The first Black woman nominated for an Academy Award in the Best Adapted Screenplay category, for her highly acclaimed film “Mudbound” (2017), Dee Rees’ “The Last Thing He Wanted,” is something we’ve been looking forward to for years. Partnering with Netflix again (her breakout was the 2011 indie “Pariah“), her latest stars Anne Hathaway, Ben Affleck, Rosie Perez, Willem Dafoe, and is adapted from Joan Didion‘s namesake novel.
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Set in the middle of the 1980s Contra activity in Central America, the drama centers on a veteran D.C. journalist (Hathaway) who loses the thread of her own narrative when a guilt-propelled errand for her father thrusts her from byline to unwitting subject in the very story she’s trying to break. It’s a political thriller, but also one very tied to family and fate. The film makes its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival this week. Here’s the official synopsis:
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Adapted from the Joan Didion novel of the same title, THE LAST THING HE WANTED is set against the nebulous milieu of the Iran-Contra scandal. Veteran D.C. journalist Elena McMahon (Academy Award® winner Anne Hathaway) abandons the 1984 campaign trail out of a misguided sense of duty to her father, Dick McMahon (Oscar® nominee Willem Dafoe). Guilted into running a dangerous fool’s errand on his behalf, Elena leverages the moment to pursue her own investigation but instead gets tipped into the confounding center of the very intrigue she’s trying to expose. Answers turn into questions and wrong turns lead to dead ends in this stylish political thriller as Elena becomes increasingly lost on a map of someone else’s making and the possibility of return — to home and to herself — slowly narrows. The fourth film from director and Academy Award® nominated writer Dee Rees (Pariah, Bessie, Mudbound) co-stars Oscar® winner Ben Affleck, Academy Award® nominee Rosie Perez, Edi Gathegi, Mel Rodriguez, Onata Aprile and Toby Jones. Marco Villalobos co-wrote the script, and Cassian Elwes produced with Rees.
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“The Last Thing He Wanted” stars Anne Hathaway, Ben Affleck, Rosie Perez, Willem Dafoe, Edi Gathegi, Mel Rodriguez, and the script was written by Dee Rees and Marco Villalobos. “The Last Thing He Wanted” releases globally on Netflix February 21, 2020. Watch the first trailer below and look for our review from Sundance this weekend.