[This story contains spoilers from A Big Bold Beautiful Journey, now playing in theaters.]
2025 seems to be the year of original films — that’s what the stars of A Big Bold Beautiful Journey is saying.
The romantic fantasy film, which hit theaters on Friday, is led by Margot Robbie as Sarah and Colin Farrell as David, whose characters meet at a wedding and have both rented cars with a speaking GPS that guides them to locations where they open literal doors and are transported back in time to relive their most pivotal moments.
The movie’s story is also an original idea. As there have been many remakes, sequels and reboots, especially in the last couple of years, this year alone has seen new stories thrive on the big screen (Farrell mentions his favorites below) as well as last year’s Anora, which won the Academy Award for best picture.
“I feel like there’s a lot of original films at the moment, which makes me so happy,” Robbie told The Hollywood Reporter at the film’s New York City premiere. “Right now, in particular, is a really good time for film.”
Farrell echoed Robbie’s point and added that there’s a place for both to co-exist. “I know there’s a lot of sequels and there’s talk about a lot of sequels and IPs that have been used before and reimaginings and revisitings of worlds. This year I saw Bring Her Back, and then I saw obviously Sinners and the other day I saw Weapons,” he told THR. “I get really excited when I see original stuff, really, really excited. So there’s always going to be original stories and there’s always going to be rehashes and there’s room for both.”
A Big Bold Beautiful Journey is inspired by screenwriter Seth Reiss‘ own personal experiences. “I was heartbroken. I had just been broken up with. I had rented a car and was driving to a wedding and I remember feeling at my lowest moment and then on the way back from the wedding, the GPS was like purge on to I-95 for 290 miles and then I thought, Well, what if it asked me, ‘Seth, do you want to go on a big, bold beautiful journey?’ And I was like, that might be a good idea for a movie,” Reiss said.
While the film explores the budding love between Sarah and David, which its director, Kogonada, told THR, Robbie and Farrell have a “unique spark together that was undeniable from the first day of rehearsal to the very end of the shoot,” it also examines the life regrets that can haunt you.
Specifically for Sarah, as she missed the chance to be with her mom when she died. One of the doors Sarah opens is her childhood home, where she then spends time with her mom and forgives herself for her own past mistakes. Robbie spoke about what it was like to shoot the emotional scenes with Lily Rabe, who plays Sarah’s mom.
“Doing those scenes in the movie were incredible because Lily and I we’re pretty much the same age, but the whole premise of the film is you walk through these doors and everyone sees you as younger self and so we’re doing these scenes where I felt like a little kid even though I’m acting against an actress who’s pretty much the same age as me and we had this mother-daughter dynamic nonetheless,” she said. “That’s really a credit to her and the kind of actor she is but it gives you an idea of the kind of movie it is, where there’s something surreal about it but it feels very grounded at the same time. It gets emotional, it’s funny, it’s romantic, you get a bit of everything.”
Reiss adds that he hopes the film will spark more new stories: “I think there’s nothing more fun than seeing something that we haven’t seen before, and it’s really exhilarating and it just reminds us of why we went to the movies.”