Beau is Afraid has a new trailer teasing the film's huge scope. The project is the third film from celebrated director Ari Aster, who burst onto the scene with the popular A24 horror outings Hereditary and Midsommar. Expanded from his 2011 short film Beau, the film stars Joaquin Phoenix as a man named Beau who experiences surreal, horrifying, kaleidoscopic adventures while traveling to his childhood home after the death of his mother (Patti LuPone).
Today, A24 dropped a brand new behind-the-scenes teaser for the film ahead of the official Beau is Afraid release date on April 21.
The first-look clip features new scenes from the film, but it is largely centered around Aster attempting to explain his epic film in just a few simple words. The closest he seemed to get was describing it as "a Jewish Lord of the Rings, but he's just going to his mom's house."
Is Beau is Afraid a Multiverse Movie?
One of the most mysterious elements of Beau is Afraid is the fact that Beau appears in the film at four distinctly different ages. He also encounters a variety of different worlds that look alternately hyper-real and incredibly flat and fake. While it's not clear if the film's events take place in living flashbacks, hallucinations, or something more supernatural, the film also seems in line with a recent boom in multiverse stories.
A24's Everything Everywhere All At Once is the closest comparison, as that film followed a laundromat owner who accesses the abilities of every alternate version of herself to save the world. However, superhero movies have also embraced this trend, especially the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which kicked off a story branch known as the Multiverse Saga with entries like Loki season 1 and Spider-Man: Far From Home. The DC Universe is also getting in on the fun with their upcoming film The Flash.
Beau is Afraid could very well follow an unequipped man being thrust into the multiverse. However, the surreal odyssey remains firmly shrouded in mystery for the time being. It is also possible that the exact nature of Beau's experiences will never be properly revealed beyond the fact that the film is using them to create an entirely subjective experience of the character's life.
Source: A24
