Jeff Nichols’ first film in over seven years, “The Bikeriders,” premiered last week at Telluride to mostly positive reviews.
It’s not like Nichols hasn’t attempted to make a new movie during his absence. In an extensive interview with the Happy Sad Confused podcast, Nichols delved into some of the projects that fell apart. We can thank our lucky stars he didn’t make this IP junk.
One of them was his “A Quiet Place” spin-off, which ended with him parting ways due to creative differences, replaced by “Pig” filmmaker Michael Sarnoski. The film is now due to be released on March 8, 2024.
However, by the sounds of it, Nichols was never that into making the movie, he even sounds relieved that it didn’t happen — so are we:
“I dabbled with…John Krasinski called me about maybe doing ‘A Quiet Place’ prequel, but luckily, that didn’t work out. I just wasn’t the right fit, you know? […] They (Paramount) took it over, and I’m sure they’re doing something really special with it because Michael Sarnoski took it over, and that guy’s a really great filmmaker, but stuff like that wasn’t the right fit.”
Nichols also notes that he worked on his now-canceled “Alien Nation” film for four years, calling its scrapping a “heartbreaker.” Nichols was set to film “Alien Nation” in 2018 with what he described was going to be “a big, $100 million studio film, set in Arkansas.” Problem was that Disney bought Fox and killed the project, which Nichols called a “soul-crushing” experience.
On the ‘Alien Nation’ front, that was a heartbreaker. That’s one of the reasons it’s taken me so long to make another film. I spent four years on that. We were at the one yard line. I had it cast and we had it ready to go, but the universe didn’t want me to make that right then.
That was an original story I crafted and they wanted to put the ‘Alien Nation’ title on it. Fortunately that script without the title has gone over to Paramount. After the strike lifts, I can get back to work on it.
It’s kind of amazing working on something for so long. I built this entire alien species and all these other things, but it also takes place in Arkansas and feels like one of my films. But it might cost a lot of money. It might be the worst experience of my life, but I’d love to make that film.”
He then mentions his idea for DC’s “Aquaman” — supposedly, the pitch he gave was for a darker and more serious movie, but Warner rejected him. “I still have scenes from [‘Aquaman’] in my head that would’ve been good. They would’ve been quite different from the film that was made. It wasn’t ever feasible.”
Nichols mentions that he’s no longer interested in tackling IPs and would rather concentrate on original stories.
The short version: "Woman Unknown" was a compromise. The jury deadlocked over "Possible Love" and "NAZA," not able to com to terms, fell back on their #3, May el-Toukhy's film.