Jenna Ortega hopes that her new film, the dystopian sci-fi “Klara and the Sun,” can remind people to live in the moment in the age of AI and all-consuming technology.
“I think we gotta put our focus on one another and put down the computers and phones,” the star told Variety on the red carpet at the movie’s world premiere at London Film Festival on Thursday night.
Waititi, Adams, Murphy and Lyonne all walked the London Film Festival red carpet on Thursday night, alongside Waititi’s wife Rita Ora, author Ishiguro and a surprise appearance from Florence Pugh, who stunned in a blue floral gown with statement sleeves. Pugh enthusiastically greeted Ortega and Adams before they all posed for photos together alongside producer Rachel Forman.
Florence Pugh, Amy Adams, Jenna Ortega and Rachel Forman at the “Klara and the Sun” world premiere in London.
Getty Images for BFI
Ortega clarified that though Klara is an “artificial friend,” she doesn’t work like the AI that we know today.
“AI I guess pulls all this information from the internet and Klara gets all her information from the real world,” she said. “So that’s a little bit different. She’s kind of like a toddler in a sense. Playing her specifically in this film was really interesting because Taika wanted a more human approach, so he didn’t want to do movement that was too robotic, maybe more sort of clumsy and unknowing.”
Waititi echoed Ortega in saying that the film’s message is to “put the phone down.”
“I would just like people to remember what friendship is, connect with people and just be,” he said. “Just be in the moment.”
Ishiguro acknowledged that, since his novel came out in 2021, the world’s awareness and attitude about AI has changed greatly.
“I thought this was supposed to be a big secret!” Ishiguro said. “No, Jenna didn’t introduce us. Tim lives quite near where I live in North London, and I was dropping in on him in his very strange and wacky and beautiful house. I mean, it looks like a Tim Burton set. And we started to talk about a project and I wrote a script on spec. We decided to just do it privately between the two of us, and then take it to people.”
“Klara and the Sun” is set to hit theaters via Sony Pictures on Oct. 23.
