Chris Pine has a glorious career in Hollywood as an actor but when he tried to direct a movie, the expected wonders from the Wonder Woman 1984 star, just fell short. Pine directed the 2023 movie Poolman under the banners of Vertical Entertainment starring himself in the lead.
Pine’s Poolman was a critical disaster, met with negative reviews as it failed to impress both the audience and critics. However, the actor/director still believes that he has done something good with the movie refusing to accept the harsh criticism.
Chris Pine Refused to Believe the Brutal Criticism of Poolman
Chris Pine ventured out from being an actor to have a taste of film direction with his directorial debut Poolman. The movie was essentially intended to be a huge comical relief blended with a mysterious tone. However, at the premiere of Poolman at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) on September 11, 2023, the actor/director faced perhaps the most brutal criticism in his career. “You know, like after the reviews in Toronto I was like maybe I did make just a pile of sh*t,” Pine said recently in his interview with Josh Horowitz on the Happy Sad Confused podcast. However, the director refused to accept the criticism.
“So I went back and I watched it and I was like this I f*cking love this film. I love this film so much like it actually, it like when I set out I was like you know you asked yourself these questions as a creator, you’re like, ‘what do I want people to feel at the end?’ I knew exactly in this contextually was happening during Covid and it was happening a lot of kind of global sociocultural like weight. I was like, I want people to walk in and feel lighter than when they walked in and it’s not a lol movie it’s not like a gag movie, It’s supposed to be like a delight it’s just supposed to like tickle the back of your cheeks,” Pine said.
Perhaps, a vibe movie as Horowitz insisted. Regardless, the movie has failed to make a splash. Still, the movie will remain close to him. Pine has a marvelous resume as an actor including his Star Trek role and he might come back stronger again with another project to direct.
Chris Pine Addressed If He Had Chinatown And The Big Lebowski Influence In Poolman
Chinatown is a classic, the Roman Polanski-directed Jack Nicholson starrer mystery thriller would be any moviegoer’s go-to film. Pine’s movie has a reference to the movie as his character, Darren Barrenman looks for inspiration to be a detective watching Chinatown.
“Chinatown and so far as like my character watches the film in order to learn ostensibly how to be a good detective right ostensibly because it’s about water ostensibly because it’s about Los Angeles and water etc. But I think my spirit animal deeply was, strangely enough, was being there. I saw being there and, um, in this beautiful film about an innocent walking through this insanely jaded cynical corrupt world right just remaining innocent the whole time and in the end walking on water and disappearing,” Pine said.
The Poolman director further revealed although it might seem that Darren Barrenman resembles Jeff Bridges’ iconic The Dude from the Coen brothers’ acclaimed comedy The Big Lebowski, there is a huge difference. Pine said that it was primarily, Barrenman with a purpose in his movie while The Dude seemingly lacked it.
Poolman is now showing in select theaters.
