Unfolding in real time, The Desperate Hour is a new thriller from award-winning filmmaker Phillip Noyce. In the movie, Recently widowed mother Amy Carr (Naomi Watts) is doing her best to restore normalcy to the lives of her young daughter and teenage son in their small town. As she's out for a jog in the woods, she finds her town thrown into chaos as a shooting takes place at her son's school. Miles away on foot in the dense forest, Amy desperately races against time to save her son.
Earlier this week, we were fortunate enough to catch up with the Oscar-nominee to discuss the challenges that telling a story as hard-hitting as this one presented. Even though our time was brief, we took the opportunity to ask Watts about another project she worked on several years ago: The Impossible.
Released in 2012, the J. A. Bayona (Jurassic World: Dominion) helmed disaster drama told the story of a family caught up in the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. It also marked Tom Holland's film debut, and when The Impossible found a new audience on Netflix during the pandemic, some photos Watts shared of the Spider-Man: No Way Home star as a child quickly went viral on social media.
Here's what the actress told us about seeing how far Holland has come in the past decade:
"[It's] so wonderful. I’m so happy for him. I always knew that Tom would go on and have a pretty outstanding career. I didn’t think of Spider-Man [Laughs]. That’s just, you know, not something that came to mind, but I knew that he had all of the goods. This was a kid who was doing his first movie, had unbelievable access to emotions, had great discipline and whether or not that comes from his dance and athletic background, I don’t know, but he had a really great family too."
"They’re a really solid team of people there supporting him. He’s off on his own now, of course, but just having a really good foundation…you’re going to be up for all of the challenges in our industry that play out if you’ve got a good family. It doesn’t surprise me is what I’m trying to say!"
Watts has always been very supportive of Holland's career on social media, and it's pretty incredible to see how far he's come since making The Impossible (Spider-Man: No Way Home has grossed over $1.8 billion at the global box office despite the current "pandemic era" we find ourselves in).
The Desperate Hour is in Theaters, on Digital, and On Demand February 25, 2022.