Starring Hugh Jackman (Logan, X-Men franchise), Rebecca Ferguson (Mission: Impossible movies), and Thandiwe Newton (HBOās Westworld, Solo: A Star Wars Story), Reminiscence, an action thriller written, directed, and produced by Lisa Joy (HBOās Westworld) arrives at the scene and premieres exclusively in the Philippines on HBO GO on October 4.
Nick Bannister (Jackman), a private investigator of the mind, navigates the darkly alluring world of the past by helping his clients access lost memories. Living on the fringes of the sunken Miami coast, his life is forever changed when he takes on a new client, Mae (Ferguson). A simple matter of lost and found becomes a dangerous obsession. As Bannister fights to find the truth about Mae’s disappearance, he uncovers a violent conspiracy, and must ultimately answer the question: how far would you go to hold on to the ones you love?
Known for her extensive work on the HBO science-fiction drama series HBOās Westworld, Reminiscence marks Joyās feature film directorial debut. The film was produced by Joy, Jonathan Nolan, Michael De Luca and Aaron Ryder. The executive producers were Athena Wickham, Elishia Holmes and Scott Lumpkin. Several HBOās Westworld collaborators comprised Joyās creative team, including director of photography Paul Cameron, production designer Howard Cummings, editor Mark Yoshikawa and composer Ramin Djawadi, along with costume designer Jennifer Starzyk.
Looking Back, Moving Forward
All during her first pregnancy, Lisa Joy was never far from her laptop. The coinciding moments of profound loss following the loss of her grandfather and the prospect of new life stoked the creative sparks that compelled her to explore the overriding theme of memory within a wholly-created and genre-bending world. The filmmaker says, āSome of the most incredible moments of our lives are locked in our heads; theyāre the stories that we revisit again and again, that make our life worth living. Sometimes, those stories arenāt shared by anyone else and so when you go, they go. In the end, I think we all become stories. We coalesce into a couple sentences over generations, and Iāve always thought, āTry to make it so your sentences are good, that you add more joy into this world than you took from it.ā
A New Kind of Noir
For all the cinematic acumen and film references present in Joyās work, it is surprising that she did not grow up steeped in the art of cinema. Her real instruction in and appreciation for the classics began when she was in college, working as an au pair in her senior year to āfinance working for literary magazines in New York.ā
When her young charge had been tucked in for the night and his parents had gone out, Joy would hole up in bed and watch old films. She confesses, āFilm noir really spoke to me, the same way that mythology spoke to me. They are both about complex people in a world that can be dark, cruel, lawless. There are no clear-cut heroes, no clear-cut victims. The complexity of those characters navigating that world, thatās what I was drawn to. In writing āReminiscence,ā I wanted to delve even deeper into that complexity, twisting around traditional notions of noirā¦ starting with the term ānoirā itself. Weāre used to those kinds of films being very dark and for me, I wanted it to be flooded with light and natural beauty because sometimes the darkest things hide in the most beautiful surroundings.ā
Assembling a Memorable Cast
In the case of her leading man, the filmmakerās reputation opened the door, but the goodsāeven the promise of themāsealed the deal. Hugh Jackman tells, āWhen I met with Lisa, she had shown me some of the visuals and I understood what the movie was about in general, but I hadnāt seen the script. And I was already excited about it. I was excited about the world of the film. I was excited about the character and about her as a writer-director. I think sheās incredibly talented, but when I met her in person, she just gave off an air of confidence and surety, not only about the material, but how she was going to tackle it. Her passion for it. Itās a rare thing for me to just have that instant sort of gut feeling that āIāve got to do thisā and, to be honest, I felt that 20 pages in when I later got the script.ā
Rebecca Ferguson likewise responded to Joy and her way with words, both spoken and on the page. Ferguson says, āLisaās way of writingāthereās a poetry, a musicality without sounding ridiculous. It makes me, as an actor, want to be absolutely truthful to each and every word. I think, other than the writing, the first thing I fell in love with was that Mae was portrayed in many different ways. Sheās portrayed through othersā ideas of her. Her existence is defined by each person who thinks they see her. Talking to Lisa, it became, who is Mae? What is her true identity? When does she let things slip through the cracks? Iād never done something like this before.ā
For the part of WattsāNick Bannisterās support and colleague in one packageāJoy turned to the āinimitableā Thandiwe Newton. Newton reveals, āWhen Reminiscence came along, it took me a week just to wake up to the fact that Lisa wanted me to be a part of her first feature. I donāt think itās an obvious choice to have me in the role, but thatās where magic kind of happensāwhen youāre entrusted to do something bold, something different, to use my skills as an actor to transform. With Watts, I got to explore and play a personality that I donāt think I wouldāve necessarily gotten the opportunity to do.ā
The film stars Cliff Curtis (The Meg, Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw), Oscar nominee Marina de Tavira (Roma), Daniel Wu (TVās Into the Badlands, Warcraft), Mojean Aria (TVās See and Dead Lucky), Brett Cullen (Joker), Natalie Martinez (The Stand and The Fugitive series), Angela Sarafyan (HBOās Westworld) and Nico Parker (Dumbo).
Stream or download Reminiscence and catch indelible performances from Thandiwe Newton and Angela Sarafyan across three seasons of HBOās Westworld on HBO GO. Download the app at the App Store or Play Store on your device. You can also access HBO GO via Cignal or at https://www.hbogoasia.ph/. HBO GO can be accessed via Android TV, Apple TV, LG TV and Samsung Smart TV ā and comes with AirPlay and Google Cast functionality.