it restraining or freeing in a sense?

MS: It’s a little bit of both. I love dialogue. I love a long dialogue scene where you really get to understand these characters and their nuances, but then at the same time, I think you rely on having really good actors like Joe and Lupita, but just watching these two people navigate silently together and their expressions also brings out a ton of stuff that in some ways, you wouldn’t be focused on as much in a more dialogue heavy movie. So, you’re just trading one tool for another. You do have to lean on your actors a lot more to be able to convey these characters and convey these moments, but I was lucky to have amazing actors.

(L to R) Lupita Nyong’o as “Samira” and Director Michael Sarnoski in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

MF: Can you talk about centering the movie on the character of Sam, and what Lupita Nyong’o brought to the role?

MS: I think Lupita brings a lot to every role she does. She’s incredible. She’s extremely intelligent, she’s very thoughtful and is willing to dive in and talk about these characters and figure out what’s driving them, what their history is. All of the nuances of these characters, she spends a lot of time on, and I think Sam, on paper, she’s kind of prickly and standoffish and has separated herself from her past life, and to be able to play that character in a way that doesn’t alienate the audience but actually makes the audience lean in is really difficult, and she did an amazing job with that. You get that she’s got a chip on her shoulder, but it makes you care about her more, and you want to know more how this story is going to play out for her and how she’s going to develop. I think that just comes from creating a very full, realized character that she does so beautifully.

(L to R) Joseph Quinn as “Eric” and Lupita Nyong’o as “Samira” in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

MF: Can you also talk about Sam and Eric’s unusual friendship, and Lupita and Joseph Quinn’s onscreen chemistry?

MS: I think we really lucked out with both together because Joe’s wonderful, and I think there was something about it being such a silent film with not a lot of dialogue, that the two of them really had to lean in and engage with each other. So, they’re watching each other’s performances a lot. They really connected on a silent but beautiful level, and I think it made a dynamic that you just felt like these two people were really seeing each other and really trying to understand each other because that’s what they were doing on set every day. I think it came across on screen better than I could have hoped.

Djimon Hounsou as “Henri” in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

MF: Can you talk about the decision to bring back Djimon Hounsou’s Henri from ‘A Quiet Place Part II’ and flesh out that character’s backstory?

MS: He’s an incredible actor and he’s so easy and fun to work with, and so, A, I’m just happy I did that, but B, I liked the idea of in the second one, we see a glimpse into his stable society that he’s helped create, and I wanted to explore the difficult decisions that were made in order to get to that place and hint at this wasn’t all happy living on an island stuff. He must have made some really hard decisions to protect his family and to lead this group of people. So, I wanted to glimpse that, but then I also wanted to use that as a, okay, this is his story and he’s going to go off and live that story, and this is where Sam diverges from that. So, it’s also used as a foil to her personal journey, going to get pizza story, and he’s going to escape the island and try and survive in this apocalyptic world. So, I use it as something to just compare her story, so we understand, that’s not what she’s engaged with. He was wonderful.

Lupita Nyong’o as “Samira” in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

MF: Can you talk about New York City as a character in the film?

MS: When I first got this project and when I was working on the script, I rented an apartment in New York for a month, just to steep myself in this place because I knew that that needed to be a part of it. This was a New York day one invasion movie, which we’ve seen a lot of, and I felt like if I was going to do it, I wanted to do it right with New York City. I think the thing I ended up landing on was exploring the different meanings of New York City to different characters, and for Sam, she’s someone that was raised here but then had to leave it behind. For Eric, he’s someone that came here with dreams. He’s the classic immigrant story to New York, and they all mean different things, but we all have this common understanding and cultural meaning of New York. So, I wanted that to just be felt so that we could all relate to that, but then also understand the kind of nuanced differences between each character’s relationship with the city. I just spent a lot of time wandering around New York, reading books about New York, and just thinking about what it meant to these characters. I think as a society, we have a very charged relationship with this city, and especially the idea of the destruction of this city. Without putting too fine a point on it, I wanted to tap into that so that people could feel like they were there with these characters, and they recognize these images and these ideas and these feelings.

Lupita Nyong’o as “Samira” in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

MF: Finally, how difficult is it directing a cat?

