Though things have been awfully quiet for the last couple of years, it seems that the ‘Tron’ grid might actually be coming back online. According to Deadline, Disney is busy making a deal with director Joachim Rønning to make ‘Tron: Ares’, with Jared Leto attached to star.
The latest installment of the venerable sci-fi trilogy (which has become used to big gaps between movies––after all, ‘Tron: Legacy’ hit screens 28 years after 1982’s original) is gearing back up again after rumors of other filmmakers looking to tackle it.
‘Tron’, for those who are somehow unaware, starred Jeff Bridges and was set inside a computer program called the Grid, where Bridges’ computer hacker is abducted and forced to participate in gladiatorial games alongside the heroic title character (Bruce Boxleitner).
The movie didn’t set the box office alight, but its envelope-pushing computer generated effects were groundbreaking for the time and it became a cult favorite.
It was also enough of a known name for Disney––a company that thrives on raiding its back catalogue for potential source material––to commission the follow-up. ‘Legacy’ saw Bridges reprising his role (this time playing both hacker Kevin Flynn and Clu, his villainous virtual (and de-aged) counterpart, and Garrett Hedlund and Olivia Wilde joining the franchise.
Olivia Wilde as Quorra in ‘Tron: Legacy.’
‘Legacy’ director Joseph Kosinski talked up the idea of a sequel around that movie’s release, but development stalled out and he moved on to other things, including a slightly successful other legacy sequel called ‘Top Gun: Maverick.’
Leto’s name was first mentioned back in 2017, when he tweeted his excitement to be part of a follow-up movie. “I am so very excited and proud to confirm that YES––I will be starring in ‘Tron,’ ” he wrote. “We will work as hard as we possibly can to create something that I hope you all will love. We have some very special ideas in store for you all… See you in the grid! I’m struck with such gratitude for the opportunity to bring this movie to life, especially as both the original video game and the film affected me so deeply as a young child. The fact that I get to be a part of this new chapter is mind-blowing.”
Garth Davis, the director behind ‘Lion’ and 2018’s ‘Mary Magdalene’ was mentioned as a potential filmmaker, though despite aggressively pursuing the job, he’s since dropped off the project. Rønning, the Norwegian filmmaker who made his name co-directing voyaging movie ‘Kon-Tiki’, has become a reliable go-to director for Disney.
Deadline cautions that the deals are still being made, but a crew is being assembled for a potential August start to the shoot in Vancouver. Jesse Wigutow wrote the script and despite earlier versions being mentioned as a reboot, ‘Ares’ appears to be a direct sequel to ‘Legacy’.
Now we just wait to see if it boots up this time.
Jaed Leto in Apple TV+’s ‘WeCrashed.’
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Margot Robbie plays Nellie LaRoy in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.
Debuting in theaters on December 23rd, ‘Babylon’ is the latest film from Damien Chazelle, the writer-director of ‘Whiplash’ and ‘La La Land’. Unfortunately, it is also his weakest effort, though not for lack of ambition and scale.
Starting, perhaps as it means to go on with a desire for shock and even a metaphor for what happens to many of the characters in the movie, ‘Babylon’ features an elephant defecating noisily and filthily across an unfortunate man helping to push the truck it is riding in up a hill, the result also splattering the camera.
The animal is on its way to be the star attraction a lavish Hollywood bash being held in the hills, and one of the people helping to get it there is Manny Torres (Diego Calva), who fortunately avoids being covered in Proboscidea poop.
He ends up hired to help out at the party and has his first experience of roaring ‘20s Hollywood––or at least its decadent, wild excessive side––where sweaty, near-naked crowds writhe in time to jazz music. Drugs and booze are in free supply, all thanks to the host, veteran actor Jack Conrad (Brad Pitt) who shows up with his latest soon-to-be-ex-wife, played in a brief scene by Olivia Wilde.
(L to R) Brad Pitt plays Jack Conrad and Diego Calva plays Manny Torres in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.
Looking to gatecrash is Nellie LaRoy (Margot Robbie), an ambitious young woman convinced she has untapped star power, and who ends up scoring a lucky break, setting her star on the rise as Jack starts to see his own begin to fall.
Manny––who befriends Nellie––is captivated by the idea of working in Hollywood, and sees his own prospects enhanced when one of Jack’s team asks him to make sure the sozzled actor gets home safely. From there, Manny works his way up the ranks, his good ideas for movies helping boost his career in the fictional film studio of the story.
