In Kiyoshi Kurosawa's ‘Cloud,' an online hustler gets his merciless, real-world comeuppance
What loneliness plus technology hath wrought is a central theme of Kurosawa's, and he's tried to warn us. In his seminal, turn-of-the-millennium freakouts 'Cure' and 'Pulse' — movies that spurred the J-horror phenomenon — paranoid dread was palpable, an ongoing worry as ordinary people became victims of a violent senselessness. You could watch these occult-tinged scenarios and think, 'That future looks scary.' Speculative technophobic horror has been replaced by a disturbance more bleakly resonant: how things are now. Kurosawa's title isn't referencing our cyber era's wispy metaphor for data security; he's talking bad weather, the kind that's here to stay.
As ever, it starts with the allure of opportunity. If you're wondering what kind of person scoops up tickets for Christopher Nolan's 'The Odyssey' a year in advance just to scalp at a 400% hike, meet Kurosawa's blank-faced protagonist Yoshii (Masaki Suda). He's a young Tokyo laundry plant worker who in his downtime traffics in resold goods at exorbitant markups, with little care for their authenticity. Though his factory boss (Yoshiyoshi Arakawa) sees enough potential in him to offer a path to advancement, the direction-less, contempt-filled Yoshii would rather hole up in his apartment under a fake name and mercilessly lowball sellers and gouge buyers on the black market, each new sale on his computer screen like a dopamine hit.
After an especially large windfall, which allows him to high-hat a onetime school colleague (Masataka Kubota), Yoshii quits the laundry. With his materialistic girlfriend Akiko (Kotone Furukawa) in tow, he moves to a secluded house in the country to essentially decamp from civilization and maximize his operation — even hiring a fresh-faced assistant named Sano (Daiken Okudaira, sneakily perfect), who shows a keen interest in the business. But a series of bizarre, vaguely threatening incidents seems to follow Yoshii, a patten that eventually reveals itself in the film's second hour as a coordinated campaign to exact righteous vengeance on an online scammer.
Kurosawa films the descent into kill-or-be-killed mayhem with his typically masterful visual proficiency — any given frame of Yasuyuki Sasaki's no-nonsense cinematography can quickly go from bland to ominous. But none of it is cathartic, nor intended to be. It's a showdown on the edge of an abyss or, from a blackly comic point of view, the grimmest edition ever of that old surprise-reunion show 'This Is Your Life.' To view 'Cloud' as mere commentary on 21st-century greed is to miss the existential nightmare that Yoshii's armed, bloodthirsty and mostly hapless pursuers represent: regular folk driven to kill after a humiliating experience. And who are they gunning for? Someone just as pathetic. Game on.
Again, if you keep up with the news, this brutal collapse is more revealing than prophetic. The gathering dismay that was presented as a ghost in the machine when Kurosawa imagined 'Pulse' in 2001 can now be depicted in 'Cloud' with pitiless precision as a discernible reality, ready to be manifest whenever, wherever. 'Let's enjoy ourselves,' one of the older members of the mob implores to a fellow vigilante, and somehow that observation is scariest of all.
Yoshii does acquire some help, however, in trying to survive his ordeal, and it's the kind of thematic touch that further deepens an eerie truth behind his seemingly over-the-top scenario: Somebody is always there to keep the chaos thriving. At one point, Yoshii mutters, 'So this is how you get into hell.' He doesn't exactly sound disturbed by the prospect.