MS: It is impossible. You’re not directing a cat, you just are casting your wishes to the winds and hoping for the best. Once you get the hang of it, after a couple of weeks of shooting, then you know, okay, this is what the cat can do. This is what the animal trainers can help us with, and these are the things that we can aim for, and you adjust certain actions based on that. So, it’s like once you have an understanding with the cat and the trainers, then it becomes a lot easier. But I think that initial sniffing out period of like, okay, so he’s not going to want to do this action, and if we want him to do this, there’s going to have to be food involved or something like that, and then you just start figuring out creative compromises and solutions to all that stuff. So it wasn’t that hard. I think it’s telling that by the end of the movie, the cast and crew all adored Nico and Schnitzel who played Frodo, whereas if it had been a real pain, everyone would’ve been like, “Thank God Nico and Schnitzel aren’t on set anymore.” I think it really worked out wonderfully.
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What is the plot of ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’?

On the first day of an invasion by aliens that hunt living things by sound, a woman dying of cancer (Lupita Nyong’o ) tries to make her way uptown in Manhattan while befriending a fellow survivor (Joseph Quinn) who’s lost and alone as the world crashes down around them.

Who is in the cast of ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’?
- Lupita Nyong’o as Samira
- Joseph Quinn as Eric
- Alex Wolff as Reuben
- Djimon Hounsou as Henri
- Elaine Umuhire as Zena
(L to R) Director Michael Sarnoski and Lupita Nyong’o as “Samira” in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

Other Movies in the ‘A Quiet Place’ Franchise:
- ‘A Quiet Place‘ (2018)
- ‘A Quiet Place Part II‘ (2021)
Buy ‘A Quiet Place’ Movies On Amazon
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July 31, 2024
Movie Review: ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’
(L to R) Joseph Quinn as “Eric” and Lupita Nyong’o as “Samira” in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

Opening in theaters June 28 is ‘A Quiet Place: Day One,’ directed by Michael Sarnoski and starring Lupita Nyong’o, Joseph Quinn, Alex Wolff, and Djimon Hounsou.

Related Article: ‘Black Panther’s Lupita Nyong’o to Star in ‘A Quiet Place’ Spin-Off ‘Day One’

Initial Thoughts

Lupita Nyong’o as “Samira” in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

Although ‘A Quiet Place Part II’ already documented the arrival of the first movie’s vicious aliens via opening flashbacks, this prequel makes the choice to tell more or less the same story again, only on a bigger canvas. ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ is set in New York City, as opposed to the quiet rural town of John Krasinski’s first two films, giving new director and writer Michael Sarnoski a much wider field to play on.

Sarnoski made a bracing debut in 2021 with ‘Pig,’ an affecting study of loss and love hiding within a crime thriller, anchored by a brilliant Nicolas Cage performance. Although he’s thrust into blockbuster territory with ‘Day One,’ the movie’s quieter moments are what work best, providing brief moments of human empathy amidst the otherwise familiar mechanics of the alien invasion we’ve seen in the two previous ‘A Quiet Place’ entries.

Story and Direction

(L to R) Lupita Nyong’o as “Samira” and Director Michael Sarnoski in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

Opening on a bird’s-eye view of New York City (with a title card telling us that the city constantly generates 90 decibels of noise), Sarnoski zeroes in on Samira (Lupita Nyong’o), a bitter young woman ravaged by cancer and living out her last days in a hospice. Her caregiver, Reuben (Alex Wolff), encourages her to come with him and the other patients into Manhattan to see a show – but boy did they pick the wrong day, even if Samira is enticed by the promise of pizza and being allowed to bring her faithful cat, Frodo (get it, Sam and Frodo?) along with her.

Not long after the show – and in case the jet fighters that buzzed the city earlier and the helicopters whizzing overhead at this point didn’t tip it off enough — the sky is suddenly full of meteorites streaking down to Earth, carrying our hideous extraterrestrial pals from the first two films, who can’t see for beans but track everything – including the scores of hapless humans they pick off within minutes of landing – by sound.

As everything on the streets goes to hell, the group bus is caught in an explosion. Samira stumbles out, covered in chalk-white dust – filmmakers are still reaching back for that 9/11 imagery, some 23 years later – and watching in horror as people around her are picked off one by one. Another explosion sends her through a storefront and knocks her out. She wakes up sometime later, back in the theater with other survivors that include Frodo, Reuben, and a man named Henri – played by Djimon Hounsou in what is essentially an origin story for the character he played in ‘A Quiet Place Part II.’

