Lucy in the Sky | |
---|---|
Directed by | Noah Hawley |
Screenplay by |
|
Story by |
|
Produced by |
|
Starring | |
Cinematography | Polly Morgan |
Edited by | Regis Kimble |
Music by | Jeff Russo |
Production companies |
|
Distributed by | Fox Searchlight Pictures [2] [1] |
Release dates |
|
Running time | 124 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $21.4 million [3] |
Box office | $325,950 [3] [2] |
Lucy in the Sky is a 2019 American psychological drama film loosely inspired by the life of NASA astronaut Lisa Nowak, who is portrayed by Natalie Portman. [4] The film was directed, co-produced, and co-written by Noah Hawley in his feature directorial debut. In addition to Portman, the film stars Jon Hamm, Zazie Beetz, Dan Stevens, Colman Domingo, and Ellen Burstyn.
Lucy in the Sky had its world premiere at the 44th Toronto International Film Festival on September 11, 2019, [5] [6] and was theatrically released in the United States by Fox Searchlight Pictures on October 4, 2019. The film received negative reviews from critics and was a box-office bomb, grossing a mere $325,950 against its $21.4 million budget.
Astronaut Lucy Cola is left awestruck from her first mission in outer space. Upon returning to Earth, she immediately feels disconnected from her normal life with her husband and niece. Although required to undergo NASA therapy and recommended to rest, Lucy begins pushing herself physically and mentally in order to return to space on the next available mission. During training, Lucy encounters a younger female astronaut named Erin. Bored by and frustrated with her supportive husband, Lucy begins spending time with other astronauts who have been to space, eventually beginning an affair with one named Mark.
Determined to beat a record recently set by Erin, Lucy nearly drowns during an underwater test, but remains completely calm with her heartbeat actually growing calmer. Later it is discovered that Mark is also having an affair with Erin, leaving Lucy feeling increasingly isolated from her husband. Refusing to be beaten, Lucy pushes to escalate her affair and demands that Mark cease his relationship with Erin. Lucy's beloved grandmother dies of a stroke, an event that leaves Lucy deeply distressed and causing her husband to be increasingly concerned by her erratic behavior. Breaking down after the funeral, Lucy walks out on her husband, with her teenage niece in tow. She cries in a public restroom at a bowling alley and asks, "Is this as good as it gets?"
NASA administration confronts Lucy with her near drowning (as well as evidence that she has been blowing off therapy) and tells her she is being passed over for the role in the upcoming mission. Despite promises that she can qualify for the following mission in three years' time, Lucy becomes furious and paranoid that she has been passed over for ulterior reasons. Breaking into Mark's computer, Lucy finds emails showing both that he has continued his affair with Erin, as well as correspondence from Mark urging NASA that Lucy be passed over. Her paranoia is confirmed when Lucy finds that Erin has been selected for the mission.
With her grip on reality now completely unraveling, Lucy decides to take revenge on Mark and Erin. Lucy and her niece embark on a cross country trip. Along the way, she experiences hallucinations of her grandmother and leaves emotionally erratic messages for NASA. Wearing a wig, Lucy storms into an airport where Mark and Erin are located. Following Mark to his car, Lucy tearfully confronts him, but is stopped when Erin appears. Lucy sprays insect spray into Mark's face and Mark speeds off in his car. Lucy completely breaks down and is apprehended by the police while attempting to flee. An assortment of weapons and tools are discovered in her car.
Three years later, Lucy's niece is giving a presentation in class, with Lucy's husband in attendance. Lucy is working as a beekeeper; she closes one of the hives, then opens the hood of her protective suit, smiling momentarily at the bees and one butterfly flying around her.
