Moviefone Editorial

Tag: luc-besson

  • The ‘Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets’ Trailer Will Blow Your Mind

    It’s very easy to say that something is unlike anything you’ve ever seen before, especially since it’s very rare that something (especially a major motion picture) can be all that different. But after watching the trailer for Luc Besson‘s upcoming sci-fi extravaganza “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets,” it’s very clear that the movie, which opens next summer, will be unlike anything you’ve ever seen before.Dane DeHaan and Cara Delevingne in Valerian and the City of a Thousand PlanetsIf you’ve never heard of “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets,” you’ve still probably been exposed to it (at least tangentially) — the French comic books that the film is based on (Jean-Claude Mézières and Pierre Christin) are said to have influenced George Lucas when he was crafting the “Star Wars” series. So, you know, there’s that. Based on this teaser trailer, though, it’s a lot more outrageous, wacky, and fun than anything George cooked up.

    The trailer is brief and mostly dialogue-free. There’s a truly incredible song backing the action that will probably blow your mind when you hear it, but Besson asked that we keep it a secret (for now). But pretty much from the very beginning your jaw will be on the floor. This movie looks like it crams an almost incalculable amount of science fiction-y stuff in it: robots, aliens (dozens of different species), monsters, glittering futuristic cities, spaceships (the main characters’ signature ride was designed with the help of Lexus), characters running on beams of energy, different planets, and, of course, ray guns. There’s one shot that’s looking down towards the city and I swear to god there are flying carpets zooming past. (For those wondering, the majority of the visual effects were split between Weta and Industrial Light & Magic.)Alpha Space Station Docking Bay Extras K-Tron Warriors sets from "Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets"You get a sense of the playful, almost-romantic banter between intergalactic peace-keeping agents Valerian (Dane DeHaan) and Laureline (Cara Delevingne), without ever getting into the narrative nitty gritty. And almost as eye-popping as the various aliens, spaceships, and robots, is an appearance by a positively radiant Rihanna, who as we all know is so perfect she might as well be an android.

    At the end of the tease comes a very delicious tag line: “A universe without boundaries needs heroes without limits.” Aaaaaand is it Summer 2017 yet?

    After watching the trailer, we mingled with Besson, who was on hand to answer any questions and also to have some wine and cheese with a small assortment of journalist (he’s French, after all!) The filmmaker said of “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets,” “It’s my dream sci-fi movie.” And there’s a sense that he has been working towards this film his entire career — “The Fifth Element,” which will be 20 years old by the time “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets” hits the big screen, felt like an initial stab at this kind of material. It, too, was inspired by French comic books (Mézières was often cited) and had a similarly decadent, larger-than-life aesthetic (those Jean Paul Gaultier costumes!)

    But it’s not just “The Fifth Element” that “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets” calls to mind. There’s also echoes of the absurdist humor that ran through things like “Angel-A” and “The Family,” and the kind of harmonious one-love message of his brilliant “Lucy,” which was sort of like Terrence Malick’s contemplative “Tree of Life” but remade as a late-night direct-to-Cinemax action movie. And someone from Besson’s EuropaCorp told us that the original comic books that inspired “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets” have largely informed Besson’s entire career, from the way he writes rat-a-tat dialogue between actors to his fascination with a strong female central character.Star Dane DeHaan, director Luc Besson and star Cara Delevingne team up for EuropaCorp's Valerian and the City of a Thousand PlanetsWhen I asked Besson about Alexandre Desplat‘s score for the film (which, honestly, seems like an odd tonal fit considering the composer’s rather somber proclivities), since it was announced that he would be handling the music shortly after leaving similar duties on “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story,” Besson said he hadn’t heard anything yet. “He starts this week,” Besson explained. So while things that he had been tinkering with for “Star Wars” could end up in the mix for “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets” (and given how long Desplat was a part of “Rogue One,” that seems likely), Besson hasn’t heard a note.

    Besson has secured the rights to nine of the comic books in the series and will have a script for the second film by the time “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets” hits screens next summer (a trilogy has been fully mapped out, as of now), so if the movie turns out to be as awe-inspiring as the trailer suggests, there should be a lot more from the franchise coming your way very soon.

    But let’s not get ahead of ourselves, here; for now let’s all get really excited about “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets.” (Between this and “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2,” Summer 2017 is going to be full of really crazy space operas.)

    If two minutes of “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets” leaves you borderline speechless, imagine what the whole movie will do.

  • 11 Greatest Female BAMFs in Movie History

    %Slideshow-370856%What’s the legacy of “La Femme Nikita,” which opened stateside 25 years ago this week?