Sam and Frodo eventually leave the theater, with Sam still determined to get to Harlem for pizza at a place called Patsy’s. Why she thinks that Patsy’s will be open and serving as New York City crumbles into smoking ruins is one of the more inexplicable aspects of the narrative here. Along the way, she comes across a young Englishman named Eric (Joseph Quinn, soon to be seen as the Human Torch in ‘The Fantastic Four’), who’s prone to panic attacks and doesn’t want to be alone, so Sam grudgingly lets him accompany her.

(L to R) Joseph Quinn as “Eric” and Lupita Nyong’o as “Samira” in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

The burgeoning friendship between Sam and Eric is probably the best part of ‘A Quiet Place: Day One,’ with Nyong’o and Quinn doing a lot of the heavy lifting to make one feel something for two otherwise thinly written characters. All we know about Nyong’o is that she has cancer, is a poet, and wants pizza; we know even less about her companion, but the longish second act does allow their relationship to breathe a bit.

That’s where this movie works: in developing a relationship where there was none before. After all, the first two movies were about a family; the dynamics and love were already there. If ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ is good at one thing, it’s showing us that unimaginable tragedy and horror can bring total strangers together to help each other as well.

The rest of the movie – that is, the action sequences between the Sam/Eric stuff – is on rinse/repeat cycle: monsters attack, everyone gets quiet, someone accidentally makes a noise, monsters attack again. Refreshingly, we’re not given a whole lot of exposition again about how the creatures operate via sound alone; on the other hand, everyone seems to learn this rather quickly. Also, where exactly do eight million people in New York City go in the space of a day? What is the government response other than a few helicopters flying overhead and knocking out the bridges? And why does Frodo the cat – who arguably steals the movie – never meow or hiss once?

The Cast

(L to R) Joseph Quinn as “Eric” and Lupita Nyong’o as “Samira” in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

Lupita Nyong’o is a transformational actor. She looks totally different here from her turn in the ‘Black Panther’ movies, which look just as different from her work in ’12 Years a Slave.’ As mentioned above, Sam is not a particularly well-fleshed-out character when we meet her, but Nyong’o has a way of bringing out pain, warmth, and humanity all at the same time.

Joseph Quinn is not quite on her level, but he’s equally empathetic and often humorous – a young man who’s totally lost and alone in a different way than Sam. He’s afraid, and he almost gives into panic, but he is able to muster himself up and even make good decisions along the way. We haven’t seen his work as Eddie Munson on ‘Stranger Things,’ but we’re convinced Quinn will be a terrific Johnny Storm (as long as he gets the American accent down).

That’s pretty much it – Alex Wolff and Djimon Hounsou get very little to do (Hounsou setting up a movie that’s already three years old aside), so this is largely a two-hander for most of its running time. Thankfully, Nyong’o and Quinn are up to the task.

Final Thoughts

Lupita Nyong’o as “Samira” in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

We went into this with low expectations: first, because it’s a prequel and they are always problematic from a narrative point of view, and second, because we weren’t big fans of the two popular previous ‘A Quiet Place’ entries to begin with. But we liked ‘Day One’ a hell of a lot more than ‘Part II,’ if only because our main characters here don’t make as many dumb mistakes, and we may even like it best of the three.

But familiarity also breeds contempt, and ‘Day One’ certainly does nothing to advance the mythology of the entire franchise, especially with regards to the aliens. Aside from one brief, puzzling scene in what looks like an alien garden, we learn nothing new about these creatures or their purpose here. Even with a few tense set pieces, the attacks and chases take on a numbing sameness.

Sarnoski benefits from excellent sound, and gets some decent mileage out of his sets (England’s Leavesden Studios, home of ‘Harry Potter,’ stands in for the streets of New York), but even the post-apocalyptic urban milieu seems commonplace now. ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ does succeed in putting some heart into what could have been a fully generic cash grab, and Sarnoski again shows that he knows how to work with major actors while also displaying the confidence to make a film on a larger scale. But the quietly poignant half-movie that Lupita Nyong’o and Joseph Quinn star in is much more interesting that the monster movie noisily wrapped around it.

‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ receives 6.5 out of 10 stars.
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What is the plot of ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’?

On the first day of an invasion by aliens that hunt living things by sound, a woman dying of cancer (Lupita Nyong’o ) tries to make her way uptown in Manhattan while befriending a fellow survivor (Joseph Quinn) who’s lost and alone as the world crashes down around them.