In February 2017, Noah Hawley was brought onto the project, then known as Pale Blue Dot, to produce alongside Bruna Papandrea and Reese Witherspoon, with Witherspoon intended to star in the lead role. [7] However, in November 2017, Witherspoon dropped out of the film in order to shoot a second season of Big Little Lies . [8]
By January 2018, Hawley was also set to direct the film, while Natalie Portman entered into negotiations for the lead role. [9] The film is Hawley's feature film directorial debut, [10] and derives its title from the Beatles song "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds". [11] In March 2018, Jon Hamm joined the cast. [12] In April 2018, Zazie Beetz joined the cast, with Dan Stevens joining in May. [13] [14] In June 2018, Ellen Burstyn joined the cast to portray the grandmother of Portman's character. [15] In July 2018, Colman Domingo and Jeremiah Birkett joined the cast of the film. [16] In February 2019, it was announced Nick Offerman had been cast in the film. [17]
The film had its world premiere at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival on September 11, 2019. [20] It was released on October 4, 2019. [21]
The film made $55,000 from 37 theaters in its opening weekend, which was described as "terrible". [22]
On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 21% based on 127 reviews, with an average of 4.4/10. The site's critics consensus reads, "Natalie Portman gives it her all, but it isn't enough to overcome Lucy in the Sky's confused approach to its jumbled story." [23] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 36 out of 100, based on 36 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". [24]
At the 46th Saturn Awards, the film earned three nominations: Best Science Fiction Film, Best Actress for Portman, and Best Supporting Actress for Burstyn. [25]
In 2023, Director Noah Hawley said he “did not have a great experience“ making Lucy In The Sky: “In retrospect, the movie was bought and set up as a Reese Witherspoon black comedy, and there must have been some extent to which Searchlight was expecting it to be that, and I delivered my magic realism astronaut movie [with Natalie Portman]. They didn’t know what to do with that movie.“ [26]
In November 2018, retired astronaut Marsha Ivins, who flew five missions, criticized the premise of the plot and denied that there is such a thing as a "longstanding idea that says astronauts begin to lose their grip on reality after being in space for an extended period of time". [27] [28] [29] Following its premiere at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival, multiple media outlets, some jokingly, criticized the film for failing to include the more salacious elements of Nowak's real-life case, in particular, her alleged use of adult diapers to avoid having to take bathroom breaks on her journey. [30] [31] [32] [33]
Natalie Portman is an Israeli-born American actress. She has had a prolific film career since her teenage years and has starred in various blockbusters and independent films, receiving multiple accolades, including an Academy Award and two Golden Globe Awards.
Darren Aronofsky is an American filmmaker. His films are noted for their surreal, melodramatic, and often disturbing elements, frequently in the form of psychological fiction.
Jeff Russo is an American composer, songwriter, guitarist, vocalist and music producer, and one of the two founding members of the rock band Tonic. He is also a founding member of acoustic rock band Low Stars.
Greta Celeste Gerwig is an American writer, director, and actress. Initially known for working on mumblecore films, she has since expanded from acting in and co-writing independent films to directing major studio films. Gerwig was included in the annual Time 100 list of the most influential people in the world in 2018.
Noah Hawley is an American screenwriter, director, producer, author, and singer. He is best known for creating and writing the FX series Fargo (2014–present) and Legion (2017–2019). He also worked on the series Bones (2005–2008), The Unusuals (2009), and My Generation (2010).
Jane Got a Gun is a 2015 American Western film directed by Gavin O'Connor and written by Brian Duffield, Joel Edgerton, and Anthony Tambakis. The film stars Natalie Portman, Edgerton, Noah Emmerich, Rodrigo Santoro, Boyd Holbrook and Ewan McGregor.
Natalie Portman is an Israeli-American actress and filmmaker. She made her film debut in Luc Besson's action thriller Léon: The Professional, which starred her as the young protégée of a hitman. She followed this by appearing in Michael Mann's crime thriller Heat (1995), Ted Demme's romantic comedy Beautiful Girls (1996), and Tim Burton's science fiction comedy Mars Attacks! (1996). Three years later, her supporting role as the precocious, responsible daughter of a narcissistic mother played by Susan Sarandon in the drama Anywhere but Here earned Portman her first Golden Globe Award nomination. In the same year, she played Padmé Amidala in the first of the Star Wars prequel trilogyStar Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace, which brought her international recognition. She reprised the role in its sequels Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones (2002), and Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith (2005).
The Age of Adaline is a 2015 American romantic fantasy film directed by Lee Toland Krieger and written by J. Mills Goodloe and Salvador Paskowitz. The film stars Blake Lively as Adaline, with Michiel Huisman, Kathy Baker, Amanda Crew, Harrison Ford, and Ellen Burstyn. Narrated by Hugh Ross, the story follows Adaline Bowman, a young woman who stops aging following an accident at the age of 29.