    Well, it spawned an American remake (“Point of No Return“), two TV series, and a filmmaking career (Luc Besson’s) centered on telling stories of strong women fighting against a world of brutality and betrayal. But it also spawned a new kind of action heroine: sexy, stylish, lethal, full of attitude — and not afraid to show the emotional toll of her violent ways. Here, then, is a celebration of Nikita and the badass heroines who have followed in her stiletto-heeled footsteps.

  • ‘Taken 3’ Review: Only Liam Neeson Die-Hards Need Apply

    liam neeson in taken 3When “Taken” was first released, nobody thought that it would lead to anything, much less an insanely lucrative franchise. It was a modestly budgeted thriller ($25 million) that was first released overseas, in France, where its core creative team was from and where the film was mostly set. It starred Liam Neeson, who at the time was not much of a box office draw, and had a grippingly simplistic story, the kind of stuff compulsively readable paperbacks novels are made of. But then it came out and connected with people in a big way, making more then $225 million and leading to a sequel that made even more. In an era when studios are trying to artificially manufacture franchises and entire universes, “Taken” came out of nowhere and lasted much longer than anyone could have guessed.

    But just because something is a franchise, doesn’t mean that it necessarily should be one. This weekend’s “Taken 3” makes this lesson explicitly clear.

    In “Taken 3” nobody is taken (this was a stipulation Neeson made); instead the genre is refashioned as a “wrong man” thriller, with Neeson’s Bryan Mills on the run from both the police (led by a goateed Forest Whitaker) and assorted Eastern European thugs (they have bad accents, worse haircuts, and prison tattoos), after his ex-wife (Famke Janssen) turns up murdered. Those “particular set of skills” that Neeson famously remarked upon in the first movie are this time utilized to get him out of a number of sticky situations, all while trying to clear his name and bring down the actual killers.

    And honestly, as a premise, especially for a franchise as threadbare as “Taken,” this could have been pretty fun. These kinds of movies, whether their Alfred Hitchcock classics or something like Harrison Ford‘s “The Fugitive,” offer a very specific thrill, since as a law abiding citizen it’s uncomfortably easy to place yourself in the shoes of someone who was accused of something they had nothing to do with. The catharsis, of course, comes from the accused overcoming the odds and actually finding a certain level of justice and understanding.

    The problem is that the movie is limply directed, once again by “Taken 2” auteur Olivier Megaton, so nothing seems to matter. You would think that the stakes couldn’t be higher, although everything is photographed with the wistful negligence and technical expertise of a daytime soap opera or a commercial for laundry detergent. The propulsive drive of this kind of story simply isn’t there; everything feels slack and lazy.

    Most of this isn’t the fault of the performers. Neeson is, yet again, the epitome of composed cool and fierce determination; he’s a hulking physical presence but never brutish, his eyes glitter with fiery intelligence and every movement suggests tightly coiled, barely contained rage. When a police officer mutters that, “This is going to end badly for you,” Neeson blinks and says (in that beautifully gravelly delivery), “Don’t be such a pessimist.” Yes Liam Neeson yes.

    It’s just that the script, co-written by series overseer Luc Besson and his writing partner Robert Mark Kamen, gives Neeson (and Whitaker and sweaty series newcomer Dougray Scott, who delivers every line in a weirdly timed, Christopher Walken-esque cadence) precious little to do. Frantic action sequences pop up every once in a while, but Megaton shoots them with little regard for spatial relationships or more generalized geography. So people run into other people and cars crash into other cars, but you can’t tell exactly who is running or crashing into who.. The actors try desperately to add some weight to these sequences, but they’re so joyless and confusing that they barely register as complete scenes. Instead they’re just a series of images that flit by without narrative importance or emotional resonance. (The less said about a clumsy, out-of-left-field subplot involving the unplanned pregnancy of Neeson’s college-aged daughter, played by 31-year-old actress Maggie Grace, the better.)

    Honestly, it didn’t have to be this way. Besson is certainly capable of turning trashy material into world-class entertainment (as with last year’s wonderful “Lucy”) and Neeson continues to be one of the most compelling action heroes we’ve seen on screen in years, particularly in his team-ups with filmmakers like Joe Carnahan and Jaume Collet-Serra. But any chance of a celebratory send-off to the “Taken” series (if this is, indeed, that, since the conclusion certainly leaves room for a fourth film down the line) is dashed by “Taken 3’s” utterly lackluster execution.

    “Taken” was never envisioned as a franchise and this third film makes it very apparent why. Even a cracking good story, repeated too many times, robs it of its power, even if that story is growled at you by Liam Neeson.

    Bottom line: Only Neeson die-hards need apply. This doesn’t do a satisfactory job of wrapping up the franchise or providing much entertainment value at all. Instead, download Neeson’s recent, brilliant, wholly overlooked detective movie “A Walk Among the Tombstones.”
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