Adam McKay has said his 2021 satirical comedy Don’t Look Up was watched by between 400 million and half a billion people on Netflix, which shows that viewers know when they’re being “gaslit,” adding that the Los Angeles wildfires serve as a reminder of the film’s message.
In a new interview, the climate activist and filmmaker was discussing the wildfires blazing through Los Angeles and the effect of the climate crisis on disasters.
“We’re heartbroken. Afraid. Sad,” he told NME about the fires that have killed at least 27 people.
“Some people are blaming power lines or arsonists [for the fires], but I know plenty that are now realising the climate breakdown we’re all in globally is here – happening right now. I’ve heard that from friends: they say, ‘I thought we had more time’. The answer is: ‘We don’t – it’s here now’.”
Speaking about the continuing impact of his 2021 film, Don’t Look Up, still the second most-watched film on Netflix, McKay said he focused on the audience response to the film, instead of critics’.
“In the face of these dramatic catastrophes that keep happening, a movie seems really small and ridiculous. But what was inspiring and energising was the popular response to that movie, not the critics and the cultural gatekeepers who hated it. It ended up being number one in something like 85 countries, as diverse as Pakistan, Vietnam, US and Uruguay.
“That’s extremely rare for a comedy which is usually confined by cultural regional reference points.”
Don’t Look Up stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence as two scientists who struggle to alert Earth to an impending catastrophe after noticing that the planet is on a collision course with a huge comet.
McKay described Don’t Look Up as “a dark comedy”, telling the Happy Sad Confused podcast in 2021 that it is “a disaster movie in which people don’t necessarily believe that the disaster is coming”.
On why he believed so many people watched Don’t Look Up, McKay said viewers “connected with the idea of being gaslit”.
“The estimates of how many people saw that movie – Netflix will never say exactly – but it’s somewhere between 400 million and half a billion. Viewers all really connected with the idea of being gaslit. Being lied to by their leaders, lied to by their big news media, and being lied to by industries.
“It was funny – when I realised that was the common connection point, I was like, of course! It’s happening everywhere now with this global neo-liberal economy that we’re all living in. It’s such a cancer and everyone is feeling it.”
In a four-star review for The Independent, Clarisse Loughrey wrote that the satire “does very well to capture the feeling that the entire world is losing its mind”.
However, Louis Chilton felt that while “the central metaphor of Don’t Look Up is chillingly relatable,” it “doesn’t make it a good film”.
In 2022, McKay said that his home insurance had been cancelled due to climate-linked disasters.
“Just had my home insurance cancelled because Southern California is at too high risk now for fire and floods," he tweeted, including an emoji of a comet. “This s*** is real and happening right now,” he had posted on X, formerly Twitter.
Don’t Look Up is available to stream on Netflix now.
