For the first time, Judd Apatow will be killing people in one of his movies, and also going a bit Jurassic World as well.
In a pronounced deviation from the low-key comedy drama of Funny People, Knocked Up or The King Of Staten Island, Judd Apatow’s new movie features 20 minutes of FX-powered dinosaur action.
The film in question is The Bubble, a movie about making movies during a pandemic, headed to Netflix either at the end of this year or the beginning of next. The dinosaur sequences, it’s more than reasonable to assume, are scenes from the movie within the movie. Apatow explained to Leonard Maltin, during this week’s Maltin on Movies podcast:
I’ve always joked about my disinterest in making an action movie or superhero movie. It’s just not my gift. I like them. I never think I’m the guy you would want making them. So it’s funny because 20 minutes of my movie is a dinosaur action movie… so I’m just figuring out how to do that right now… this is the first movie I’ve made where people get killed. I’m finally killing people.
I suppose there might be an actual dinosaur in the film, rather than an in-the-movie-in-the-movie-dinosaur (I can already invent a couple of Covid-19 metaphors that could make good use of one) but I wouldn’t bank on it.
The Bubble has been inspired by the making of Jurassic World: Dominion, which was filmed under strict, and at the time, brand new pandemic protocols. There have been whispers that the shoot was high-pressure with some even saying ‘strained’ or ‘difficult.’ Here’s hoping it’s a cracker, meaning all of those efforts were worthwhile.
It’s easy to see Karen Gillan as a Bryce Dallas Howard analog in the movie, and Pedro Pascal could well be Apatow’s take on Chris Pratt. Meanwhile, David Duchovny and Leslie Mann make a good fit for Jeff Goldblum and Laura Dern, or at least similar characters whose decades-ago affair would surely make it at least a little tricky for them to now share a ‘Covid bubble’ for the duration of a movie’s production. Not, of course, that we’re expecting 1:1 parallels between The Bubble and Dominion.
Netflix’s opaque long-term scheduling (which I personally love) means that the film can be delayed if necessary, so Apatow’s first run at CG action can, budget willing, take all the time it needs. What will action sequences through an Apatow filter feel like? I for one am most intrigued to find out.
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