Jackie is a 2016 biographical drama film directed by Pablo Larraín and written by Noah Oppenheim. The film stars Natalie Portman as Jacqueline Kennedy. Peter Sarsgaard, Greta Gerwig, Billy Crudup, and John Hurt also star; it was Hurt's final film released in his lifetime before his death in January 2017. The film follows Kennedy in the days when she was First Lady in the White House and her life immediately following the assassination of her husband, United States President John F. Kennedy, in 1963. It is partly based on Theodore H. White's Life magazine interview with the widow at Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, in November 1963.
High Flying Bird is a 2019 American sports drama film directed by Steven Soderbergh, from a story suggested by André Holland, with the screenplay by Tarell Alvin McCraney. The film stars Holland, Zazie Beetz, Melvin Gregg, Sonja Sohn, Zachary Quinto, Glenn Fleshler, Jeryl Prescott, Justin Hurtt-Dunkley, Caleb McLaughlin, Bobbi Bordley, Kyle MacLachlan and Bill Duke, with additional appearances of basketball players Reggie Jackson, Karl-Anthony Towns and Donovan Mitchell. The film follows a sports agent who must pull off a plan in 72 hours, pitching a controversial opportunity to his client, a rookie basketball player during the company’s lockout. The film was shot entirely on the iPhone 8, becoming Soderbergh's second film to be shot on an iPhone, after Unsane.
Zazie Olivia Beetz is a German-American actress. She is best known for her role in the FX comedy-drama series Atlanta (2016–2022), for which she received a nomination for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series. She starred in the Netflix anthology series Easy (2016–2019) and currently voices Amber Bennett in the adult animated superhero series Invincible (2021–present).
Seberg is a 2019 political thriller film directed by Benedict Andrews, from a screenplay by Joe Shrapnel and Anna Waterhouse based on the life of Jean Seberg. It stars Kristen Stewart, Jack O'Connell, Margaret Qualley, Zazie Beetz, Anthony Mackie, and Vince Vaughn.
Wounds is a 2019 psychological horror film written and directed by Babak Anvari, in his English language debut, and starring Armie Hammer, Dakota Johnson, and Zazie Beetz. The film is based on the novella The Visible Filth by Nathan Ballingrud.
Extinct is a 2021 animated science fiction comedy film directed by David Silverman, and co-directed by Raymond S. Persi, from a screenplay by Joel Cohen, John Frink, and Rob LaZebnik. It features the voices of Rachel Bloom, Adam Devine, Zazie Beetz, Ken Jeong, Catherine O'Hara, Benedict Wong, Reggie Watts, and Jim Jefferies in a story following two flummels named Ed and Op, an extinct cat-like species with giant holes in the center, that find themselves transported from their island home in the year 1835 to modern day Shanghai.
Joker: Folie à Deux is an upcoming American musical psychological thriller film slated to be a sequel to the 2019 film Joker. Joaquin Phoenix reprises his role as the DC Comics character the Joker, and Lady Gaga plays Harley Quinn. Zazie Beetz also reprises her role from the first film, while Steve Coogan, Brendan Gleeson, and Catherine Keener join the cast in undisclosed roles. The film is directed by Todd Phillips, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Scott Silver. It is produced by Warner Bros. Pictures and DC Studios in association with Village Roadshow Pictures, Bron Creative and Joint Effort.
The 35th Film Independent Spirit Awards, honoring the best independent films of 2019, were presented by Film Independent on February 8, 2020. The nominations were announced on November 21, 2019 by actresses Zazie Beetz and Natasha Lyonne. The ceremony was televised in the United States by IFC, taking place inside its usual tent setting on a beach in Santa Monica, California. Aubrey Plaza returned to host the ceremony for the second time.
Star Trek 4 is the working title of an American science fiction film in development at Paramount Pictures based on the television series Star Trek by Gene Roddenberry. It is intended to be the 14th feature film in the Star Trek film franchise and the 4th of the franchise's reboot films. There have been several different iterations of the film in development since 2015.
Lady in the Lake is an upcoming American limited series based on the novel of the same title by Laura Lippman. It is set to premiere on Apple TV+ in 2024.
Jane Foster is a fictional character in the film and television franchise Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) portrayed by Natalie Portman, based on the character of the same name from Marvel Comics created by Stan Lee, Larry Lieber, and Jack Kirby.
David Rysdahl is an American actor. He is best known for starring in the fantasy drama film Nine Days (2020), the thriller film No Exit (2022) and the biographical thriller film Oppenheimer (2023).