Robert Pattinson’s sci-fi thriller ‘Mickey 17’ finally theatres on March 7. Bong Joon Ho, the Oscar-winning director behind ‘Parasite’ has helmed the drama. Based on Edward Ashton’s novel, ‘Mickey 7,’ the film stars Pattinson as Mickey Barnes. He plays a disposable employee sent on a mission to colonise a new planet. As he dies, one of his clones takes his place. Now, following the film’s release, several viewers believe that Bong has based Mark Rufallo’s flamboyant character on Donald Trump. However, the ace filmmaker has denied the rumours.
In a recent conversation with Entertainment Weekly, Bong Joon Ho stated that Ruffalo’s character in ‘Mickey 17’ does not draw inspiration from any particular political figure. Instead, the character is an amalgamation of different dictators one has seen throughout history. The filmmaker’s clarification comes after several viewers speculated that Mark Ruffalo’s persona in the film is inspired by US President Donald Trump.
Bong Joon Ho said, “When we showed the film in Berlin and talked to people from many different countries, it seemed like people were projecting the most stressful political leader onto the character of Marshall.” Moreover, Bong emphasised that the role of Marshall’s wife, Gwen, played by Toni Collette, is also a crucial part of the characterisation. “They move as a couple. To me, that was quite important. So, think about the Ceausescu couple from Romania and the Marcos couple from the Philippines. It’s always very uncanny when dictators move as couples. It makes them even more ridiculous and more terrifying. And it’s true love that [the characters] have.”
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Meanwhile, during his conversation with Indie Wire, Bong iterated that Marshall’s history remains under wraps. He said, “We’ve heard of stories of Hitler when he was in Vienna, getting offended by certain things, and that culminating into other things. Not to justify the horrible things that politicians do, but when you go through a lot of trauma, or you feel this inferiority complex against something, and you channel it in that wrong direction. You end up becoming a horrible person and political leader. And if you think about Marshall, we don’t really know his history. But we can tell that he has a very low sense of self-worth.”