Richard Linklater’s Secret Movie: The Director Confirms 1969 Coming-of-Age Film and Needs Your Help
Zack Sharf
Richard Linklater is up to his old tricks again. The director has confirmed to The Houston Chronicle that he’s currently at work directing a secret project in Houston, Texas. Linklater isn’t ready to reveal any cast or plot details, but he’s ok with letting everyone know the film will be a coming-of-age story that takes place in 1969 and centers around the moon landing.
“You had so much going on in Houston at once: NASA, the Medical Center, the Astrodome,” Linklater said. “There was a communal atmosphere. You had all these kids with parents working at NASA for a common goal.”
The Chronicle says the new film was partly inspired by Linklater’s time shooting his magnum opus “Boyhood.” The film got the director thinking about his own childhood and growing up in the wake of the moon landing, which is where the script was inspired. The movie will feature “regional hits” from 1969 and be set during the summer. Similar to “Boyhood,” the film will be told from a child’s point of view.
Linklater has already announced he’s tackling an adaptation of the novel “Where’d You Go, Bernadette” with Cate Blanchett, so it seems like the Houston-set secret project is a quick trip back to his indie roots before he takes on a larger project. He was last in theaters in the fall with “Last Flag Flying,” starring Bryan Cranston, Steve Carell, and Laurence Fishburne.
The Houston Film Commission has issued the following statement, which announces Linklater needs your help for any nostalgic Houston memorabilia you may have in your possession.
Director Richard Linklater needs your Houston area photos, videos from the 1960s for a new movie. Have a home movie from Astroworld or the Astrodome, or a recording of your little brother with Kitirik? Did someone you know use a Kinescope to record the moon landing? If so, we want to see it and anything else that documents that era. There is no wrong material, as long as it from Houston in the 1960s we want to see it.
Linklater is aiming to release the film in 2019 to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing.