Who is in the cast of ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’?
- Lupita Nyong’o as Samira
- Joseph Quinn as Eric
- Alex Wolff as Reuben
- Djimon Hounsou as Henri
- Elaine Umuhire as Zena
Lupita Nyong’o as “Samira” in ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ from Paramount Pictures.

Other Movies in the ‘A Quiet Place’ Franchise:
- ‘A Quiet Place‘ (2018)
- ‘A Quiet Place Part II‘ (2021)
Buy ‘A Quiet Place’ Movies On Amazon
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June 27, 2024
Casting Roundup: Rami Malek to Play Buster Keaton

Rami Malek as Freddie Mercury in ‘Bohemian Rhapsody.’

Ready for some casting news? You know you are. First up, we have word that Rami Malek––who, let’s not forget, won an Oscar for playing a real-life star (Freddie Mercury) in ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’––is looking to repeat that trick by embodying none other than cinematic legend and comic genius Buster Keaton in a new limited series.

It all springs from ‘The Batman’ director Matt Reeves who, when he’s not busy writing the sequel to the 2022 superhero success, is also figuring out the spin-off Penguin TV series starring Colin Farrell as the character, which is headed to HBO Max.

According to Deadline, Warner Bros. TV is working with Reeves’ 6th & Idaho Productions company to develop the new series, which will focus on the vaudeville-turned-silent comedy movie star. Ted Cohen, a veteran of ‘Succession’ and ‘Friends’ (there are two very different credits, if ever we saw them) is on board to adapt James Curtis’ biography ‘Buster Keaton: A Filmmaker’s Life’.

That’s assuming Warners can lock down the rights to the book, but with Reeves and Malek both planning to produce and Reeves (despite his busy schedule) aiming to direct the limited series, we’d imagine they sound like a safe pair of hands to most book rights agents.

Keaton, who became famous for movies such as ‘The General’, ‘Sherlock Jr.’ and more was born into a vaudeville family but saw his career wane after striking a deal with MGM and yielding his artistic independence. His wife divorced him, and he became an alcoholic. His career rebounded in the 1940s, he remarried and earned an Honorary Academy Award in 1959.

Reeves and co. are taking the potential series out to streaming services and networks, though you’ve got to think that, given the Warner Bros. TV connection and Reeves overall deal with Warner Bros. Discovery, HBO Max is in with a shot.

Marvel Studios’ ‘Captain America: New World Order.’

One the other side of the Big Two Superhero coin, there is news via Deadline that ‘Atlanta’ and ‘Space Jam: A New Legacy’ actor Xosha Roquemore is joining the cast of ‘Captain America: New World Order’.

Disney/Marvel’s latest Cap-focused story will continue the story of Anthony Mackie’s Sam Wilson as he grapples with inheriting the mantle (and shield) of Captain America from old pal Steve Rogers (Chris Evans, who likely won’t be in this one).

As seen in Disney+ series ‘The Falcon and the Winter Soldier’, Sam initially rejected the idea of following in Steve’s footsteps, leading to the creation of US Agent (Wyatt Russell). But our hero eventually embraced his destiny and will face his biggest challenge yet in the new movie.

Written by ‘Falcon’ showrunner Malcolm Spellman along with Dalan Musson, ‘New World Order’ has Julius Onah directing and Tim Blake Nelson, Harrison Ford, Danny Ramirez, Carl Lumbly and Shira Haas featured alongside Mackie. We don’t, of course, yet know who Roquemore will be playing.

As for the others, Nelson is returning as his ‘The Incredible Hulk’ character Samuel Sterns (AKA villain The Leader), Ford is taking over the role of Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross from the late William Hurt, Lumbly reprises the role of Isaiah Bradley, a previous super soldier experiment who was imprisoned by his own government and Ramirez is once again playing ‘Falcon’ series character Joaquin Torres, who inherited the Falcon suit from Sam.

Haas, meanwhile, will be Sabra, an Israeli character from the comics whose Mossad connections could prove controversial for the story––assuming they’re not changed for the movie, which is often the case with Marvel comics characters arriving in the MCU.

The movie will be in theaters on May 3rd, 2024.
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Finally, Above The Line reports that Alex Wolff is reuniting with his ‘Pig’ director Michael Sarnoski for Paramount’s first spin-off from John Krasinski’s successful ‘A Quiet Place’ movies.

