Alex Scharfman bang that a movie about killer unicorn is ambitious . “ A healthy swing ” is how he describesDeath of a Unicorn , his newA24horror drollery starring Jenna Ortega and Paul Rudd . You only get one feature directorial debut , so Scharfman carry the escapist populism made famous by Steven Spielberg , Ridley Scott , and John Carpenter for his version of a satirical creature - feature . In other Scripture , Scharfman wanted to make “ someone ’s favorite movie , ” one you rewatch many clip in the hope of discovering new things .
InDeath of a Unicorn , Elliot Kitner ( Rudd ) and his girl , Ridley ( Ortega ) , are driving to a retreat when they accidentally crash into a unicorn . In jounce , the duo determine the best course of action is to store the drained unicorn in the trunk and keep on on toward the lavish home of Odell Leopold ( Richard E. Grant ) , Elliot ’s political boss , and his family — married woman Belinda ( Téa Leoni ) and Word Shepard ( Will Poulter ) . There , the grouping discovers the unicorn ’s healing powers and attempts to extract them from its lineage . The move proves pricey as the unicorn might not be as favorable as it appears .
In an audience with Digital Trends , Scharfman discusses the film ’s bloodline and the emotional core at the write up ’s center .
This interview has been edit for distance and clarity .
Digital Trends : How did you pitch this movie ? Did you just fall out and say , “ I have this unicorn flick , ” or did you tog it up in a different fashion ?
Alex Scharfman : I do n’t like peddle things , to be reliable . I ’d tell friends about it , but I do n’t think I ever flip it to anybody like , “ Hey , you concerned in this ? ” I discover this with a couple of thing that I ’d written . When I hear to explain it to my manager before I wrote it , he was like , ‘ Wait , what ? ” And then I was like , I ’ll just compose it .
I ’ve had this fall out before while trying to explain it … I ’m just gon na compose it and you ’ll see . If you like it , enceinte . It ’s not necessarily good business for me because I then end up indite things on specification , but at least it gives me an chance to lay out what I desire the movie to be . Then , people can be like , “ I ’m into this or I ’m not into this . ”
There ’s so much interjection of disconfirming blank space when you cant an estimation . Something like this is idiosyncratic and very execution dependant — a word people say a flock about movies that are trying to commingle music genre and tone and things like that . It ’s heavily trying to reintroduce old mythology in a Modern linguistic context . I do n’t know . I ’m just lead to f — — publish it . Read it , and if you wish it , dandy . We can talk . I had all different types of pitches . The three - Word of God pitch — it ’s sea wolf unicorn . I had all these unlike versions of it in my creative thinker .
take the script , and you ’ll find out .
Yeah . Again , perchance that ’s my own performance anxiety . I have friends who vend who are just like , “ I ’m gon na memorize the playscript , and I ’m gon na verbalise you through the whole movie , and it ’s gon na take an time of day and a one-half . ” I ’m like , what the f — are you talking about ? I would go nuts if I had to do that s—. I ’m a writer , not an actor . I ca n’t do that .
In the notes , you wanted to make “ someone ’s favorite movie . ” It ’s escapist populism . Do you feel that the plastic film industry has get by from that , and this is a mode to impart it back ? Or did you take those idea [ from escapist populist movies ] and make it for now ?
It was more the latter . I do n’t know . It ’s hard to suppose about anything as carry a fleur-de-lis for anything other than what it is . If this movie ’s carry a flagstone , it ’s for the Death of a Unicornflag . That ’s it to me . One of the North Stars was to make a movie that felt like the movies that drive me into make motion-picture show when I was a young person . I was in my early to previous stripling or early twenties , watching the making ofAlienthree fourth dimension in a row . That ’s what I meant by making someone ’s favorite moving picture .
Something that feels escapist , feels big , feels like it ’s about the magic trick of motion-picture show , but also has a sure rewatchability . I hope that there are layers to stuff . you may keep exploring it . You might not find out joke the first time around . Sometimes I just like amusing joke that are n’t like self-aggrandizing laugh lines . That ’s a weird turn of idiom that ’s in there . Cool . If you wish it , peachy . If not , we ’re still go ahead . That ’s sort of what I was getting at with that smell .
I worked as a manufacturer for a while , and I read a lot of scripts . A tidy sum of scripts exist because someone want to make a movie , not because the movie want to exist . You live what I mean ? Someone ’s endeavor to impose something on the world , and not care , “ Here ’s a account that wants to be told or a narrative that is asking to be told out there . ” I was seek to do something that was asking to be told . I was trying to find a account that felt merit of being someone ’s favorite movie . I have a sure someone in mind . It was really myself in my other 20s . But yeah , I feel like too often people are n’t thinking like that , which is challenging . Someone ’s favored movie is a really eminent f — — bar , but that ’s the hope .
It is cause of death unicorns , so it is challenging .
For sure . This picture show is a healthy swing . It is not shy about maximalism , and that ’s part of that dream .
When did you make love Will Poulter was gon na steal the show ?
I do n’t have it off . I wish everyone in the show .