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Forbes
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Christopher Nolan's ‘Odyssey' Shoots In Disputed African Territory: What To Know
Oscar-winning director Christopher Nolan's upcoming movie 'The Odyssey' is facing backlash from some local activists and African film organizations for shooting scenes in disputed territory in the Western Saharan city of Dakhla, which is occupied by the Moroccan government. "The Odyssey" is director Christopher Nolan's first film since the Oscar-winning "Oppenheimer." ... More (Photo by) Getty Images 'The Odyssey,' which is currently filming and set to release in theaters next summer, is shooting in locations across Europe and Africa, including the city of Dakhla in the Western Sahara territory, which has been occupied by Morocco for the past half-century. The United Nations has classified Western Sahara, a sparsely populated territory in northwestern Africa, as a 'non-self governing territory,' though the United States in 2020 recognized Morocco's claim to the Western Sahara territory. Some film organizations and human rights groups, which dispute Morocco's claim to the territory and have accused the government of committing human rights abuses against the indigenous Sahrawi people, condemned the production for shooting in Dakhla. The Western Sahara International Film Festival, which is based in Sahrawi refugee camps in nearby Algeria, said in a statement the production is 'contributing to the repression of the Sahrawi people by Morocco' and aiding the 'Moroccan regime's efforts to normalise its occupation of Western Sahara' by filming in the city. Reports from Moroccan outlets indicate Nolan shot scenes for 'The Odyssey' in Dakhla last week. Forbes has reached out to Syncopy, Nolan's production company that is backing the film, and Universal Pictures, the movie's distributor, for comment. In the Western Sahara International Film Festival's statement, executive director María Carrión urged Nolan to 'stop filming in Dakhla and stand in solidarity with the indigenous Sahrawis who have been under military occupation for 50 years.' Carrión said indigenous Sahrawis are 'unable to make their own films about their stories under occupation' because of the threat of 'persecution' by the Moroccan government. Mamine Hachimi, a Sahrawi activist who co-directed '3 Stolen Cameras,' a documentary about media censorship in Western Sahara, told Middle East Eye the production is an 'act of cultural complicity' and filming in the territory 'without the consent of the Sahrawi people becomes part of that system of repression.' The Ministry of Culture of the Polisario Front, the armed Sahrawi group that claims the Western Sahara territory, said in a statement shooting a major Hollywood production in Dakhla is a 'violation of international law and of the ethical standards governing cultural and artistic work,' declaring its 'unequivocal rejection of the decision to select an occupied territory as the location for a major international film production.' Adala UK, a United Kingdom-based non-governmental organization that advocates for human rights in Western Sahara, sent a letter to the British government expressing 'profound concern' that the project, which is backed by Nolan's British film production company, is shooting in Dakhla, which the group says will 'legitimize' Morocco's occupation. Contra Reda Benjelloun, who leads the Moroccan Cinematographic Center, a Moroccan agency that supports its film industry, told a local outlet last week Nolan's production is 'extremely important' for Morocco, noting 'The Odyssey' is the first major Hollywood production to choose to film in the territory. Western Sahara was previously a Spanish colony, but Morocco annexed the territory in 1975 after Spain relinquished its claim. The annexation came after the International Court of Justice ruled Morocco did not have sovereignty over the area, and the United Nations does not officially recognize its claim and instead classifies Western Sahara as a non-self governing territory. Morocco occupies much of the territory, while a smaller fraction is controlled by the Polisario Front's declared government, the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic. The SADR is a member of the African Union and is recognized by more than 40 UN member states. Some human rights groups have accused Morocco of human rights abuses in Western Sahara. Amnesty International says the Moroccan government targets 'journalists, activists and government critics through prosecution and surveillance,' and in a report last year, the United Nations' High Commissioner for Human Rights documented receiving 'allegations relating to human rights violations, including intimidation, surveillance and discrimination against Sahrawi individuals particularly when advocating for self-determination.' What Do We Know About 'the Odyssey?' 'The Odyssey' is an adaptation of Homer's poem of the same title, according to Universal Pictures, and the movie is planned to release in theaters on July 17, 2026. Nolan is directing the project and wrote the screenplay. The movie stars Matt Damon as Odysseus, and the supporting cast features Oscar winners Anne Hathaway, Charlize Theron and Lupita Nyong'o, as well as Tom Holland, Zendaya and Robert Pattinson. 'The Odyssey' reportedly carries a $250 million budget, making it Nolan's most expensive film to date. The movie is reportedly the first big blockbuster to be shot on IMAX film cameras, as the company developed new camera technology specifically for the film. 'The Odyssey' is Nolan's first film since 'Oppenheimer,' which famously opened in theaters alongside 'Barbie' in 2023 and won a leading seven Oscars in March 2024. Nolan won his first two Academy Awards for the movie, taking home Best Picture and Best Director. Tangent Nolan made about $72 million in pre-tax earnings from 'Oppenheimer,' Forbes estimated in 2024. Forbes estimated Nolan made about 15% of the movie's first-dollar gross, meaning he made a share of the movie's earnings from the box office and licensing before the studio made its money back. 'Oppenheimer' grossed $975 million at the global box office, according to Box Office Mojo. Further Reading Christopher Nolan's 'The Odyssey' Wades Into African Territorial Dispute (Bloomberg) Here's How Much Christopher Nolan Made On 'Oppenheimer' (Forbes)
