Luc Besson’s upcoming Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets looks like a psychedelic and pop-infused science fiction extravaganza. A brilliant, Beatles sampling trailer released last November promised a distinctly French-themed space adventure, with a hint that Besson plans to revisit the aesthetic loudness and imagination that’s made The Fifth Element a minor classic.
Expectations are high then, and with the film’s release set for July, EW has now revealed a new poster. And… well, in my humble opinion, it’s a bit rubbish. The trailer showed us a world crammed to the rafters with exciting sights, but this merely shows us stars Dane DeHaan and Cara Delevigne staring moodily at us from inside a gigantic ‘V’ (for Valerian). Helpfully, someone has stencilled their character names on their costumes, probably so nobody picks up the wrong outfit in space school.
It’s way too early to start worrying about Valerian just yet – after all, Besson has recently proved he’s capable of exceeding studio expectations with the success of absolutely barmy evolve-em-up Lucy. Still, I picked up more than a hint of the Wachowski’s notorious flop Jupiter Ascending (extremely underrated, incidentally) in the trailer, and the studio must be a little nervous about this going up against Dunkirk, War for the Planet of the Apes and The Dark Tower – not to mention Spider-Man: Homecoming.
Maybe that’s why they’ve gone with a powerfully dull and conventional poster. At any rate, Besson seems to like it, as he’s explained that it summarizes the predominant color in the film, in this case, “ice blue.”
Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets drops into theatres on July 21st. Check out the new one-sheet below and let us know what you make of it. Kind of boring, right?