I will say that everyone is funny , but the loudest I laughed was at Will ’s jest .
I mean , that ’s a case who popped off the page . His [ Will ’s ] comic timing is just incredible . He grounds it . It ’s obviously a heightened fictitious character , but he notice an aroused grounding in making that grapheme rooted in his sense of insufficiency . The plot of his funniness is all built on this frailty , vulnerability , and weakness in a way that feel very human . I suppose it translate to an effective depiction of a part who ’s more than just like an adversary whom you hate . I feel defective for that fiber at least . His parent did a f — — number on his head , and he ’s left to deal with the consequence of that .
We did a mesa read , and it was like very clear . I was like , Will ’s cookery here . But I already knew he was going to . You watch him inMidsommar , We’re the Millers , or anywhere where he ’s given a little flake of a comedic leash , and he knows how to use it . So it was very clear to me that we got very rosy that he wanted to be in the movie .
It was such a weird matter , going fromDeath of a Unicornand laughing at Will to seeing an early cover ofWarfare . It [ Warfare ] was rocking me to my core . It ’s the duality of what he could do .
He [ Will ] and I were talk about that last night . It speak to his versatility as a performer . He can do whatever he wants . Will is just like the real deal of real deals . An incredible thespian who really can do any and everything .
This picture show has satiric paper . There are things to say about capitalist economy , stratum , and race . But there ’s also this emotional essence at the center . It ’s the father - daughter kinship between Paul Rudd ’s eccentric and Jenna Ortega ’s reference . I would n’t say a lot of satires have a lot of meat . This one does . When did you decide that you needed this excited core in the film ?
I try not to decide anything . I seek to let the narrative decide things . [ Laughs ]
Fair !
It ’s curious . I ’ve said to actors that I ’m not defecate any decisions here . The story is driving the ship . I ’m the vehicle by which the chronicle speaks .
You ’re the captain .
[ Laughs ] No , the story is the captain , and I ’m the boat . I do n’t know how this metaphor works . I think one of the matter I bring in early on was that the unicorns elicit worked up reactions from us as humans because they ’ve been with us for so long , and we all bear a mountain of association with them . It feel weird to me to try and make a consecutive misanthropical picture . I think that would have been kind of a ill service to what a unicorn is and the potency that it has .
There ’s a certain , like , E.T.kind of quality to the movie , with this aroused association to this creature . Obviously , ours is a horror picture show , andE.T.is not scary . That [ the emotional core ] always felt of import to have in the pic . It feel like it was constituent to what we were doing . I think the challenge became line up the caustic remark and the aroused bow on a thematic level .
One thing I was witting of was that we were making a satire , which can be misanthropical . And like I read , I think the movie desire an excited nitty-gritty . I always think about David Foster Wallace had this whole bit about verbalise about the job with cynicism and sarcasm . Ultimately , it ’s a negative note value proposition that you ’re tearing stuff down . You ’re saying there ’s a problem with this , and there ’s a problem with that . At the close of that , you ’re like , “ OK , but then what are we positing as a mode frontwards ? What is an actual overconfident value complex body part ? ”
That was something I had long thought about , and , as someone interest in satire , I think about it a mickle . It ’s not enough to tear something down . You ask to nominate something new . The challenge became , how do you align the satirical angle with the emotional center of the moving picture ? I was think about Elliot , Ridley , and the repairing of their relationship . In this context , it ’s this familiar family relationship where they ’ve tolerate a deprivation , and as a reaction to that loss , Elliot made it his mission to ensure that they have a degree of financial security system so that if anything like that happens again , they will be o.k. .
It ’s an emotional chemical reaction to a social problem in the reality : it strike money to get by in it . Through a degree of moral relativism as a coping mechanics , he [ Elliot ] has told himself , “ Whatever I have to do to achieve that remnant is o.k. . If I have to work for bad people and do speculative things , that ’s OK if , at the close of it , it is to the benefit of my daughter and my loved ones . I can protect her and allow for for her in a way . ” Obviously , over the course of action of the movie , she ’s [ Ridley ] becoming more vocal in her asseveration that it ’s really not all right . She does n’t want those thing . What she require is a relationship with her father establish on a shared value and a shared sense of ethical motive of what ’s correct and faulty in the world .
That in reality , the end do n’t justify the means . The mean value count for a lot , and how we live every daytime counts for a lot . And I think in so doing , she sort of provokes for him the realization that if she does n’t need this s — , then why is he doing this ? Maybe it ’s for him . Maybe he has to look in the mirror and recognise that he want material thing and that he does n’t actually demand them because , at the end of the day , they ’re not offer him the consolation that he ’s assure himself they would .
Something that I definitely endeavor to string through the middle of this question of aligning the satire and the heart is like making the picture something about the things we do for our loved ones and the things we order ourselves we do for them . To me , that bring an worked up center to the satirical slant of , like , how do we rent in a late - stage capitalist company ? What do we do in that mother wit of moral relativism , and make sense of our way through the humankind ?
dying of a Unicorn isnow in theaters .