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‘The Home' Director Wanted To Show A Different Side Of Pete Davidson
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'The owner, introduced me to Pete said, 'This is a young comedian who wants to be an actor,'' DeMonaco remembers. 'He went on to SNL, but we always stayed in touch and were actually writing a comedy together right before COVID. Then COVID hit and we really didn't see each other. I think we played Call of Duty Zombies during the pandemic. He had also written a wonderful comedy version of The Purge that I was trying to get going with Blumhouse and Universal." That project never got off the ground, but DeMonaco was determined to work with Davidson at some point, and the opportunity finally arose via The Home. The comedian headlines the piece as Max, a product of the foster system trying to avoid jail time by accepting a job as a custodial worker at a retirement home. 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L-R: James DeMonaco and Pete Davidson on the set of 'The Home' And since this is the creator of The Purge we're talking about, there also had to be a little sociopolitical commentary thrown into the mix, 'without being preachy and proselytizing,' affirms the director, who added in a subplot about a destructive hurricane, as well as an eerie educational video from the Cold War period extolling the wondrous benefits of drilling for oil (you'll know it when you see it). 'I guess the idea of climate change and previous generations raping the [environment] was on my mind," muses DeMonaco. 'My daughter was turning a teen at the time and looking out for her future. I think it all coalesced into this weird idea about a crazy retirement community.' The Home standing as an allegory for older generations ruining the planet for future ones is 'there for people who want to feel it,' DeMonaco continues. 'And hopefully, it's just a fun genre piece for everybody else.' 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Pete was very tense. We were all very tense, but there was no damage [done] to his eye, thank God." A close-up of Pete Davidson's eyeball in 'The Home' Another haunting image takes the form a creepy mask, which is not only a nod to The Purge universe, but also to DeMonaco's childhood fears. 'Since I was a small boy, I've been just absolutely terrified of anyone in a mask,' the director admits. 'My mom said I couldn't go into Burger King or McDonald's. I guess they used to have Ronald McDonald and the Burger King character in the McDonald's when I was very young, growing up in Brooklyn and Staten Island. She said I would literally run out screaming. I couldn't go to circuses either because of the clowns. Not that they're wearing masks, but it's kind of a mask. I finally realized years later [that] there something about not knowing a person's real [face]. I don't like not knowing a person's expression. I need to be able to read someone's face [and] the mask doesn't allow one to see the face.' He continues: 'I think we're all feeding off our own fears, dreams, and nightmares as we make films. I was prone to night terrors growing up, and still am. I still often scream in my sleep, which is terrible for my wife. So I think masks have always been a part of my nightmare-scape.' In the end, Max discovers that the old folks he's been tending to are much older than they appear. The retirement community is actually the front for a sinister cult, one that counts Max's foster parents — Couper (Victor Williams) and Syliva (Jessica Hecht) — among its members. For over a century, this clandestine group has extracted youth-sustaining substance from unsuspecting victims, including Max's older brother who supposedly died years before, to extend their lifespans. 'There have been a lot of movies that suddenly drop a bomb, but what it really is, is kind of a letdown,' DeManaco says. 'So we took a lot of time to sit [and think], 'Okay, if we're going to do this … I want to make sure I'm not disappointed by the truth.'" As the aforementioned hurricane hits the retirement home, Max breaks free of his bonds and goes on a blood-soaked rampage, slicing and dicing his way through the terrified cult members in what DeMonaco calls a 'brutal revenge fantasy" that is less Chad Stahelski and more Paul Greengrass. 'I love watching the John Wick movies [but] my personal shooting style for action scenes is more dirty and gritty [like] the way [Paul] Greengrass shoots, where it just feels a little more raw and non-choreographed. Yet you have to choreograph because you don't want someone to get hurt. So it's very fine line where you don't want to feel [the choreography]. I hope it plays both." The day they filmed Max's killing spree was quite fun for DeMonaco, who got to dump copious amounts of blood on the iconic Pete Davidson, "although he really got into it," concludes the director. 'He got his revenge at the end of the shot when he came and hugged me and ruined my really cool shirt. But whatever. That's okay … I hope the audience has as much watching it as we did shooting it." The Home is now playing in theaters everywhere. Click here for tickets!
