Though a spin-off of the Transformers franchise, Bumblebee marks a different turn, something more intimate and character driven than what has preceded it. To celebrate its release we spoke to two of the film’s leading stars in Hailee Steinfeld and John Cena, as well as director Travis Knight, to talk about things Bee.
Knight begins by telling us about the challenges in remaining faithful to the brand while at the same time stamping his own identity on proceedings, and just how much of an influence John Hughes is on his work. Steinfeld and Cena go on to talk about our love for the cinematic trope that sees a child befriend a “monster”, while us silly old humans think the latter is a threat.
Knight discusses Michael Bay’s involvement and Steinfeld tells us of Kelly Fremon Craig’s help on the project too, who she collaborated with on The Edge of Seventeen. Cena talks about the notion of nostalgia too – a key theme in this movie – and what toys from his childhood he’s never been able to throw away. Finally Knight talks about how he went about giving the title role emotion having taken away the character’s voice, and what it was like doing his first ever live action movie, after the success he had with the animation Kubo and the Two Strings.
Watch the interviews here:
Synopsis
