Tron Legacy director Joseph Kosinski talked to MTV about his upcoming reimagining of Disney’s The Black Hole.
In the original, the explorer craft U.S.S. Palomino is returning to Earth after a fruitless 18-month search for extra-terrestrial life when the crew comes upon a supposedly lost ship, the magnificent U.S.S. Cygnus, hovering near a black hole. The ship is controlled by Dr. Hans Reinhardt and his monstrous robot companion, Maximillian. But the initial wonderment and awe the Palomino crew feel for the ship and its resistance to the power of the black hole turn to horror as they uncover Reinhardt’s plans, which involve turning his former crew into robots and flying through the hole.
“For me, it would be taking ideas and iconic elements that struck me as timeless and cool and preserving them while weaving a new story around them that’s a little more ‘2001,’” said Kosinski. So what kind of things would he preserve?
“What sticks out most is the robot Maximilian,” he added. “The blades and the vicious killing of Anthony Perkins. That freaked me out and that’s definitely going to be an element that will be preserved. The design of the Cygnus ship is one of the most iconic spaceships ever put to film.”
Kosinski said they’ll concentrate more on the science behind black holes for this new version. “From a conceptual point of view, we know so much more about black holes now, the crazy things that go on as you approach them due to the intense gravitational pull and the effects on time and space. All that could provide us with some really cool film if we embrace it in a hard science way.”
