''Mute'' (also known as ''Moon II'' in some countries) is a 2018

neo-noir Neo-noir is a revival of film noir, a genre that had originally flourished during the post-World War II era in the United Statesroughly from 1940 to 1960. The French term, ''film noir'', translates literally to English as "black film", indicating ...

science fiction film Science fiction (or sci-fi) is a film genre that uses speculative, fictional science-based depictions of phenomena that are not fully accepted by mainstream science, such as extraterrestrial lifeforms, spacecraft, robots, cyborgs, interstellar ...

directed by

Duncan Jones Duncan Zowie Haywood Jones (born 30 May 1971) is a British film director, film producer and screenwriter. He is best known for directing the films ''Moon'' (2009), ''Source Code'' (2011), ''Warcraft'' (2016), and ''Mute'' (2018). For ''Moon'', ...

, who co-wrote the script with Michael Robert Johnson. A follow-up to his 2009 film ''

Moon The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System and the largest and most massive relative to its parent planet, with a diameter about one-quarter that of Earth (comparable to the width of ...

'', it stars

Alexander Skarsgård Alexander Johan Hjalmar Skarsgård (; born August 25, 1976) is a Swedish actor. Born in Stockholm, he began acting at age seven but quit at 13. After serving in the Swedish military, Skarsgård returned to acting and gained his first role in th ...

Paul Rudd Paul Stephen Rudd (born April 6, 1969) is an American actor. He studied theater at the University of Kansas and the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, before making his acting debut in 1991. He received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in ...

Justin Theroux Justin Paul Theroux (; born August 10, 1971) is an American actor and filmmaker. He gained recognition for his work with director David Lynch in the mystery film ''Mulholland Drive'' (2001) and the thriller film ''Inland Empire'' (2006). He also ...

Robert Sheehan Robert Sheehan (born 7 January 1988) is an Irish actor. He is best known for television roles such as Nathan Young in ''Misfits'', Darren Treacy in '' Love/Hate'', and Klaus Hargreeves in ''The Umbrella Academy,'' as well as film roles such a ...

Noel Clarke Noel Anthony Clarke (born 6 December 1975) is a British actor, screenwriter, director, and comic book writer. Rising to prominence for playing Mickey Smith in ''Doctor Who'' (2005–2010), he played Sam in the films ''Kidulthood'' (2006), ''Adu ...

Florence Kasumba Florence Kasumba (born 26 October 1976) is a Ugandan-born German actress. She is best known for her portrayal of Ayo in the Marvel Cinematic Universe films '' Captain America: Civil War'' (2016), ''Black Panther'' (2018), '' Avengers: Infinit ...

, and

Dominic Monaghan Dominic Bernard Patrick Luke Monaghan (born 8 December 1976) is a British actor. He is best known for playing Meriadoc "Merry" Brandybuck in Peter Jackson's film trilogy ''The Lord of the Rings'' (2001–2003), and Charlie Pace on J. J. Abram ...

, revolving around a mute bartender (Skarsgård) searching for the love of his life (

Seyneb Saleh Seyneb Nesha Saleh (born 25 December 1987) is a German actress. She is best known for her role as Naadirah in the 2018 Netflix film ''Mute (2018 film), Mute''. Biography Seyneb Nesha Saleh was born on 25 December 1987 in Aalen, Baden-Württem ...

) who has mysteriously disappeared. A third instalment, a graphic novel called ''Madi: Once Upon A Time In The Future'', was released in 2020. It was released on

Netflix Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fil ...

on 23 February 2018 and received negative reviews, with praise for the visuals but criticism for its pacing, plot, and mishandled subject material; it drew unfavorable comparisons to ''

Blade Runner ''Blade Runner'' is a 1982 science fiction film directed by Ridley Scott, and written by Hampton Fancher and David Peoples. Starring Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, Sean Young, and Edward James Olmos, it is an adaptation of Philip K. Dick' ...

'' from many critics.

