Jennifer Connelly on the red carpetImage via Ian West/PA Images/INSTARimages
Director Joseph Kosinski made a splashy feature debut with Tron: Legacy, a movie that was initially written off as an underperformer but has since developed quite the formidable reputation as a modern cult classic. Kosinski’s visual flair and talent for large-scale storytelling caught the eye of the industry, and he soon bagged a movie with Tom Cruise: Oblivion. The science-fiction drama did fairly well at the box office, but his third feature film didn’t. In fact, the movie in question — Only the Brave — remains his only flop. The survival drama follows an elite group of firefighters confronted by the most terrifying fire of their lives. Kosinski knocked it out of the park with his follow-up, the legacy sequel Top Gun: Maverick and then with this year’s F1, but Only the Brave proved that he doesn’t need a massive canvas to work on to extract emotion. Those who’ve never watched the movie will get a chance to do so next month, when it debuts on Netflix.
Released in 2017, the film ironically earned Kosinski the best reviews of his career until then. It holds a “certified fresh” 87% score on the aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, where the consensus reads, “Only the Brave’s impressive veteran cast and affecting fact-based story add up to a no-frills drama that’s just as stolidly powerful as the real-life heroes it honors.” Only the Brave features Josh Brolin, Taylor Kitsch, Ben Hardy, Miles Teller, Jeff Bridges, James Badge Dale, and Jennifer Connelly. Produced on a reported budget of just under $40 million, the movie grossed a little over $25 million worldwide.
‘Only the Brave’ Has Several Genre Companion Pieces
Only the Brave recently got a new genre companion piece, director Paul Greengrass‘ equally acclaimed The Lost Bus. Starring Matthew McConaughey as a down-and-out school bus driver who is handed the unexpected responsibility of ferrying children to safety during a forest fire, the film debuted on Apple TV only a few weeks ago. It did rather well, on the back of positive reviews for Greengrass’ direction and McConaughey’s central performance. The Lost Bus was preceded by Taylor Sheridan’s Those Who Wish Me Dead, which features Angelina Jolie as a smokejumper. Both movies are available to watch at home, and Only the Brave will debut on Netflix on January 1. Kosinski is now putting together a reboot of Miami Vice, while work on a third Top Gun movie also continues.
Stay tuned to Collider for more.