A noir, ensemble, revisionist western set during the pandemic? It sounds very Ari Aster, doesn’t it?
Ari Aster, the director of Hereditary (on the set of which he is pictured above) and Midsommar moved away from horror recently with Beau Is Afraid, a mind-bending mix of comedy, drama and horror featuring Joaquin Phoenix. Following that, it looks like Aster may be continuing his move into diverse genres with Phoenix once again coming along for the ride.
According to World of Reel, Aster’s next film is a revisionist western flick that will be situated during the pandemic. We’ve known for a while that the film, Eddington is set to shoot later this summer, presumably now Aster has completed his promotional duties for Beau Is Afraid. What we didn’t know (and what the outlet is reporting based on an Aster interview with Italian outlet, La Repubblica) is that it will be set during the pandemic.
The filmmaker has talked about the project in the past, saying “although it’s sort of a – I don’t know if you’d call it a revisionist western. It’s contemporary; one foot is in the western and one foot is even more heavily in the noir genre. So it’s like a film noir ensemble western dark comedy.”
When you consider the weirdness of the setting and the melting pot of genres that Aster is talking about working with, it all makes for the kind of intriguing proposition that the filmmaker has come to be known for. Whilst Beau Is Afraid didn’t fare too well critically or commercially, we’re hoping A24 continues to back Aster as he’s one of the foremost filmmakers in taking risks and avoiding convention. We’re all for that and we’ll bring you more on Eddington as we hear it.
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