In a time in the (not so distant) future human kind is forced to face the damage they’ve put the Earth through.
And the man chosen to fix the damage? Jake Lawson (Gerard Butler), the architect of “Dutch Boy”- a satellite structure created to override Mother Nature under the power of man. But absolute power corrupts absolutely and when malfunctions with “Dutch Boy” lead to catastrophes on Earth it’s up to Lawson, his brother Max (Jim Sturgess) and White House Secret Service operative (Abbie Cornish) to solve the mother of all mysteries before the mother of all storms hits.
The Knockturnal got to sit down with the cast and director/writer of Geostorm, read our exclusive interview with Dean Devlin below:
Nicolette Acosta: Congratulations on Geostorm. You’ve done a lot of work in this vein: Independence Day, Geostorm, what draws you into this genre, this sort of thriller, sci-fi, and action film?
Dean Devlin: You know… I’m just a nerd. And there are certain kinds of nerdy movies that I loved growing up, and I always hoped that one day I’d have the chance to make some. But I live in a time where the bar has been set high for these kinds of movies, so when you do it you have to put ‘em on steroids, so hopefully this is every movie I ever loved growing up, on steroids.
Nicolette Acosta: Pretty sure you took every possible apocalypse scenario, and was like, ok we are gonna give you all of them. So what Geostorm different than the apocalypse movies that have come before it?
Dean Devlin: Well I think there are a couple things: One, we’ve seen natural disasters in movies before so what we really set out to focus on in this movie was unnatural disasters. In other words, the type of disaster, that could only happen if we were to mettle with nature. Under no circumstance can nature do this, but if we start playing, if we start messing around with it, what could happen? And yes we can get a place on earth with tornadoes, but if you get 50 of them, marching down a street, that’s something that could only happen if we started playing God. So those were the kind of images that we wanted to go after. But at the heart of the movie, is really a political thriller. And it’s a who done it? Early in the movie somebody dies, and the big question is who killed him and why?
Nicolette Acosta: Every turn you are still guessing, it’s awesome! Where did you get the idea for Geostorm? You were watching the news and were like wow it would be horrible if this all happened at once?
Dean Devlin: It was actually my daughter. My eldest daughter was six years old at the time, and she was starting to learn about climate change, and she asked in a very naïve way, “Dad, why can’t we just build a machine that fixes that?” And I started to try to talk to her about geo-engineering, the science of it, and why there is a moral problem with it, and dilemmas on how to implement it. But then I realized the best way to explain it to my daughter, was a bedtime story, and that’s really what Geostorm is. It’s a fable. What could happen if we wait to long to deal with this.
Nicolette Acosta: Out of all of these natural disaster storms, what is the one that would send you running in the other direction?
Dean Devlin: For me to be in a lighting storm where there is lightening every four feet, it terrifies me… To be in a hailstorm, where hail is the size of boulders… So all of these things are horrific for me. But I think probably the one that would get me the most is the army of marching tornadoes; because there is just so much power in a single tornado, think of them in groups! I think I’d want to avoid that one the most.
Nicolette Acosta: What’s the biggest message you want people to walk away from watching Geostorm?
Dean Devlin: Well ideally, it would be; let’s not wait for this to happen. Let’s not wait for us to have to build something like the Dutchboy Project, let’s deal with it now before it gets out of hand.
The film is now playing.
