Tom Hanks Reuniting With Forrest Gump Star For New De-Aging Movie
Tom Hanks and Robin Wright will both star in the upcoming Here, which will make extensive use of de-aging technology.
We already knew the Forrest Gump lovebirds Tom Hanks and Robin Wright were reuniting for the upcoming comic book adaptation Here, and now we know the two may actually look just like they did back in 1994. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the “AI-driven tool” Metaphysic Live will be used in Here to de-age Hanks, Wright, and other actors in the film. Here is set in a single room over the course of many years, necessitating that the actors’ age ranges fluctuate.
It’s fitting that it should be the big players in the creative team behind Forrest Gump — Robert Zemeckis, who directed Gump, is also helming Here — to make a movie that will rely so heavily on de-aging technology. The Oscar-winning Forrest Gump likewise used CGI in a way that was, at the time, brand new. The visual effects allowed Tom Hanks’ character to appear to be interacting with real life historical figures such as John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, and John Lennon.
Of course, de-aging is nothing brand new to Hollywood at this point. Marvel Studios has used de-aging extensively and Martin Scorsese made headlines for turning back time on Robert De Niro in 2019’s The Irishman. But, none of those films relied quite as heavily on this specific brand of visual effects as Here will.
As much as Metaphysic Live might be able to rejuvenate Tom Hanks and Robin Wright, it likely won’t be able to turn things back as far as the source material. Richard McGuirre originally published a 6-page version of Here in the comics anthology magazine Raw in 1989. It was expanded into a graphic novel that was published in 2014.
Like the version of Here Tom Hanks will star in, the narrative of the original Here takes place in a single room, but it goes backward and forward in time much further than a single lifetime. For example, in the original 6-page version, one panel shows a man laughing in 1989, a mouse about to get caught in a trap in 1999, and a Stegosaurus growling in 100,650,010 B.C.
It’s a safe bet that Robert Zemeckis’ film will follow a more linear, traditional narrative than what unfolds in the graphic novel. In the source material, it’s the place that’s the main character, as opposed to any specific person. But generally speaking, you don’t hire Tom Hanks to play second fiddle to a room.
We don’t yet know when to expect Here to hit theaters. Along with Tom Hanks and Robin Wright, the film will star Paul Bettany and Kelly Reilly. Robert Zemeckis will direct and the script is written by the Oscar-winning Eric Roth.