Plot

A childhood swimming accident leaves Leo mute, as his devout Amish mother refused the surgery which could have helped him. As an adult in 2035, he swims frequently and has perfected the technique of holding his breath underwater. He is also a talented artist and loves woodworking. Leo works as a bartender at a Berlin strip club owned by Maksim and dates cocktail waitress Naadirah, with whom he is deeply in love. She confides in her gay friend Luba, who also works at the club, that she has not told Leo about her past or her desperate need for money. Naadirah shows up at Leo's apartment and attempts to tell him about “something important”, but Leo tells her, by a note, that as long as they are together, nothing else is important. Then he shows her an elaborate bed he has been carving as a present for her. Naadirah is overcome with emotion and they have sex. Elsewhere, Maksim's mobsters meet two American surgeons, Cactus Bill and Duck, who run a black-market clinic. The two doctors are close friends, having served in combat together. Bill (who has an aggressive, volatile temper) desperately wants to leave Berlin and has pressed Maksim to provide forged documents for him and his young daughter, Josie. Duck, however, enjoys living in Berlin and has another, official, clinic where he performs cybernetic surgery. Some of his patients are children, and Duck appears to have a sexual interest in very young girls. Naadirah goes missing and Leo is unable to contact her; but then he begins to receive a series of text messages on his phone, giving clues as to her whereabouts. Leo asks Luba for help, but Luba (who is jealous of Naadirah’s affection for Leo) refuses. Leo remembers that Naadirah wrote an address in his notepad and tore out the page. He uses charcoal to read the imprint of the address on the next page of the notebook. The address leads Leo to the apartment of a man called Oswald. Leo sees a photo of Naadirah at the apartment and, when he expresses interest, Oswald assumes Leo works for Maksim's underling, Nicky Simsek, who is skimming money from Maksim's prostitutes. Leo meets with Simsek, who is babysitting Josie, at a diner. Leo befriends Josie, who is sketching, by drawing a picture for her. Then - watched by Maksim’s henchmen - he leaves Simsek money from Oswald and an incriminating note. After tracking down Naadirah's address, Leo discovers Luba living there instead. Luba admits that he and Naadirah have been working as prostitutes to earn the money she so desperately needs. Leo obtains the address of Naadirah's mother and visits her. There, he learns that Naadirah is Josie's mother, and realises Bill is responsible for Naadirah's disappearance. Having discovered that Simsek has been double-crossing him, Maksim orders him tortured by Bill and Duck. Bill later discovers a picture of a naked child on Duck's computer, which he took using a hidden camera in his consulting room. Bill becomes violent and threatens to break Duck's arms if he ever goes near another child, but before the situation can escalate, Bill receives a call from Maksim advising that he has the forged documents ready. Bill is elated, and takes Duck out on the town in celebration. During the evening Duck casually reveals that he is the author of the anonymous texts to Leo, which he had sent to “mess with him”. As they leave a casino, a security guard stops them for a casual theft, and an enraged Bill pulls out a huge knife and threatens to kill the guard. When Duck intervenes, Bill strikes him. Upset by this, Duck texts Bill's destination (Maksim’s club) to Leo. Leo goes to the club, taking a support beam from the bed he made, and uses it to beat up Maksim and his henchmen; he then takes Bill's forged documents. At Bill's house, Leo finds a badly wounded Simsek strapped to a gurney in the basement. He releases Simsek, who tries to escape but is killed when Bill appears. Bill reveals Naadirah’s asphyxiated body to Leo; he killed her because she was trying to get custody of Josie. The two men fight and Leo stabs Bill through the throat with his own knife. Then he carries Naadirah’s body out into the garden, and sits by a tree, cradling her. Duck then turns up, but refuses to take Bill to a hospital. Instead, he turns the surveillance camera, which shows Josie's room, towards Bill's face, so that the dying man can see Duck carry away his daughter. Duck finds Leo in the garden and knocks him out. Back at Duck’s clinic, he implants an

electrolarynx An electrolarynx, sometimes referred to as a "throat back", is a medical device about the size of a small electric razor used to produce clearer speech by those people who have lost their voice box, usually due to cancer of the larynx. The most ...

in Leo’s throat, so that he can hear Leo “apologise for killing Bill”. When Leo refuses, Duck drives him and Josie to the bridge shown in the one photo Leo has of Naadirah. Duck says he took the photo himself, when he, Bill and Naadirah visited the spot together in happier times. Duck threatens to throw Leo off the bridge if he doesn’t apologise, but Leo takes a deep breath and, gripping Duck tightly, launches them both into the water, holding Duck down until he drowns. When Leo surfaces he sees Josie near the edge, and - thanks to Duck’s implant - is able to shout a warning to her. When Leo is finally back on the bridge, he tells Josie he will take her to her maternal grandmother. A final scene shows Leo sitting with Josie in a restaurant, both drawing pictures. He notices that she wears a bracelet of wooden beads that he carved for her mother, and produces another bead, which he gives her.

