Alec Baldwin is one of those actors who you can get away with calling a “thespian” non-ironically, a serious performer who approaches his work as a craft to be honed to excellence. He’s an intense presence and accordingly is attracted to intense roles, all of which is to say that the upcoming sci-fi picture Andron represents a change of pace for him. On paper, this genre picture sounds like the kind of project Baldwin typically tries to stay away from, heavily laden with CGI effects instead of privileging character or dialogue. But just take a look at the trailer embedded above — there he is, maintaining his composure while walking through floating digital Matrixy text and throwing a chair through a hologram. They guy’s a consummate professional.
Francesco Cinquemani’s film has bounced around the festival circuit since debuting at the Italia Film Festival last year, regarded as a product of Italy despite its English-language script and Hollywood cast. Piggybacking on post-apocalyptic smashes like The Hunger Games and The Maze Runner, Andron focuses on ten prisoners who have mysteriously been abducted and placed in a gigantic labyrinth from which they must escape, or face certain doom. Baldwin portrays the overseer of this most deadly game, who in turn reports to a gruff overseer played by Danny Glover. (To put it in Hunger Games terms, Baldwin would be Wes Bentley while Glover would be Donald Sutherland.)
The special effects on display in the trailer look pretty low-rent, and the cast of unknowns, aside from Baldwin and Glover, also suggests a microbudget production flying under the radar. But once this lands a release date stateside, it could be worth tracking down, if only to see how Thespian Alec Baldwin handles a concept this frivolous.