Yahoo
4 hours ago
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The future of Alien, without Sigourney Weaver
In space, no one can hear you scream. But what about down here? Well, we're about to find out. Having spent seven movies in the furthest reaches of the galaxy, the Alien franchise, begun by Ridley Scott in 1979, is about to be, quite literally, brought down to Earth. In Noah Hawley's upcoming Disney+ TV series, Alien: Earth, a research vessel owned by the megacorp Weyland-Yutani, familiar from the films, crash-lands into the Bangkok of 2120 (two years before the events onboard the spaceship Nostromo in the first Alien film). The crash brings HR Giger's unmistakable Xenomorph, plus a whole host of other nasty intergalactic beasties, to our planet. The snappy new tagline tells you all you need to know: 'We were safer in space.' Hawley – the writer-director known for his innovative take on Marvel superheroes in Legion and his daring extension of Coen Brothers' lore in the Fargo anthology series – has given the sci-fi horror franchise another twist. Alongside the familiar 'synths' – the unsettling androids made famous in the franchise by Ian Holm, Lance Henriksen and (in the Prometheus films) Michael Fassbender – and cybernetically enhanced 'cyborgs' (humans with hi-tech additions), Hawley has introduced an even more troubling creation: the 'hybrid'. These are synthetic beings downloaded with human consciousness, created by a shadowy corporation named Prodigy. In this case, the consciousness of a group of terminally ill children, who become known as 'the Lost Boys'. Forget Alien, this is Frankenstein for the 21st century. 'The first idea when I started thinking about Alien was the fact it's not just a monster movie,' says Hawley. 'The Ian Holm reveal – that he was a synthetic. He was artificial intelligence, and that artificial intelligence was trying to kill them.' When Hawley began writing the show, 'ChatGPT didn't exist', but the series' central question about our reliance on and suspicion of AI has become eerily prescient. 'It's like Noah saw into the future,' says Sydney Chandler, who plays Wendy, the leader of the Lost Boys and the central figure of Alien: Earth. It is the past, however, that has inspired Hawley. The look and feel, particularly in the opening scene, is pure 1970s. Andy Nicholson, the production designer, pored slavishly over the original two films (1979's Alien and James Cameron's 1986 follow-up Aliens). He used the Nostromo as a blueprint for the vessels and taking inspiration from 1970s Italian furniture and car interiors. 'We decided it should be the future as imagined in 1979,' says Nicholson, 'and not to go in the direction of Prometheus'. Scott, an executive producer on the project, was happy to let them get on with it. 'Every time I spoke to him, he was storyboarding,' says Hawley. 'First House of Gucci, then The Last Duel, and then Napoleon. He made at least three movies while I was making one season of television.' Both Hawley and Nicholson are careful not to criticise Scott's Prometheus movies, but it's clear they want a clean break from them. 'The 1970s movie-ness of Ridley's film and the very 1980s movie-ness of Cameron's film, those were a big part of it for me,' says Hawley. 'Prometheus is a prequel, but one in which the technology feels thousands of years more futuristic. So I had a choice. And there was just no way to make Alien without the retrofuturism of technology.' Indeed, much of the look has stuck so closely to the first two films' concepts that many of the original designers have been given production credits on Alien: Earth. This is seen most starkly in the very first few minutes of the show, which begins just as Alien did, with a group of workers on board a vessel bound for Earth, the Weyland-Yutani owned Maginot, waking up from cryostasis. The aesthetic – from the furnishings and computer graphics to the sweaters and the moustaches – is pure 1979. 'I really wanted to send a message that the movie I was most inspired by was Ridley's,' explains Hawley. Even Jeff Russo's soaring score apes that of Jerry Goldsmith's memorable intro music – with a twist. 'You want to pay homage to what came before and yet also forge a new identity – that's the trick, right?' says Russo. As we approach the Maginot, Russo's orchestral title track is assailed by distortion and, most disturbingly, human voices. It's Alien, Jim, but not as we know it. Soon the Maginot, and its mason jars of alien lifeforms, are lying in pieces in Prodigy City, 'New Siam', on a sweltering Earth. Those lifeforms were the major challenge. Hawley decided they could not simply rely upon Giger's world-famous, biomechanical Xenomorph. Nicholson felt the pressure: 'The Xenomorph was the scariest space creature you'd ever seen. And these creatures had to be worse.' Before the Maginot goes down in flames, we see the jars and glass boxes filled with all sorts of primordial, unearthly beings. 