‘Babylon’ is primarily the story of Manny, Nellie and Jack, with some attention paid to jazz musician Sidney Palmer (Jovan Adepo), who will carve his own path out in the entertainment industry, performer Lady Fay Zhu (Li Jun Li), and gossip columnist Elinor St. John (Jean Smart).
The characters’ arcs weave in and out of each other, as Nellie becomes more and more famous (while her gambling habits and other addictions catch up to her) and Chazelle roams from party to party, interspersed by scenes where movies are made.
Jovan Adepo plays Sidney Palmer in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.
Around them, Hollywood begins to evolve from the silent era to the age of talkies, and from rough-and-ready shooting in the desert to cavernous soundstages.
Robbie is particularly vibrant in the film, finding different layers to her character as she moves through the business, and is convincing at every step. Whether she’s conniving to get her name in lights, or overhearing people talking her down, this is further proof that she’s one of the best working at the moment. Pitt, meanwhile, commits to the easy charm of Conrad, whose career is on the wane as audiences don’t warm to him once talking pictures come along.
Calva, who is probably best known to American audiences from ‘Narcos: Mexico’, is something of a revelation, a soulful presence in the movie who worries that his soul is tainted as he climbs the executive ranks and then has to help Nellie out of her money problems.
Smart, whose gossip hound flits in and out of the story, is particularly strong, though she’s not often on screen for more than a minute or so. But her big scene with Jack, where she explains his downward slide, is a highlight. Li, meanwhile, who is also largely on the sidelines, makes the most of her role.
Margot Robbie plays Nellie LaRoy in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.
And there are certainly elements to recommend here: in some scenes, ‘Babylon’ has a pleasing level of comedy, especially when director Ruth Adler (Olivia Hamilton) and Nellie are trying to shoot a scene in the early sound era, where mic positions, concerns over volume and particularly an overheating cameraman, provide memorable laughs.
Chazelle unfortunately loses focuses when it comes to the theme of the film, though. Certainly, there is plenty to be mined from the idea of Hollywood and this time, but ‘Babylon’, for all its length and intertwined stories, merely scrapes the surface. The concept that the entertainment industry is a place for excess and fraught with problems for those who seek stardom is hardly a fresh one, and the movie has little to say that is new or interesting.
This is much bigger than his previous efforts, but it soon becomes ungainly, and is loaded down with flabby scenes that add little. Even a crazed moment for Calva, where he’s seeking financial help from the distinctly dodgy James McKay, played by Tobey Maguire, which takes in freaks, torture implements and an alligator, feels like it could easily be lost in the service of reducing the movie’s overinflated running time.
Tobey Maguire plays James McKay in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.
The less said about the final montage that wraps up the movie, the better, to be honest. It’s meant to celebrate the movies but ends up an embarrassingly amateur example, cramming in easy highpoints and coming across as something out of a film school offering.
Given that he’s been planning and writing the movie in his head for around 15 years, we’re sorry to report that Chazelle has fumbled this one. ‘Babylon’ is not without its charms and some diversion, but beyond the main cast’s appeal, it is a lot of sound and fury, signifying––not nothing––but not much.
‘Babylon’ receives 2.5 out of 5 stars.
(L to R) Margot Robbie plays Nellie LaRoy and Diego Calva plays Manny Torres in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.
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Moviefone recently had the pleasure of sitting down in-person with writer and director Damien Chazelle to talk about his work on ‘Babylon,’ what audiences can expect from the new movie, why he was interested in this point in Hollywood’s history, casting Pitt and Robbie, and the importance of music in his films.
‘Babylon’ writer and director Damien Chazelle.
You can read the full interview below or click on the video player above to watch our interviews with Chazelle, as well as actors Jovan Adepo and Li Jun Li.
Moviefone: To begin with, what would you say to moviegoers getting ready to sit down and watch this film to prepare them for the experience they’re about to have?
Damien Chazelle: That’s a good question. I would say just to prepare yourself for a wild ride. It’s not the kind of movie about older Hollywood that I think anyone is expecting. It’s shocking, it’s wild, it’s crazy, it’s a roller coaster ride, it’s an adventure, and it’s a party. I would say to go in with that in mind.
But beyond that, I don’t know, I wouldn’t say much. I think ultimately I made this movie for audiences, for them to have an experience. I think whatever mindset you’re in when you sit down in the theater for this movie, it will sweep you up and it’s going to take you for a ride whether you want to or not.
MF: What was it about this era in Hollywood’s history, the period moving from silent films to talkies, that really fascinated you and what were some of the themes you wanted to explore with this movie?