Working from a concept originally created by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods and developed by Krasinski, the 2018 originally saw Krasinski directing and starring as part of a family (also including Emily Blunt, Millicent Simmons and Noah Jupe) who are dealing with a post-apocalyptic world brought about by dangerous, mysterious alien creatures who hunt by sound.

The 2020 sequel, ‘A Quiet Place Part II’, also directed by Krasinski, saw the family still trying to survive in the wake of terrible tragedy.

Paramount is naturally looking to launch a cinematic universe, and ‘Day One’ is the first flag stuck in the ground for that. Originally to be directed by Jeff Nichols (who left to pursue another film project he’d set up), the established script has passed to Sarnoski, who won acclaim for 2021’s ‘Pig’, starring Nicolas Cage and Wolff.

Nicolas Cage and Alex Wolff in ‘Pig’

He’s since worked on the screenplay and is now gearing up to direct, having cast Lupita Nyong’o and ‘Stranger Things’ Joseph Quinn in the movie.

‘Day One’s plot remains a mystery for now, though the title points to it being set on the first day that the aliens arrived and began causing chaos (which is glimpsed briefly at the start of ‘Part II’). The characters appear unlikely to interact with Blunt and co., this story heading off in a different direction.

And Wolff is far from a stranger to scary stuff: he’s appeared in movies such as Ari Aster’s ‘Hereditary’ and M. Night Shyamalan’s ‘Old’.

‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ will be out on March 8th next year. And if you were wondering what Blunt and the kids have been up to, Krasinski is still looking to make ‘Part III’ of the main film series ready for 2025.

Emily Blunt as Evelyn Abbott in 2018’s ‘A Quiet Place.’
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January 23, 2023
First Teaser for Christopher Nolan’s ‘Oppenheimer’

Having famously switched his filmmaking operations to Universal from longtime home Warner Bros. after dissatisfaction with the straight-to-HBO handling of some movies and its treatment of ‘Tenet’, Christopher Nolan has been working away on his next movie, ‘Oppenheimer’.

Universal, naturally, is going all out to promote this one, including with this first, unusual teaser, which features fragments of footage from the film, some voice-over dialogue referring to its subject matter and an ominous countdown clock.

Some have speculated that it’s to the release date – but not in America, as those figures don’t sync up. But with the movie opening in Singapore the day before its Stateside release, it makes more sense.

Nolan here is adapting the Pulitzer Prize-winning book ‘American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer’ by Kai Bird and the late Martin J. Sherwin. It chronicles how he was part of the infamous Manhattan Project and played a key role in the creation of atomic weapons, yet later came to have complicated feelings about their deadly power. He lobbied for international control of nuclear power and opposed the creation of the even more destructive hydrogen bomb.

Cillian Murphy, a Nolan regular, plays Oppenheimer, who is glimpsed briefly in this first footage.

Cillian Murphy as J. Robert Oppenheimer in ‘Oppenheimer’ written and directed by Christopher Nolan.

Emily Blunt is playing his wife, biologist, and botanist Katherine “Kitty” Oppenheimer, with Matt Damon as General Leslie Groves Jr., director of the Manhattan Project and Robert Downey, Jr. as Lewis Strauss, a founding commissioner of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission.

Florence Pugh will portray psychiatrist Jean Tatlock, who turns out to have a hidden agenda, while Benny Safdie plays theoretical physicist Edward Teller. Michael Angarano is physicist Robert Serber and Josh Hartnett plays pioneering American nuclear scientist Ernest Lawrence.

Also among the cast? Kenneth Branagh, Rami Malek, Gary Oldman, Dane DeHaan, Jack Quaid, Scott Grimes, Dylan Arnold, Olivia Thirlby, Olli Haaskivi, Matthew Modine, Gustaf Skarsgård (yes, another son of Stellan, and aged between Alexander and Bill), Jason Clarke, David Dastmalchian, Alden Ehrenreich, Casey Affleck, Tony Goldwyn, Alex Wolff, Josh Peck, James D’Arcy, David Krumholtz…

Look, at this point it’s probably easier just to list the people who aren’t in Nolan’s latest. It might be the first end credits crawl in years where the cast runs for a longer time than the effects teams.

