“Malcolm & Marie” Starring Zendaya and John David Washington | Official Trailer and Key Art

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We feel like the trailer for the upcoming Malcolm & Marie should be prefaced by its press release:

Writer/Director Sam Levinson teams up with Zendaya and John David Washington for an achingly romantic drama in which a filmmaker (Washington) and his girlfriend (Zendaya) return home following a celebratory movie premiere as he awaits what’s sure to be imminent critical and financial success. The evening suddenly takes a turn as revelations about their relationships begin to surface, testing the strength of their love.

Working with cinematographer Marcell Rev, Levinson creates a film of rare originality; an ode to the great Hollywood romances as well as a heartfelt expression of faith in the medium’s future.

We felt like the context was needed because … man, we don’t know about this one. While we get that feeling of epic, melodramatic, stylish romance in the grand Hollywood tradition, the black-and-white conceit, the setting, the costumes, and especially the dialogue all make it sound pretty damn cheesy. We also felt like you needed to know this was a Hollywood couple after a movie premiere not just to explain their outfits, but to kind of couch the overwhelming obviousness of their age difference.

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To be fair, John David Washington is 36 and Zendaya is 24; hardly a scandalous age gap. It’s just that Hollywood has such an overwhelming habit and history of normalizing older man/younger woman casting choices without ever examining them in-story (like the otherwise well-done Mank did recently, to its huge detriment). A hot director would absolutely be dating or living with a significantly younger actress type, so the film has lots of room to just let the relationship exist and the age difference go uncommented-upon, but it would feel like a weird avoidance in a film seemingly all about two people going deep on their own relationship and history.

Still, it looks stylish and these two have such a weird energy with each other that it could be interesting. We’re having a hard time seeing Zendaya in this kind of role, but she just won an Emmy, so we’ll see how far her wings spread now.

[Photo Credit: Netflix – Video Credit: Netflix via YouTube]

• John David Washington
• Malcolm & Marie
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• Netflix
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• Zendaya
• Zendaya Coleman