DC: Well, a lot of it had to do with just how unhinged the society was at that time. I just hadn’t realized the extent to which people at that time partied, how hard they lived, how hard they worked, and how recklessly and transgressively they operated. It was this circus atmosphere that I think in many ways got lost once Hollywood became a little more sanitized and regulated, and became more of a corporate industry.
The Hollywood in this movie is right before that. It’s the last gasp of the wild West of early Hollywood when it was still unregulated. It was like people pitching a tent in the desert and making their movies, and doing them the way they wanted to. There was just this manic, hysterical atmosphere where anything went. That was key to try to capture that and take that as far as it went.
Brad Pitt plays Jack Conrad in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.
MF: Can you talk about casting and working with Brad Pitt and Margot Robbie?
DC: It was amazing. As a director, it’s a dream come true. They’re such seasoned actors so, yes, on the one hand, you’re getting these larger-than-life movie stars, and they’re playing larger-than-life movie stars in the movie, so that’s kind of perfect. But they’re also just real thespians.
They deliver. They know how to craft performances that move you and make you laugh and cry and break your heart. They take you on a ride. I think they help ground this movie and make it human, so that even at its most excessive, larger-than-life, outrageous, shocking moments, you still feel a beating heart underneath. That’s thanks to them, I think, and the rest of the cast.
MF: Margot has a scene in the movie where her character has to cry on cue. Did she actually do that on set, or did you have to enhance it in post?
DC: That is Margot! Otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to shoot it. You can’t CG that!
Margot Robbie plays Nellie LaRoy in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.
MF: Finally, can you talk about Justin Hurwitz’s music for the film and the importance of music in all your movies?
DC: Music comes early on for me. I work with the same composer, Justin Hurwitz, for all my movies. We’ve worked together since college. We have a shorthand at this point. As soon as I have a script, I hand it to him, and he starts working on the music.
By the time I’m shooting, I’ve got a lot of the music already in place. We can play it on set and we can set the mood with it. We can have the actors dancing to it and thinking about it, and just letting it seep into their body. You get a sense of what the tone is right away. That’s really important to me, and especially with this movie. I knew I needed a very specific tone and a specific kind of energy and pulse, and that’s what the music provides.
Director Damien Chazelle on the set of ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.
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And the new film is a very, very different beast from that initial offering, swapping charming, warm coming-of-age antics and slapstick humor for paranoia, gaslighting and a theme that would feel right at home in a thriller from the 1970s.
We’re introduced to Alice Chambers (Florence Pugh) and husband Jack (Harry Styles) who count themselves lucky to be living in the idealized community of Victory, the experimental company town housing the men who work for the highly top secret Victory Project and their families.
The 1950’s societal optimism espoused by their boss Frank (Chris Pine) – who is equal parts corporate visionary and motivational life coach – influences every aspect of daily life in the tight-knit desert utopia, which is seemingly carved from the landscape in California’s Palm Springs.
While the husbands spend every day inside the Victory Project Headquarters, working on the “development of progressive materials,” their wives, including Frank’s elegant partner, Shelley (Gemma Chan) fill their time enjoying the beauty, luxury and debauchery of their community. Life is perfect, with every resident’s needs met by the company. All they ask in return is discretion and unquestioning commitment to the Victory cause.
Alice and Jack are initially thrilled with their lives, sizzling with sexual chemistry and barely able to keep their hands off each other when they’re at home, and at one point in Frank’s bedroom during a party.
Even though it might seem repetitive – Jack heads off to work, Alice cleans the house and busies herself with cooking, ballet and shopping – it’s so comfortable that no-one questions it. Until Alice starts to.
She’s spurred by the behavior of another wife, KiKi Layne’s Margaret, who has been having serious second thoughts after taking her son out to the restricted desert area outside the community, where he disappeared and is seemingly dead.
As Margaret’s actions grow more out of keeping with everyone else, Alice starts to feel a tingling sense of paranoia. Is this idealized life she’s living as, well, ideal? And her sense of reality starts to crumble.
Given that this is a psychological thriller, you know there will be something going on, but we won’t get into that here – the basic set-up is all you really need.
Wilde weaves a compelling, mysterious and stylish story, stretching a relatively thrifty $20-$30 million budget into an effective, layered world. She drip-feeds tension into the narrative from the off with the mysterious rumbles that shake the houses from time to time, written off by the residents as a side-effect of whatever the men are working on.
She and her team have built something that looks and sounds fabulous, whether it’s cinematographer Matthew Libatique’s sun-bleached visions of this community with its pastel, mid-century modern houses or John Powell’s score, which dials up the creepiness as the narrative moves on. Together with the sound team, it creates a real feeling of unease.