‘Oppenheimer’ sees Nolan tackling a historical subject again, and one that surely offers the opportunity for plenty of his terse dialogue and large-canvas visions. It won’t surprise you to learn that it has been shot and be and released on 65mm IMAX and large-format film. Providing the beautiful footage is another repeat Nolan colleague, director of photography Hoyte Van Hoytema, while composer Ludwig Göransson returns after scoring ‘Tenet’. A pulse-pounding biopic thriller with high stakes certainly feels like it could work well for Nolan.

‘Oppenheimer’ will be in theaters here from July 21st.

Cillian Murphy as J. Robert Oppenheimer in ‘Oppenheimer’ written and directed by Christopher Nolan.
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July 28, 2022
M. Night Shyamalan and Alex Wolff Discuss ‘Old’

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In the new movie ‘Old,’ Alex Wolff (‘Pig,’ ‘Hereditary’) plays a boy that suddenly turns into a teenager, and his family is aging just as rapidly. This mind-bending movie is written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan, (‘The Sixth Sense,’ ‘Unbreakable’) and they spent some time talking to us about their new movie.

Writer/director M. Night Shyamalan on the set of ‘Old’

First up, M. Night Shyamalan talks about the writing process and using the camera to show the passage of time.

Moviefone: What was your process for writing the screenplay?

M. Night Shyamalan: The screenplay, I needed it to be kind of this slow revving up and then this kind of tumbling, so it would happen so fast that the characters were having a tough time internalizing everything that was happening, and you’d feel breathless. To get that cadence right was the tricky part, and a lot of characters, and getting this darker comedic tone that’s underlying everything. So it was a tricky process to get that movement.

MF: What were the end themes, your goal for the themes for the script?

Shyamalan: It’s about our relationship to time. We all have a screwed up relationship to time. And the pandemic kind of underlined that when we had to stop, and we were all so bad at that, at stopping and looking around. And it felt painful. And we didn’t know… Just take a breath and take in where we are and who you’re with.

And this story is a little bit the reverse of that, kind of. When it’s going so fast, do you do that? Do you take it in? That’s the only way to deal with time, no matter how fast it’s going, be present. So it’s about those themes of being present versus trying to beat time.

MF: The premise of the movie I found so intriguing, it’s quick aging. Now it’s not just physical aging though, it’s also mental aging to go along with it.

Shyamalan: Yeah, that was a huge part of it. As I’m getting older, and thinking, I’m imagining how our minds are taking in information differently. And I find that a fascinating part about getting older, how your thoughts come to you differently.

And when I think about when I go see my parents and all, they think in much broader movements, and they take in things in a larger way than I do. And then I’m thinking in a slightly larger way than my kids do.

They’re taking more frenetic energy and information in a different way. How we think changes. And that was a fun aspect of getting older on a beach, where you can actually realize your thoughts are changing because they’re happening so fast. Hey, in the morning I was thinking this way, and now I’m thinking in a different way.

MF: What kind of discussions did you have with your younger actors, though? Because there is something like life lessons, right? As you grow older, and you do start thinking differently, you have though lived all those days, and you’ve actually experienced things to think that way, but really they haven’t in this movie. They’re just hour by hour getting older.

Shyamalan: It was a fascinating thing. I spent a lot of time with the actors saying, “This is not Tom Hanks in ‘Big.’ This is not you suddenly 40-year-old body, but you’re 12 years old. You are thinking like a 40-year-old. Your mind is taking in information like a 40-year-old, but you have no life experience between 12 and 40. So it’s a very fascinating contradiction. There’s whole gaps in your knowledge, but I’m listening to you and taking in what you’re saying in a different way than a 12-year-old would. So a very different kind of thing. The matrix of how you’re taking in information is older, but you have no life experience.” So it was fascinating conversations we had.

MF: The shooting location was beautiful, it was very claustrophobic, very prison-like. What was your overall visual style for the film?

Shyamalan: Oh, we had all kinds. We could go on forever about the visual language of the movie. We tried to have it a set of languages that the audience could feel. They wouldn’t know it, but they would feel it. One of them, for example, is that the camera moves independently from the actors. So they’re representing time’s kind of, it’s not connected to you. It just keeps moving and moving.

So it’ll keep spinning around the actors, and your big events are happening off camera, and you’re missing it. And you may catch it on camera, you may not, but you get that sense that the camera’s moving of its own accord, just like time is. And we had lots of shots like that, even zooms like that, that are moving without regard to the characters. And they’re just glancing the frame as you’re focusing in on something.

