"Nothing is more addictive than the past," Hugh Jackman's character Nick Bannister says in the Reminiscence trailer, which takes us right into a world where memories are high-value items – with some coming at a terrible cost.
The sci-fi thriller is set in Miami, but not as we know it – the movie takes place in the future and the city is partly submerged underwater with global warming meaning that human life has become nocturnal to avoid the unbearable heat of the sun. Bannister, a closed-off veteran, and his associate Watts (Thandiwe Newton) run a company that offers clients the chance to relive any of their memories – and with the present practically unlivable, who wouldn't want to step back into the past, if only momentarily?
However, when the mysterious Mae (Rebecca Ferguson) comes into Bannister's life (and promptly disappears) things start to get complicated – what starts out as a simple case of lost and found quickly escalates into violent crime, with Mae seemingly at the center of it all. The new high-octane trailer for the movie promises action and passion in equal measure, all against a disquieting backdrop of eerie dystopia, with Bannister in a desperate quest to find out who Mae really is.
Reminiscence is Westworld co-creator Lisa Joy's feature directorial debut – she also wrote the script and co-produced the movie, and it was important for her to ground the movie in the present as much as the future.
"The future isn't this distant thing. It's here and the things we do right now form our world so quickly," Joy said at a press conference attended by 12DOVE. "Science fiction has these connotations of futurism and the distant world, but for me what science fiction is, is metaphor. It's metaphor on a grand scale for the things we are experiencing in this world."
Reminiscence is released simultaneously in US theaters and on HBO Max on August 20. In the meantime, check out our list of all the other upcoming movie release dates to get excited about this year. And, if you don't have a subscription yet, be sure to take a look at our guide to the best HBO Max prices.
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