Christian Bale travels back in time to 1830s upstate New York for the Netflix movie "The Pale Blue Eye."
The Academy Award winner plays Augustus Landor, a former detective forced out of retirement to investigate a series of hangings at West Point. Augustus (Bale) joins forces with Edgar Allan Poe (Harry Melling) to solve the case of a serial killer who may have a supernatural element. Based on the novel by Louis Bayard, “The Pale Blue Eye” is directed by Scott Cooper (“Crazy Heart”) and opens in theaters December 23 and streams on Netflix January 6.
Director: Scott Cooper
Writers: Louis Bayard, Scott Cooper
Stars: Christian Bale, Gillian Anderson, Lucy Boynton
Robert Duvall, Gillian Anderson, Timothy Spall, Toby Jones, Lucy Boynton and Harry Lawtey also star. “The Pale Blue Eye” marks Bale's third collaboration with director Cooper, who has been developing the novel's adaptation for nearly a decade. Bale also serves as a producer on the film.
Cooper called Bale his "closest friend" in an interview with Vanity Fair, citing that the film will take an interest in occult practices based on the poet Poe's real-life fascination with satanic practices. “He left us as the godfather of detective and horror fiction,” Cooper said of the iconic writer.
"I thought, 'Okay, I get to do three things with this movie: create a mystery, a father-son love story, and then a Poe origin story," said Cooper, who wrote and directed the film. movie. “Poe at this young age was quite warm, witty, funny and very southern. The experiences I'm presenting in this film led him down darker paths than we know him for."
In a GQ cover story earlier this year, lead star Bale addressed the "safety net" for the Netflix feature, his third film along with "Amsterdam" and "Thor: Love and Thunder" this year.
"I love movies being released theatrically, and I'm really worried that's not going to happen," Bale said. “‘The Pale Blue Eye’ has the safety net of Netflix. 'Amsterdam' No. I'm going to say, 'Oh, fuck.' People have always told me that this kind of thing helps. I never believed it. But I was like, 'Oh, well, okay. It matters to me. I care, you know? This is not the kind of life I come to lead playing characters. This is the realpolitik world of, 'Fucking Hell'. I want to be able to keep doing this. So, that was my original motivation. I said, 'Yeah, okay. Okay. Maybe this is the time for that.'”
“The Pale Blue Eye” opens in theaters December 23 and streams January 6 on Netflix.