Gael García Bernal and Alex Wolff in ‘Old’

Star Alex Wolff also talked about the movie.

Moviefone: I found the premise of this movie so intriguing. What was your initial reaction to the script?

Alex Wolff: I was shouting. It was so intense and so visceral. It’s just beautifully written, too. And I was shocked. Jaw dropping, everything, but I think I was surprised by what an emotional movie it is. How deep the movie goes. So I think that’s what my main response was. “Damn, he’s going for it this time. He’s really going for our hearts and our stomachs.”

MF: And I think part of that is, because the movie’s about aging, growing old very quickly, but it’s not just physical aging, it’s mental aging, I think, that gets you.

Wolff: Yeah, I think so, too. I think it’s one of the main things. And I think that it happens just so rapidly that we don’t really stop to examine how we’ve changed, but it’s terrifying to look back and see both how we’ve changed and how we haven’t changed at all. And I think that’s just such a fascinating way of looking at time.

MF: What was your preparation for this? Because although it’s very simple to say, “Oh yeah, now you’re not six anymore. Now you’re 30,” or whatever, but your character, although is thinking like an adult at 30, you didn’t have all those life experiences between six and 30.

Wolff: That’s exactly what Night would say, too. So I found that to be hard. I found that to be, every day, a new struggle of how to exactly balance out both maybe some child psychological things of displacement and things of what kids deal with, with their bodies and how your arms are so long. And how you’re looking at the sand, and it looks different as you get older, but then also having new emotional tools and new ways to express. And I just found that to be, every day was a full journey of discovery. But I did a lot of research of just reading a bunch of child psychology books. And Piaget and Bruno Bettelheim, and reading these books that clicked me into maybe some certain physical attributes that that kids have, or certain developmental issues or developmental processes that I didn’t know about, I wasn’t privy to. So I think that was part of the process. And then I had to just go back to re-examine who I was as a kid, and how I was, and face it, which is scary but fun.

MF: The adults in the movie, it’s not so obvious that they’re aging, but for the younger people, it’s very obvious. What was that makeup process like for the aging?

Wolff: Well, you see that little boy in the trailer. That’s actually me. I’m just kidding. No. That’s another actor and he was amazing. And we had to all be in sync. So that was really fun. I did have someone come up to me on the street, though, yesterday. And they said, “Wait, so you’re the little boy in that movie Old?” And I was like, “You’re close, no cigar. No, I’m not six years old.” I was like, “You’re really close.” And they couldn’t figure it out. So they just walked away, and they were like, “All right, I know you’re in that movie somewhere, but you don’t look like you’re six.” And I was like, “Thank you.”

MF: Hilarious. It’s funny that they gave up and walked away, but in my mind, I’m like, “That’s not so hard to figure out.”

Wolff: That’s how I felt, but I don’t know. I did find it funny that they gave up too. And that they stayed for a long enough time that they could’ve thought, “Oh, you age in the movie,” but no. “It was, you’re either the six-year-old, or you’re not in that movie.” And so I just went with like, “Okay, I guess I’m not in the movie.” Meanwhile, then I turn around. There’s a massive billboard for the movie.

MF: It’s movie magic!
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July 22, 2021
Alex Wolff Says Nicolas Cage “Taught Me Everything I Know”

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In the upcoming film ‘Pig,’ Alex Wolff plays Amir, a slick supplier of high-end ingredients to high-end restaurants. Wolff has appeared in both blockbusters like ‘Jumanji’ and indies like ‘Hereditary’ in 2018, and his newest movie falls squarely in the latter category. He co-stars with Nicolas Cage, who plays a hermetic truffle hunter whose only contact with the outside world is Amir. At this point, Cage’s career is legendary, with early roles in movies like ‘Valley Girl’ and ‘Peggy Sue Got Married’ then working with iconic directors like the Coen Brothers on ‘Raising Arizona’ and Martin Scorsese on ‘Bringing Out the Dead.’ So it should come as no suprise to hear Wolff describe working with Cage was a profound, life-changing experience, and he sat down with us to talk about the new movie.

Nicolas Cage and Alex Wolff in ‘Pig’

Moviefone: This is the second really powerful movie I’ve seen you do that really delves into grief. But this has a different take on grief, was that something that was attractive to you when you saw the script?