'The first movie is rooted so much in body horror and a genetic revulsion about parasites,' says Hawley, 'and this really uncomfortable, pseudosexual, penetrative design aesthetic. So I just went with: what is the worst thing? What makes me the most uncomfortable or repulsed or disgusted?' The answer, seemingly, lies in a creature known as T Ocellus, a grotesque, tentacled octopus/jellyfish thing that seems to be made out of eyes. 'That was the one,' says Nicholson, wincing. 'I saw the design and thought, 'Oh God, who came up with that?'' The jury is out on whether it is the creatures that will scare the living daylights out of viewers or whether it will be Boy Kavalier, a 20-year-old tech trillionaire played by Samuel Blenkin who runs Prodigy and has created the synthetic-human hybrids. In the world of Alien: Earth, humanity is controlled by five megacorporations who, in the style of the East India Company, have largely usurped democratic governments. The companies are in an arms race for control of the Earth, the known galaxy and the future of human life itself. Thus when Weyland-Yutani's ship crashes into Prodigy City, Kavalier smells an opportunity. An unscrupulous tech CEO with a god complex? Which real-life equivalent could Hawley have been thinking of? All of them, he says: 'It's narcissism that defines so many of these figures. The 'Great Man' has come back. And yet in many ways none of them want to grow up. If there's a metaphor between our show and our present moment, it's when you look around at all the really deep, complicated, intrinsic problems that we're having on this planet. What they really require to solve them is adults.' Not wanting to grow up is key to the Peter Pan-obsessed Kavalier, who has named his research facility Neverland and reads the book to the children each night. When they transition to their synthetic bodies, Kavalier rechristens them all from JM Barrie's story – alongside Wendy, there's Slightly, Tootles, Curly, Nibs and Smee. Kavalier, of course, is The Boy Who Never Grew Up. 'He likes that analogy,' says Hawley. 'Peter Pan is a dark book. There's a moment where Peter is angry and frustrated, so he breathes in and out as quickly as he can, because he believes that every breath he takes kills a grown-up. And it is implied that as the Lost Boys mature, he 'thins them out', to keep that out of his world. And those elements felt like they fit, thematically.' Chandler's Wendy is the first of the Lost Boys to transition and acts as a big sister to the others as they get used to their new – adult, superhuman, immortal – bodies. Chandler, the 29-year-old daughter of actor Kyle Chandler (Friday Night Lights, Bloodline), is a relative unknown, yet was determined to land the role. She flew out to Canada, where Fargo was being filmed, the morning after reading the script, and convinced Hawley to let her take him for dinner. Her determination (she calls it 'impulsivity') and passion for the role impressed him. It's a great piece of casting – Chandler imbues Wendy with an otherworldly gawkiness, a disarming innocence and an unnerving unknowability. The actress, understandably, wishes to avoid comparison between Wendy and Sigourney Weaver's Ellen Ripley. 'You can't recreate Alien. You can't recreate Ripley. If the scripts had gone in that direction, I wouldn't have wanted to do it. My goal was to bring as much strength and honesty and integrity and backbone to the character [as I could], because that's what I looked up to when I saw Alien for the first time.' For all the ingenious concepts within Alien, what underpins the franchise is human greed and the extent to which corporations are happy to play God. Like all classic sci-fi, the humans in the TV series unleash forces they can no longer control. Does Hawley feel that, via AI, we are at such a point now? 'I don't think AI is going to take my job,' he says. 'But I'm at a rarified level of storytelling, with an idiosyncratic approach. [However] I think if you are a writer on Law & Order, you should be worried.' But Hawley has bigger concerns, and they can be seen in the blood, guts and synth fluid of Alien: Earth. 'Europe does a much better job of regulating technology and thinking about the human implications of it. In the US, it's still about the dollar. And I worry there are no brakes on this train, because the people who would be the brakes are not incentivised to slow it down. I worry it's going to get away from us very quickly. If it hasn't already.' Alien: Earth comes to Disney+ on August 13 Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more. Solve the daily Crossword
