‘Fantastic Four’ Director Josh Trank Calls Film A ‘Dark Amblin Movie’

The upcoming Fantastic Four teaser launched a couple weeks back, and while the response was generally positive, it’s relatively safe to say that fans aren’t quite sure what to expect. Almost every news outlet compared the new take on the Fantastic Four to Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar. In fact, it was so similar in tone that a fan made a mashup of the two films, and it only highlighted their stunning similarities. It was a given that the film wouldn’t be a rehash of the campy Fantastic Four movies of the mid-2000s, but what could we really expect from this new take?

Empire sat down with the film’s director, Josh Trank (Chronicle), who went into slightly more detail on the film’s tone, calling it a “dark Amblin movie.” For those unfamiliar, Amblin Entertainment is Steven Spielberg’s production company under whose banner E.T., The Goonies, and Back To The Future were all created. The company has released dozens of films, to be fair (including films like Memoirs Of A Geisha), and not all of them fit the tone and style in the previously mentioned movies, but when one thinks of Amblin films, the high adventure fare with kids is usually the route one’s mind goes. So, given that Fantastic Four is being compared to a dark Amblin film, does that mean we’ll get a dark Super 8 or something altogether different?

The writer of the film, Simon Kinberg, elaborated on this explanation, saying, “There was an Amblin-style approach to the characterization, and to contextualizing everything in a real world.” In other words, I wouldn’t expect the spirit of childlike high adventure to be fully present in this one, and maybe Fantastic Four will follow along the lines of a different string of Amblin films. What does that mean for Fantastic Four? Well, if it wasn’t obvious enough from the trailer, it means you should expect a more grounded take on the characters.

Josh Trank elaborated.

“There’s the opportunity to make something that is challenging and tragic and dramatic. The opportunity is right there in the material. We’d rather steer it in that direction as opposed to just embracing a tone that comes right off the page.”

After the train wrecks of the first two Fantastic Four movies, fans are undoubtedly excited on a new take of the franchise, but does Trank’s vision veer too much on the dark and gritty side?

What do you think? Are you excited about the new Fantastic Four film? Let us know your thoughts below!