The script, from ‘Booksmart’s Katie Silberman, based on a story by her alongside Carey Van Dyke and Shane Van Dyke (yes, as in Dick Van Dyke – they’re his grandsons) serves as a solid example of the paranoia genre, crafting this world before challenging it.
While ‘Booksmart’ explored female friendship and teenage frustration, ‘Darling’ switches genres and attitude, but still keeps the focus on the experiences of women, taking in divided gender expectations of the past and gaslighting.
Pugh is, of course, fantastic, breathing conflicted life into Alice at every moment, whether she’s happily cooking up a roast, engaging in enthusiastic romance with her husband or seeing a plane crash in the desert that no one else wants to acknowledge.
Styles isn’t quite on her level, but he brings a charm and eagerness to Jack that works for the character, and when he’s called upon to do more than that, he handles it effectively.
Pine, meanwhile, is a smooth guru type, his voice full of a hypnotic, magnetic, confident smoothness that has everyone both ready to hang on his every word and yet remain slightly afraid of him.
The rest of the cast fill their roles well too – Chan playing the alpha wife to the hilt, while Wilde is Alice’s best friend Bunny, an amusing and slightly sarcastic homemaker with two kids and a slight drinking problem (though given the 1950s period, everyone happily guzzles booze, so it’s not as noticeable to them).
Despite being a key element of the story Layne doesn’t get as much to do, Margaret a slightly underserved character who edges towards cliché at times. It’s no fault of the actor, who brings a pained vulnerability to her role.
As the truth begins to dawn on Alice, and on us, the pace speeds up and the overall effect unravels slightly, the final act never quite as compelling as the build-up, the various details undercut in a more straightforward action-focused finale.
You might well figure out ahead of the characters what’s going on, and there are clues here and there sprinkled throughout the movie that verge on the less than subtle. Wilde has plenty of ideas that she wants to unpack, but not all of them arrive completely thought through – when the big revelations start to drop, the cracks in more than just Alice’s reality start to show and you’ll have questions not easily answered by the script.
Yet it still doesn’t diminish what has gone before and Pugh remains as committed as ever, spurring you to empathize with Alice even as she worries that she might be losing her mind. It’s twisted, audacious and, at least until the end, surprising. Ignore the unnecessary noise around the movie and let it transport you.
‘Don’t Worry Darling’ receives 3.5 out of 5 stars.
But for ‘Babylon’, Chazelle is thinking even bigger. He’s got Hollywood on his mind, and more specifically the 1920s, a pivotal time for both the movie industry and the city most identified with it.
At this point, Los Angeles is expanding rapidly, an infusion of money and people arriving, the latter on the hunt for wealth and fame.
Movies, and the performers who star in them, are making the difficult transition from the silent era to talkies, with some careers on the rise and some on the wane. It’s an idea that Chazelle – who won the Best Director Oscar for ‘La La Land’, but saw Best Picture go instead to ‘Moonlight’ during one of the biggest Oscar night surprise moments back in 2017 – has been percolating in his head for at least 15 years, ever since he moved to Los Angeles with his own dreams of success.
“The basic idea was just to do a big, epic, multi-character movie, set in these early days of Los Angeles and Hollywood, when both of these things were coming into what we now think of them as,” he tells Vanity Fair. “I kept putting it off, because it was just a little too massive.”
But with the likes of ‘Whiplash’, ‘La La Land’ and ‘First Man’ under his belt, he finally felt ready to tackle the giant movie he’d been making in his brain for years.
Brad Pitt plays Jack Conrad in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.
For the most part, the cast are playing fictional folk, albeit based on real movie stars of the time. Minghella is one of the exceptions, playing powerhouse producer Irving Thalberg.
Pitt’s hard-partying Jack Conrad, for example, has echoes of Clark Gable, and Douglas Fairbanks. “He’s reaching a point in his life in his career where he’s starting to look back and starting to wonder what’s ahead,” says Chazelle of the character.
Robbie, meanwhile, is Nellie LaRoy, burning with ambition and energy, who is the Clara Bow or Joan Crawford of the story. And Chazelle sees her as a good fit for the person playing her: “Margot as a person has this— it’s a very Australian sort of thing—brash, bold, hungry kind of edge to her that she was really able to tap into and do a lot of really fun things with.”
And then there’s Calva, playing Manny Torres, a Mexican immigrant who is a wide-eyed newcomer to the world and serves as the audience’s POV.
