AUSTIN, Texas -- Duncan Jones is more than a little antsy. The charmingly disheveled 38-year-old director is roughly an hour away from the world premier of his new film, Source Code, and it's starting to show.
[eventbug id="sxsw2011"]"I'm definitely nervous, but I'm also pretty excited," Jones told Wired.com at a pre-screening mixer here Friday night. "Quite a few people that I respect have seen the film and seem to really like it, so I'm just now starting to feel a little more relaxed than I did a few weeks ago."
The origin story of Jones' time-travel techno-thriller about an Afghanistan war vet trying to stop a Chicago terror attack serves as the perfect schematic to his current nervousness. After the critical and commercial success of 2009 indie sci-fi hit Moon, the uncannily modest director was approached by eventual Source Code star, Jake Gyllenhaal, to helm the film.
For Jones, this was a tricky proposition: A lot of Moon's success stemmed from his homegrown vision and the extra creative control that comes with a relatively small-scale production. Though he was intrigued by screenwriter Ben Ripley's deliciously mind-bending script for Source Code, Jones would effectively become the dreaded "Hollywood director for hire."
As it turns out, Jones didn't have too much to worry about. After making the rounds at the mixer, Jones and Source Code cast members were whisked away to the Paramount Theatre for the jam-packed premiere, which opened the South by Southwest film festival.
The scene was a stark contrast to Jones' self-doubt: Enthusiastic fans crowded the entryway and spilled into the streets, a few paparazzi were on hand to flashbulb the A-listers, and SXSW's trademark serpentine queue of badge-holders waited patiently around the block. Director for hire or otherwise, filmgoers were happy to see Jones and clearly excited to check out his second film, two years after Moon built its indie buzz in Austin.
"First, I just want to say how delighted we are to bring the film here and premiere it at South by Southwest," Jones told the raucously cheering crowd prior to the start of the film.
Not too surprisingly, he seemed much more at home in front of the packed theater of fans than at the mixer's VIP-only rooftop bar. While finishing his pre-show thank yous from the Paramount stage, he gave a cheeky shout-out to an audience member dressed as a Lunar Industries employee from Moon.
Overall, the film itself was mostly what one would expect, given the circumstances. Source Code doesn't pack the hard sci-fi punch of Moon, as Jones told Wired.com earlier, and Ripley's script isn't nearly as deliberate as the one for Jones' first film.
*Source Code'*s pairing of a constant state of peril with a brisk, 94-minute runtime pushes it closer to a traditional thriller. Despite this, Jones delivers some stunning imagery and elicits strong performances from Gyllenhaal and co-stars Michelle Monaghan and Vera Farmiga.
A number of exquisitely composed establishing shots of the Chicago skyline add to the visual splendor. And Jones plays with the movie's central element -- Gyllenhaal's hunt for a train bomber in a series of eight-minute time loops -- enough to keep each installment of the repetitive mission fresh.
Even though the story has its share of red herrings and twists, the mostly good-natured audience responded more to the subtle situational humor brought about by the Groundhog Day-sian circumstances. A few snickers were heard in response to some dubious snippets of dialog (like when a self-serious Jeffrey Wright, playing the scientist behind the military operation, matter-of-factly states, "Source Code isn't time travel. It's time reassessment"), but the crowd was clearly having fun.
Jones, Ripley and cast members took the stage for a strangely off-kilter Q&A session after the screening.
'You've got eight minutes and 140 characters to review this film.'"You've got eight minutes and 140 characters to review this film," said Twitter freak Jones, to big laughs. "That was terrifying."
At this point, Jones was at his most animate and mirthful, Gyllenhaal an even mixture of good-natured and exhausted (after a bizarre bathroom scuffle), and everyone else awkward or mute.
To be fair, the audience questions were largely of the non-question variety ("I thought you guys did a good job on the shots of the skyline") and somewhat difficult to answer in any sort of rational way. By the end of the session everyone -- especially Jones -- looked incredibly relieved.
With the first of many screenings behind him, Jones says he's ready to explore a little more of Austin and do some SXSW-style networking before he takes off early next week to continue Source Code's press tour.
"I'm going to try to stop off at the Museum of the Weird, and I've heard that Simon Pegg and the guys from Paul are floating around," said Jones during the pre-screening event. "We've been friends over the internet for a while now but it'd be nice to finally meet."
See Also:- Source Code Director Duncan Jones Talks Life After Moon
