DESTROYER—a new template for sunshine noir and one of its greatest cinematic exponents since Chinatown—is the deeply evocative redemption song of an undercover cop (Nicole Kidman, jagged, reeling, transformed) on a contemporary odyssey across Los Angeles, finally making sense of a life marked and almost ruined by an act of hesitation seventeen years ago.
As director Karyn Kusama told a Film Independent Presents audience earlier this month at the Arclight Hollywood, “We all love genre, we all love criminals, but these kinds of movies get a little too easy… We want to see the consequences, the toll.”
Kusama was speaking for herself and her writers—her husband Phil Hay and his writing partner Matt Manfredi—and all three will return to the Arclight this week for post-screening Q & A’s, followed by Nicole Kidman during the first weekend in January.
Now playing.
NICOLE KIDMAN and KARYN KUSAMA Q&A
Saturday, January 12, after the 7:30 pm show.
Cinerama Dome
Arclight Hollywood
6360 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles.
Friday and Saturday, January 4 and 5, at 7:30 pm.
KARYN KUSAMA, PHIL HAY, MATT MANFREDI IN CONVERSATION
Wednesday through Sunday, December 26, 27, 28, 29, and 30, following the 7:15 pm shows.
Arclight Hollywood
6360 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles.
Top: Elvis Mitchell, Karyn Kusama, Phil Hay, and Matt Manfredi at the Film Independent Presents screening of Destroyer at the ArcLight, Hollywood, December 12, 2018.
Above: Kusama, Arclight, December 12, 2018.
Arclight photographs by Araya Diaz/Getty Images, courtesy the photographer and Film Independent Presents.
Below: Nicole Kidman and Sebastian Stan (back to camera) in Destroyer.
Kidman and Stan photograph courtesy Annapurna Pictures.