We’re promised wild, lavish parties, scandals and more when ‘Babylon’ opens in theaters on December 25th.
(L to R) Brad Pitt plays Jack Conrad and Diego Calva plays Manny Torres in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.(L to R) Diego Calva plays Manny Torres and Jean Smart plays Elinor St. John in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.Margot Robbie plays Nellie LaRoy in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.Margot Robbie plays Nellie LaRoy in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.Li Jun Li plays Lady Fay Zhu in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.(L to R) Lukas Haas plays George Munn and Diego Calva plays Manny Torres in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.Tobey Maguire plays James McKay in ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.Director Damien Chazelle on the set of ‘Babylon’ from Paramount Pictures.
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When a group of animals receive super powers, Lex Luthor’s (Marc Maron) guinea pig Lulu (Kate McKinnon) captures the Justice League and attacks Metropolis. Krypto (Dwayne Johnson), Superman’s (John Krasinski) dog, must now learn to work with his new friend Ace (Kevin Hart), in order to rescue his owner.
With the help of a turtle called Merton McSnurtle (Natasha Lyonne), Chip the squirrel (Diego Luna), and a pig named PB (Vanessa Bayer), Krypto must team with the other Super-Pets to defeat Lulu and save Superman, Batman (Keanu Reeves) and the rest of the JLA.
The result is a really fun, funny, and emotionally heart-warming animated movie filled with DC Easter eggs that is really about the love we share for our pets, and the unconditional love they give back to us.
The movie begins with a new origin story for Superman’s (Krasinski) dog Krypto (Johnson), which shows that Jor-El sent him with baby Kal-El to Earth to protect him while Krypton was exploding. Years later, Kal-El is all gown-up now living in Metropolis as Clark Kent by day and Superman by night, fighting crime with Krypto as his partner.
We soon meet Ace (Hart), a dog living with other animals at an animal shelter. While Ace devises a plan for he and the other animals to escape, Lulu (McKinnon), a guinea pig and former pet of Lex Luthor (Maron), utilizes orange Kryptonite to give herself and the other animals super powers. Using an army of mutated guinea pigs as her minions, she captures the Justice League and begins to destroy Metropolis.
With Superman missing, Krypto teams with the now super-powered Ace and his friends to form the League of Super-Pets in order to save the Justice League and stop Lulu. But Krypto only knows how to work with Superman and must now learn from his new friends how to be a team player.
‘DC League of Super-Pets’ works on several different levels and is a thoroughly enjoyable animated movie on all fronts. For kids, there is a lot of humor, lovable characters and fantastic animation. For adults, there is a sweet and sophisticated story about the unconditional love that our pets give us. And for DC fans, there are enough comic book Easter eggs and deep cut characters to make your head spin.
Writer and director Jared Stern, who helped pen the equally excellent ‘The Lego Batman Movie,’ perfectly captured the humor and fun of these classic DC characters that are pulled from different points of the cannon.
For example, Superman has a 1940’s Max Fleischercartoons inspired costume, but the character resembles Christopher Reeve. Aquaman has his 90’s era hook, while the filmmakers chose to include the recent version of Green Lantern from the comics, Jessica Cruz. All of this leads to a well-balanced and exciting animated version of the Justice League.
The voice cast is excellent, including actor and comedian Marc Maron, who plays a very realistic version of Lex Luthor. While her role is somewhat limited, Jameela Jamil plays an excellent version of as Wonder Woman, one that I wouldn’t mind seeing in live-action someday.
And speaking of actors we’d like to see reprise their roles in live-action, can someone please make a Batman movie starring Keanu Reeves already! The ‘John Wick’ actor is very funny but also very emotional playing an extremely depressed and haunted version of the Caped Crusader.
Kate McKinnon is also at her best in this film portraying the hilarious and absolutely evil Lulu. The actress is clearly having a lot of fun in her role, and the character is a great advisory for both the animal and human heroes in the movie.
But the film wouldn’t work quite as well as it did if not for the voice work of Dwayne Johnson and Kevin Hart. The two actors have worked together before, and have great chemistry on and off the set, which is apparent watching the film and adds to their characters’ relationship.
Hart, who is certainly funny in the movie, gives a more layered and emotional performance than we’ve seen from him in the past, which works really well for his character. You understand by the end of the movie why Ace is destined to partner with Batman, and the film gives a new origin story for himself and the other previously established DC animal characters in the movie.
