Taika Waititi's career has been on shaky ground for a while now, and nobody really believed “Klara and the Sun” would fix anything. The course correction isn't coming; if anything, this will only sink him further.
Twenty-five months after shooting wrapped, ‘Klara,’ a Kazuo Ishiguro adaptation, had its world premiere tonight at the BFI London Film Festival, and the reviews are, to put it mildly, a bloodbath. Not a single major outlet came to its defense.
Deadline (negative)
The Guardian (1/5)
ScreenRant (5/10)
Little White Lies (2/5)
The Telegraph (1/5)
The Times (1/5)
Three one-star reviews from the UK's biggest papers. That rarely happens.
“Klara and the Sun” stars Jenna Ortega, Mia Tharia, Amy Adams, Steve Buscemi, and Natasha Lyonne. It tackles loneliness, love, and what makes us human through Klara (Ortega), a solar-powered android companion to a sickly teenager (Tharia) whose grieving mother (Adams) has hidden reasons for bringing her home.
Sony has it opening in the US on October 23, barely a week from now, which gives the studio almost no time to avoid the inevitable train wreck. Word of mouth like this is lethal for a $70M-ish adult drama.
Waititi has been on a cold streak. He struck out with “Thor: Love and Thunder” in 2022, and his last film, “Next Goal Wins,” also plagued by delays, was shot in 2019 and finally released in 2023 to very mixed reviews. ‘Klara’ might be the worst of the lot, which has me wondering if any major studio will want to greenlight another Taika Waititi movie in the near future.
doesn’t help that movie fans have been pushing back against Waititi more and more; his name seems to strike a nerve whenever it comes up. It wasn’t always like that. His brand of cheeky comedy and quirky storytelling was once considered “hip,” and films like “What We Do in the Shadows,” “Hunt for the Wilderpeople,” and “Thor: Ragnarok” were celebrated for their offbeat, irreverent humor. Now he’s no longer the cool kid on the block.