Alex Wolff: What was the first one you mean? Are you talking about Hereditary?

MF: Hereditary.

Wolff: Well, that’s interesting. I would say the grief is a theme in this. I’d say grief has run through a lot of the themes of maybe a lot of the work that I’ve done, and maybe represents something in me. But I feel that this movie in some ways is as much about friendship and learning how to make a friend than it is about grief. I’d say it’s a really fun, just kind, emotional wallop, this one.

MF: What’s it like collaborating with Nicolas Cage? You guys have a lot of scenes together and play off each other really nicely.

Wolff: A lot of people talk about their costars as it being a special relationship and whatever, but this was a whole other level of profoundly inspiring for me. And we did some interviews about it earlier, and I was stifling tears the entire time. As trite is that may sound, we were so… He’s the whole reason I really even started acting, and so to get to be learning from him every day and have him guide me through these scenes and carry me through these obstacles was an experience that I’ll never have again, and I would never ask for that again. It was a real gift from the world. I don’t know what I did to deserve it, but this couldn’t have been a more deep, beautiful, inspiring, rewarding process.

MF: You’ve got some great scenes with Adam Arkin, too, who kind of stealthily sneaks in here and hits you with some emotion, too.

Wolff: He’s incredible. My mom had done a play with him years ago, and so I knew him as a little boy. So it was so funny coming back and doing this thing of him being my dad. I started to be like, “Wait, you’re not my real dad, are you?” Just kidding. But no, he’s unbelievable and terrific.

MF: There’s that great scene, I don’t want to give too much away, but did you get to learn to cook a particular recipe on set for that one scene?

Wolff: I followed Nic around. I followed Nic and his cooking endeavors. I really just took all my cues from him, and he helped me cook these things. I mean, Nic became a real chef.

MF: You’ve got a bunch of scenes where you’re driving a car around. Is that you driving? Is it being towed on a trailer?

Wolff: Oh, wow. I did not expect this question. Well, some people are going to get in trouble. I actually don’t have my license, and yet I was really driving. I live in New York, I take the subway everywhere. And yet I lied and said I did have my license, and they let me drive, and I drove a super expensive, really cool Camaro. And it was just wildly dangerous, wildly fun. And I couldn’t have done it with anyone other than Nic in the passenger’s seat.

MF: Was it nerve-wracking knowing that you don’t have your license?

Wolff: No. So fun. It was more fun. I felt like I was playing a trick on everybody, it was very fun. And I’d be in the car with Nic, and I’d be like ummmm…? He knew that I didn’t have a license… (imitating Cage) “C’mon, boy!” And someone else backed the car up.

MF: How much time did you spend in Portland for the production?

Wolff: A couple of months, but it felt like that’s a huge moment in my life. That is a marker of a change in my just evolution as a person.

MF: What do you think you’re going to take with you after working with Nic? Anything that’s rubbed off, and you think, “Oh, I picked that up from him?”

Wolff: I literally feel like I was a different actor before I worked with him. It was as if I worked with him, and I was, every day, my brain was taking enormous notes and soaking them in like a sponge. So I thought that the next thing I did was all an amalgamation of things he taught me. I just feel like he taught me everything that I know, and I feel like that may happen a few times in my life, where to boil it down to one thing would super minimize what I got.

‘Pig’ will be in theaters on July 16.
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July 14, 2021
‘Hereditary’s Alex Wolff Will Star in Thriller ‘The Line’

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Alex Wolff, who was so great as the tormented older brother in “Hereditary,” will star in thriller “The Line.”

It’s being described as “a coming-of-age thriller at a university that encapsulates both the wild excitement of being young, and the dangers of living without fear of consequences.”

The film will costar John Malkovich, Scoot McNairy (“Narcos: Mexico,” “Argo”) Jessica Barden (“The Lobster”) and Lewis Pullman (“The Strangers: Prey at Night”).

Ethan Berger and Alex Russek wrote the script, with Berger set to direct. It will be the first feature film for both.

Wolff is making his own directorial debut with “The Cat and the Moon.” He also wrote the screenplay and stars as a teenager who, when his mother goes to rehab, stays with a jazz musician (Mike Epps) who was friends with his late father.

He got his start along with his brother Nat Wolff in “The Naked Brothers Band.”

[Via THR]

March 26, 2019