Johnson, who seems to be taking over DC with ‘Black Adam’ headed to theaters in October, was the perfect actor to play Krypto. His voice is familiar and already associated in audience’s minds with heroics, doing half of the actor’s job for him before he utters his first line. But he also brings Krypto to life in a way we haven’t seen before, showing off his fears as much as his strength, while emphasizing his unconditional love and faithfulness to Superman.
In the end, if you take the DC elements out of the film, you still have an extremely charming and funny animated movie about the unconditional love we have for our pets and they have for us. What ‘DC League of Super-Pets’ does best is remind us that every dog is a superhero!
‘DC League of Super-Pets’ receives 4 out of 5 stars.
The movie stars Dwayne Johnson as Krypto, Superman’s (John Krasinski) dog. When a group of animals receive super powers, Lex Luthor’s (Marc Maron) guinea pig Lulu (Kate McKinnon) captures the Justice League and attacks Metropolis.
Now, Krypto must learn to work with his new friends, including a dog named Ace (Kevin Hart), a turtle called Merton McSnurtle (Natasha Lyonne), and Chip the squirrel (Diego Luna) in order to defeat Lulu and save Superman, Batman (Keanu Reeves) and the rest of the JLA.
Moviefone recently had the pleasure of speaking with writer and director Jared Stern about his work on ‘DC’s League of Super-Pets,’ creating new origins and designs for the characters, the DC animal characters they did not use, working with Dwayne Johnson and Kevin Hart, casting Keanu Reeves and Marc Maron, and why every dog is a superhero.
Moviefone: To begin with, can you talk about creating new origin stories for Krypto and Ace the Bat-Hound in ‘DC League of Super-Pets?’
Jared Stern: We’re fans of the comics. We never wanted to do something that felt wrong. But we also wanted to do something that felt original and fresh for our universe. Krypto has a few different origin stories over the course of comics’ canon. There’s one that’s really cool where he was set up as almost a test subject to make sure that baby Superman’s escape pod worked. Then in a convoluted way, he ends up getting to Earth after Superboy has already grown a bit, which was too confusing, but it’s a very cool story.
So that one was just a little confusing but it’s so much more emotional in our movie, hopefully, and gives you the connection right away that these two are best friends forever. So, when something gets in the way of that for Krypto, it’s going to be a huge deal. So, that’s why we went with the origin story that we did there.
Then for Ace, there’s multiple origin stories for him too, but I liked the notion of telling a story about a shelter pet, a dog who’s been there for a long time. Puppies get adopted more quickly than adult dogs and just the notion of the veteran, the guy that takes care of the other pets at the shelter. They’re idiots, but they’re his idiots, like ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.’ So, that just seemed to work for our Ace, to give him a bit of a grizzled backstory, befitting someone who could become a Bat-Dog.
MF: For the animal characters, you used a combination of classic DC animal heroes, as well as some new ones. Can you talk about that choice, and did you consider any other DC animal characters like Captain Carrot, Gleek, or Detective Chimp that didn’t make it into the final cut?
JS: I mean, there’s so many to choose from. It’s pretty great. You just named a few, I could name a bunch of others that I love. I’ll just think of one that no one would ever think was in the movie. Let’s see who I love. Let’s say Bat-Cow. But there’s just so many. I love Detective Chimp. There’s the original Legion of Super-Pets, which people love. So, Beppo, that’s a good one to go with. Let’s go with that, Beppo (a monkey), Comet (a horse) and Streaky (a cat).
They’re awesome, but they’re all in the Superman family. We really wanted to do a thing that could perhaps be an origin story for all of the Justice League’s pets, so that was the driving force behind. We knew that they were going to be shelter animals and that they were going to end up hopefully being Justice League pets, so that was what shaped the choices that we made.
Then from there, we picked some of our favorites and molded new origin stories for them as well. So, Chip obviously is a little bit different than what you might have seen in the comics, but still awesome. We also have Merton McSnurtle, who’s a deep cut from “Funny Stuff,” but has appeared in various ways over the years.
Then we created some new characters, like you said. Lulu is our own creation, the villain played by Kate McKinnon, a hairless guinea pig. We wanted a villain that was really actually pretty badass and capable but made sense in a movie where the pets are the ones saving the day. So, that’s where Lulu came from.
Then we have PB the pig. I love Wonder Woman’s pet Jumpa from the comics, but I couldn’t quite fathom there being a kangaroo in a local Metropolis animal shelter. So, that’s why we created PB the pig. But there’s a couple of nods to DC canon and Wonder Woman having a pig. There’s an early issue where she flies on a pig. Then there’s a famous ‘Justice League’ animated series episode where she gets turned into a pig by Circe.
