Good idea: adapt Kazuo Ishiguro’s Klara and the Sun, a gorgeous novel by a man who has had two absolute masterpieces made from his novels (The Remains of the Day, Never Let Me Go), for the screen.
Bad idea: Hire Taika Waititi to do it.
Look, we’re not as hideously anti-Waititi as many people in similar positions and age brackets. The man has made some lovely movies, and we even liked Jojo Rabbit more than most (though not as much as we think you might think). But the dude’s got a certain kind of style, and that style has both let him down for two straight features and is almost thunderously wrong for this story’s tone. It is sad, friends, and not in a cute, cloying way.
However, if you are gonna drop a dime on making this, you might as well get talent like Jenna Ortega, Amy Adams, and Steve Buscemi to act in it. Sony — not Focus or Searchlight, surprisingly — dropped a trailer for it on Monday, and, well, make up your own damn mind about how it looks.
Peep it:
Here’s a synopsis for Klara and the Sun, which does a good job pointing you to the book and not this movie:
“Based on the bestselling novel from Nobel Prize-winner Kazuo Ishiguro and written and directed by Academy-Award winner Taika Waititi (‘Jojo Rabbit’), Klara and the Sun introduces audiences to Klara (Jenna Ortega), an Artificial Friend who wants nothing more than to find the perfect home. When Klara meets Josie (Mia Tharia), each immediately senses a kindred spirit in the other. Josie has a fraught relationship with her mother (Amy Adams) and they’ve suffered great loss, but Klara’s innocent wonder and unwavering loyalty begin to heal the family and bring light to Josie’s complicated world.”
Klara and the Sun comes (comes, comes here it comes) to theaters on October 23.