Cast

as Leo, a man left mute from a childhood accident ** Levi Eisenblätter as young Leo *

as Cactus Bill, an American surgeon *

as Duck, Cactus' partner and best friend *

as Naadirah, Leo's girlfriend *

as Luba * Gilbert Owuor as Maksim *

Jannis Niewöhner Jannis Niewöhner () (born 30 March 1992) is a German actor known for his role in the ''Timeless'' trilogy of films: ''Ruby Red'', ''Sapphire Blue'', and ''Emerald Green'', based on a book series written by Kerstin Gier Kerstin Gier (born 8 Oct ...

as Nicky Simsek *

Robert Kazinsky Robert John Appleby (born 18 November 1983), known professionally as Robert Kazinsky, is an English actor. He is known for his roles as Casper Rose in the Sky One drama ''Dream Team'', the Don in '' Captain Marvel'', Sean Slater in the BBC soap ...

as Rob *

as Stuart *

as Oswald * Mia-Sophie and Lea-Marie Bastin as Josie *

as Tanya *

Ulf Herman Ulf Nadrowski (born April 4, 1966) is a German professional wrestler, better known by his ring name Ulf Herman. He is best known in the United States for his appearances in Extreme Championship Wrestling where he was part of The Full Blooded Ital ...

as Gunther * Anja Karmanski as Kathy *

Sam Rockwell Sam Rockwell (born November 5, 1968) is an American actor. He is known for appearing in independent films and also as a character actor portraying a wide variety of roles both comedic and dramatic in films such as '' Lawn Dogs'' (199 ...

as Sam Bell (uncredited cameo)

Production

The film was in

development hell Development hell, development purgatory, and development limbo are media and software industry jargon for a project, concept, or idea that remains in development for an especially long time, often moving between different crews, scripts, game engi ...

for many years, but Jones always said he wished to direct it and has described it as a "spiritual sequel" to ''

'', heavily inspired by the

Ridley Scott Sir Ridley Scott (born 30 November 1937) is a British film director and producer. Directing, among others, science fiction films, his work is known for its atmospheric and highly concentrated visual style. Scott has received many accolades thr ...

film ''

'' (1982). During the film's development, Jones had expressed his desire for

to reprise his role from ''

'' in a

cameo appearance A cameo role, also called a cameo appearance and often shortened to just cameo (), is a brief appearance of a well-known person in a work of the performing arts. These roles are generally small, many of them non-speaking ones, and are commonly eit ...

that was to act as an epilogue for the character, and that the film would be the second instalment in a trilogy consisting of ''Moon'', ''Mute'' and yet to be announced third film. In October 2016,

officially joined the cast, joining Skarsgård, Rudd,

and

Filming

Filming began on September 28, 2016. The film was shot on site in Berlin by cinematographer Gary Shaw, who worked with Jones on ''Moon''.

Music

Clint Mansell Clinton Darryl Mansell (; born 7 January 1963) is an English musician, singer, and composer, born in Coventry. He served as the lead singer and multi-instrumentalist of alt-rock band Pop Will Eat Itself before embarking on a career as a film s ...

composed the film's score. In a series of Instagram posts titled Mute & Me, he cited the culture of 20th century Berlin as a major influence, claiming that "Berlin has been, and continues to be, a cultural hot bed of our times". Mansell drew from multiple forms of Berlin culture, including "poets and artists, musicians and philosophers, dreamers and drunks, lovers and the lost and lonely, the wild, the beautiful, and the damned". During background research for the film, Mansell claimed to have drawn inspiration from works of

German expressionism German Expressionism () consisted of several related creative movements in Germany before the First World War that reached a peak in Berlin during the 1920s. These developments were part of a larger Expressionist movement in north and central ...

such as ''Metropolis'', the crime drama ''M'', as well as works of classic and contemporary

film noir Film noir (; ) is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and motivations. The 1940s and 1950s are generally regarded as the "classic period" of American ' ...

like ''

In A Lonely Place ''In a Lonely Place'' is a 1950 American film noir directed by Nicholas Ray and starring Humphrey Bogart and Gloria Grahame, produced for Bogart's Santana Productions. The script was written by Andrew P. Solt from Edmund H. North's adaptation o ...

'', '' Cape Fear'', ''

Chinatown A Chinatown () is an ethnic enclave of Chinese people located outside Greater China, most often in an urban setting. Areas known as "Chinatown" exist throughout the world, including Europe, North America, South America, Asia, Africa and Austra ...

'', ''

Brick A brick is a type of block used to build walls, pavements and other elements in masonry construction. Properly, the term ''brick'' denotes a block composed of dried clay, but is now also used informally to denote other chemically cured cons ...

'', and ''

Blood Simple ''Blood Simple'' is a 1984 American independent neo-noir crime film written, edited, produced, and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen, and starring John Getz, Frances McDormand, Dan Hedaya, and M. Emmet Walsh. Its plot follows a Texas bartender who ...