MF: Can you talk about Dwayne Johnson’s involvement in this project, both as a producer and as the voice of Krypto, and what came first, casting Johnson or deciding to bring in his good friend Kevin Hart as the voice of Ace?
JS: It’s a good question. Dwayne’s involvement, I was thinking about from the very beginning. Sometimes you go to the studio and say, “With so-and-so, think this actor.” I swear to you when I pitched this movie I said, “Krypto the super dog. Think Dwayne Johnson.” Amazingly, we made it into reality. He said, yes, and he’s wonderful.
I think that is definitely when we started thinking about Kevin, because those two guys are so good together. But we didn’t want to just put them together just because it’s fun, because they have a good time, and that people love them together. That’s all true. But it only would’ve worked if we felt like Kevin was right as Ace the Bat-Hound.
We tested his voice out and listened to it. We noticed that he’s playing in a deeper register and he’s doing something very different. He’s still very funny in this. He’s still Kevin Hart, but he’s doing something really soulful and emotional. It’s a little bit of a lower voice for him, and I think it’s really fantastic. So, we didn’t want to just do it to do it. We did it because we felt like it would make for a really great story in our movie.
MF: As a DC fan, I thought you perfectly cast Keanu Reeves and Marc Maron as Batman and Lex Luthor, respectively. Can you talk about both of those casting choices?
JS: I’ll start with Maron, who I love. My co-director Sam Levine is an obsessive fan of the WTF Podcast. Sam is an animator and really smart about pairing voices. He just was like, “This is the voice.” He was absolutely right. He’s just such a great Lex Luther because he’s a guy who has everything and yet still can complain and be aggrieved. That’s our Lex. He’s a billionaire, but he’s just so frustrated that he can’t win.
Then for Keanu, our Batman is haunted. He’s a guy who’s seen a lot in his life. He’s still a badass Batman, but he’s a bit messed up. Most importantly, he’s the guy who just needs a pet. Keanu’s voice and what he did with it was really wonderful. I feel like he had a good time doing Batman and I’d love to make more Batman movies with Keanu Reeves any day.
MF: For the look of the Justice League, you went with a 1940’s inspired costume for Superman, Aquaman has his hook, and you chose Jessica Cruz from all the different Green Lanterns available. Can you talk about your design choices for the different Justice League members?
JS: I mean, it was a combination of a lot of stuff. We wanted to have a diverse lineup that looked like the whole world, so that could mean an Aquaman who’s from the South Pacific. That could mean a character like Aquaman who has a disability, a prosthetic limb. That could mean Jessica Cruz, and just trying to have a better gender balance between the characters. So, we just wanted it to look like the whole world without forcing it, without being preachy, just so that everyone could see themselves in the Justice League and the heroes.
Then in terms of the design, our character designers did a wonderful job. Even with the shapes of their body types, we wanted that to feel like the whole world. We just picked and chose from everywhere, all the stuff that we loved from the comics and then things that just felt right that were invented from our character designers.
So, there’s a little Christopher Reeve in our Superman, but there’s also a little bit of Max Fleischer in him as you noted. Our Cyborg is in some ways is a nod to the first Cyborg designs in the comics, but then he’s got his own little modern flare too. They all have a uniting gold element in them, which we felt connected to the golden age of DC and in our Metropolis.
MF: Finally, if you take the DC elements out of this movie, it’s really a film about a man that loves his dog, and vice versa. How did your own love for animals help inform you while developing and making this movie?
JS: Our producer Patty Hicks rescues and adopts German Shepherds. Everyone who worked on this, we’re all animal lovers and I think it comes through in the film. It’s a story about how much we love our pets and how much our pets love us. Every dog is a superhero because they love us unconditionally.
You know how it is… you think you’re living the perfect life in an idyllic community with all your needs taken care of and your neighbors a group of the best-looking people around.
And then you start to dig a little deeper and discover that it might all be built on a lie, and that the closer you get to the truth, the more danger there is.
All right, so very few people actually live that sort of life out of the movies, but that’s exactly the quandary that Alice (Florence Pugh) finds herself in in the latest trailer for Olivia Wilde’s ‘Don’t Worry Darling’.
The story for the new movie finds Alice and Jack (Harry Styles), who consider themselves lucky to be living in the idealized community of Victory, the experimental company town housing the men who work for the top-secret Victory Project and their families. The 1950’s societal optimism espoused by their CEO, Frank (Chris Pine) — equal parts corporate visionary and motivational life coach — anchors every aspect of daily life in the tight-knit desert utopia.
