Veteran filmmaker Kathryn Bigelow debuts A House of Dynamite, her first feature in eight years, this evening in Venice.
The film has been described as a nuclear thriller and opens as an unattributed missile is launched at the United States. As a result, a race begins to determine who is responsible and how to respond.
A House of Dynamite was written by Noah Oppenheim, and during this afternoon’s presser for the film, Bigelow said she took the project on as a way to promote immediate discussion about nuclear disarmament across the globe.
“Hopefully the film is an invitation to decide what to do about all these weapons,” Bigelow told journalists in the room.
“My answer would be to initiate a reduction in the nuclear stockpile. How is annihilating the world a good defensive measure? I mean, what are you defending?”
Bigelow added: “Hope against hope maybe we reduce the global stockpile someday, but in the meantime we are really living in a house of dynamite.”
The movie stars Idris Elba, Rebecca Ferguson, Gabe Basso, Jared Harris, Tracy Letts, Anthony Ramos, Moses Ingram, Jonah Hauer-King, with Greta Lee and Jason Clarke. Co-starring are Malachi Beasley, Brian Tee, Brittany O’Grady, Gbenga Akinnagbe, Willa Fitzgerald, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Kyle Allen and Kaitlyn Dever.
Producers are Greg Shapiro, Bigelow, and Oppenheim. EPs are Brian Bell and Sarah Bremner
The project marks Bigelow’s first movie since the 2017 thriller Detroit, which was produced and distributed by Annapurna Pictures.
Bigelow’s 2009 pic The Hurt Locker won six Oscars, including Best Picture, Director, Sound Editing, Sound Mixing, Original Screenplay for Mark Boal, and Film Editing. Her 2012 movie, Zero Dark Thirty, about the hunt for Osama bin Laden after the 9/11 attacks, won Best Sound Editing and grossed $132.8 at the global box office.
Venice runs until September 6.