''. Mansell also looked at the works of

New German Cinema New German Cinema (german: Neuer Deutscher Film) is a period in German cinema which lasted from 1962 to 1982, in which a new generation of directors emerged who, working with low budgets, and influenced by the French New Wave and Italian Neorea ...

filmmakers like

Werner Herzog Werner Herzog (; born 5 September 1942) is a German film director, screenwriter, author, actor, and opera director, regarded as a pioneer of New German Cinema. His films often feature ambitious protagonists with impossible dreams, people with un ...

Rainer Werner Fassbinder Rainer Werner Fassbinder (; 31 May 1945 – 10 June 1982), sometimes credited as R. W. Fassbinder, was a German filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the major figures and catalysts of the New German Cinema movement. Fassbinder's main ...

, and

Wim Wenders Ernst Wilhelm "Wim" Wenders (; born 14 August 1945) is a German filmmaker, playwright, author, and photographer. He is a major figure in New German Cinema. Among many honors, he has received three nominations for the Academy Award for Best Docum ...

. He points to Fassbinder's ''

World on a Wire ''World on a Wire'' (german: Welt am Draht) is a 1973 German science fiction television serial, starring Klaus Löwitsch and directed by Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Shot in 16 mm, it was made for German television and originally aired in 1973 in ...

'' as a specific sci-fi influence from that era. He also looked at the

krautrock Krautrock (also called , German for ) is a broad genre of experimental rock Experimental rock, also called avant-rock, is a subgenre of rock music that pushes the boundaries of common composition and performance technique or which experiments ...

group

Popul Vuh ''Popol Vuh'' (also ''Popol Wuj'' or ''Popul Vuh'' or ''Pop Vuj'') is a text recounting the mythology and history of the Kʼicheʼ people, one of the Maya peoples, who inhabit Guatemala and the Mexican states of Chiapas, Campeche, Yucatan and ...

and their collaborations with Herzog on '' Aguirre, Wrath of God'', and ''

Nosferatu the Vampyre ''Nosferatu the Vampyre'' (german: Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht, lit=Nosferatu: Phantom of the Night) is a 1979 horror film written and directed by Werner Herzog. It is set primarily in 19th-century Wismar, Germany and Transylvania, and was conce ...

''. Mansell cited Jones's father

David Bowie David Robert Jones (8 January 194710 January 2016), known professionally as David Bowie ( ), was an English singer-songwriter and actor. A leading figure in the music industry, he is regarded as one of the most influential musicians of the ...

Berlin Trilogy The Berlin Trilogy consists of three studio albums by English musician David Bowie: '' Low'', '' "Heroes"'' (both 1977) and '' Lodger'' (1979). The trilogy originated following Bowie's move from Los Angeles, California, to Europe to rid himsel ...

of albums as being a major influence in terms of representing Berlin culture, along with other

Brian Eno Brian Peter George St John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno (; born Brian Peter George Eno, 15 May 1948) is a British musician, composer, record producer and visual artist best known for his contributions to ambient music and work in rock, pop an ...

-produced albums like ''

Ultravox! Ultravox (earlier styled as Ultravox!) were a British new wave band, formed in London in April 1974 as Tiger Lily. Between 1980 and 1986, they scored seven Top Ten albums and seventeen Top 40 singles in the UK, the most successful of which was ...

''.

Release

Originally scheduled for release in 2017, ''Mute'' was released on Netflix on 23 February 2018.

Marketing

The film was heavily promoted and discussed by Jones on

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

with production stills and concept art. On 6 January 2017 three stills from the film were released, showing characters Leo, Cactus Bill, and Duck with the backdrop of a futuristic

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

Critical response

On the

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, the film holds an approval rating of based on reviews, with an average rating of . The website's critical consensus reads, "Visually polished but narratively derivative and overall muddled, ''Mute'' is a would-be sci-fi epic whose title serves as an unfortunate guide to how it might be best enjoyed." On

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

, which uses a

weighted average The weighted arithmetic mean is similar to an ordinary arithmetic mean (the most common type of average), except that instead of each of the data points contributing equally to the final average, some data points contribute more than others. The ...

, the film received a weighted average score of 35 out of 100, based on 24 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews."

References

External links

* * * * * {{Duncan Jones 2010s mystery films 2010s science fiction films British mystery films British science fiction films German-language Netflix original films Films about disability Male bisexuality in film Cross-dressing in film Films about bartenders Films directed by Duncan Jones Films scored by Clint Mansell Films set in Berlin Films set in the future German mystery films German science fiction films English-language German films English-language Netflix original films Babelsberg Studio films British neo-noir films German neo-noir films British multilingual films German multilingual films 2018 multilingual films Cyberpunk films 2010s English-language films 2010s British films 2010s German films