While the husbands spend every day inside the Victory Project Headquarters, working on the “development of progressive materials,” their wives — including Frank’s elegant partner, Shelley (Gemma Chan) — get to spend their time enjoying the beauty, luxury, and debauchery of their community. Life is perfect, with every resident’s needs met by the company. All they ask in return is discretion and unquestioning commitment to the Victory cause.
But when cracks in their idyllic life begin to appear, exposing flashes of something much more sinister lurking beneath the attractive façade, Alice can’t help questioning exactly what they’re doing in Victory, and why. Just how much is she willing to lose to expose what’s really going on in this paradise?
Wilde, who broke into directing with ‘Booksmart’ has made what looks like an intriguingly paranoid period thriller with shades of 1970s movies, ‘The Prisoner’ and the style of something that Stanley Kubrick would nod approvingly towards.
She also steps in front of the camera this time, as Mary, one of the wives who seeks to keeps the others from looking to deeply into their situation. Wilde also has Nick Kroll, Douglas Smith, Timothy Simons and KiKi Layne on the roster.
Working with cinematographer Matthew Libatique (a regular collaborator with Darren Aronofsky), and ‘Booksmart’ production designer Katie Byron, Wilde, who has a script from Katie Silberman, Carey Van Dyke, and Shane Van Dyke, certainly appears to have created something exciting, dramatic, and visually arresting.
‘Don’t’ Worry Darling’ will have you questioning the nature of your own reality when it arrives in theaters on September 23rd.
There’s a grand tradition of movies set in the 1950s and 60s that use seemingly perfect suburbia as a hotbed of paranoia and suspicion. Olivia Wilde is adding to it with her new film, ‘Don’t Worry Darling’.
Having launched her directorial career successfully with charming, witty comedy ‘Booksmart’, Wilde has a boosted budget and a starry cast for this new movie, which looks sumptuous and sexy, and promises the sorts of paranoid thrills that can bubble under a manufactured community such as the towns that popped up in remote desert locations near government or military facilities.
The story for the new movie finds Alice (Florence Pugh) and Jack (Harry Styles), who consider themselves lucky to be living in the idealized community of Victory, the experimental company town housing the men who work for the top-secret Victory Project and their families. The 1950’s societal optimism espoused by their CEO, Frank (Chris Pine) — equal parts corporate visionary and motivational life coach — anchors every aspect of daily life in the tight-knit desert utopia.
While the husbands spend every day inside the Victory Project Headquarters, working on the “development of progressive materials,” their wives — including Frank’s elegant partner, Shelley (Gemma Chan) — get to spend their time enjoying the beauty, luxury, and debauchery of their community. Life is perfect, with every resident’s needs met by the company. All they ask in return is discretion and unquestioning commitment to the Victory cause.
But when cracks in their idyllic life begin to appear, exposing flashes of something much more sinister lurking beneath the attractive façade, Alice can’t help questioning exactly what they’re doing in Victory, and why. Just how much is she willing to lose to expose what’s really going on in this paradise?
And the trailer also promises a whole lot of sexy chemistry between Pugh and Styles, who certainly appear to be happily married characters — at least, before Pugh’s Alice starts to wonder what lurks beyond at her husband’s job and soon discovers that the people behind it don’t want anyone digging into their secrets.
Working with cinematographer Matthew Libatique (a regular collaborator with Darren Aronofsky), and ‘Booksmart’ production designer Katie Byron, Wilde, who has a script from Katie Silberman, Carey Van Dyke, and Shane Van Dyke, certainly appears to have created something exciting, dramatic, and stylish. We’re getting similar vibes to ‘The Stepford Wives’ and TV’s ‘The Prisoner’.
‘Don’t Worry Darling’ will be in theaters on September 22nd this year.
New Line is the lucky winner of Olivia Wilde’s next directorial project, “Don’t Worry Darling.”
The studio won the deal to finance and distribute the psychological thriller, in what Deadline calls “one of the widest ranging film spec script auctions in years.” Among the 18 bidders were Netflix, Apple, and Blumhouse.
Wilde recently made her directorial debut with the acclaimed teen dramedy “Booksmart.” She’s embarking on a different path with “Don’t Worry Darling,” which is about a 1950s housewife whose reality begins to crack, revealing a disturbing truth underneath.
Kate Silberman, the co-writer of “Booksmart,” will rewrite the script by Shane & Carey Van Dyke.
Wilde and Silberman also recently sold a holiday comedy project to Universal.
