Jenna Ortega hopes that her new film, the dystopian sci-fi “Klara and the Sun,” can remind people to live in the moment in the age of AI and all-consuming technology.
“I think we gotta put our focus on one another and put down the computers and phones,” the star told Variety on the red carpet at the movie’s world premiere at London Film Festival on Thursday night.
Ortega, wearing a stunning yellow lace dress and hair piece, added: “Remember to be present and to appreciate people while they’re standing right in front of you.”
Based on Kazuo Ishiguro’s bestselling 2021 novel of the same name, “Klara and the Sun” is set in a future where advances in genetic engineering have divided humans into strict social classes. Ortega plays Klara, an artificial android companion who is purchased for an ailing girl named Josie (Mia Tharia). “Klara and the Sun” is directed by “Thor” helmer Taika Waititi and also stars Amy Adams as Josie’s mother, Aran Murphy (son of Cillian Murphy), Natasha Lyonne, Steve Buscemi and more.
Waititi, Adams, Murphy and Lyonne all walked the London Film Festival red carpet on Thursday night, alongside Waititi’s wife Rita Ora and a surprise appearance from Florence Pugh, who stunned in a blue floral gown with statement sleeves. Pugh enthusiastically greeted Ortega and Adams before they all posed for photos together alongside producer Rachel Forman.
Florence Pugh, Amy Adams, Jenna Ortega and Rachel Forman at the “Klara and the Sun” world premiere in London.
Getty Images for BFI
Standing alongside Ortega, Adams added that everyone she’s spoken to has gotten “something different” out of the film. “That, to me, is a really successful film that communicates something different to each viewer. So I like hearing what people get out of it,” she said.
Ortega clarified that though Klara is an “artificial friend,” she doesn’t work like the AI that we know today.
“AI I guess pulls all this information from the internet and Klara gets all her information from the real world,” she said. “So that’s a little bit different. She’s kind of like a toddler in a sense. Playing her specifically in this film was really interesting because Taika wanted a more human approach, so he didn’t want to do movement that was too robotic, maybe more sort of clumsy and unknowing.”
“Klara and the Sun” is set to hit theaters via Sony Pictures on Oct. 23.
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