The filmmaker was extremely close to his dad, who died at the age of 69 in January 2016, but has been estranged from his mother Angie, since he was 13 years old.Duncan says Mute, a science-fiction thriller which follows a speechless bartender searching for his missing girlfriend and is set in the future in Berlin, Germany, a city he visited with his father as a child, has parental relationships as a central theme.
"You know I think there's a lot of subtext in Mute that I'll become more aware of as time wears on," he tells Britain's The Times newspaper. "An awful lot of the story revolves around the nature of parenthood. What makes a good parent?"
.@MUTE_Film starts shooting in.... one week from today! :0 pic.twitter.com/hbgQVkPyMR
— Duncan Jones (@ManMadeMoon) September 21, 2016
The film shares a universe with Jones’ debut film Moon. Where Moon was inspired by classic science fiction films like Outland or Silent Running, Jones has described Mute as taking a page from Blade Runner’s playbook — something we see in the neon-lit streets of Jone’s futuristic Berlin. “It’s not a coincidence that [the film is] set in Berlin,” Skarsgard told The Times. “You can tell Duncan is very excited to be back here.”
The film's star Alexander Skarsgard, who plays bartender Leo Beiler, told The Times that his director was delighted to return to the city where David recorded three albums in the 1970s for filming. Jones also recalled advice his father gave him “about putting yourself a little bit deeper in the water than where you can reach [the bottom with] your toes.”
“That’s what I did with Mute,” he explained. “I made a film which was a little bit uncomfortable and unexpected, and darker than people might be expecting. I was nervous making it. But nervous in a good way.”
