Southland Tales Predicted the War With Iran

“Scientists are saying the future is going to be far more futuristic than they originally predicted.” No, it’s not a line someone is feeding you to sell AI. It’s a quote from Southland Tales. Sarah Michelle Gellar’s porn star-turned-TV presenter Krysta Now says it to political nepo-stepson Boxer Santaros (Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson). Turns out, the future is far more like Southland Tales than its writer-director Richard Kelly could have predicted — specifically how important the Strait of Hormuz would be to current geopolitics. Speaking to GQ, Kelly recalled how he came up with one small detail in his prologue: “I remember I was putting together, like, how can I succinctly illustrate the beginnings of a World War Three type situation? And in all the research I was doing, it was like, That’s the one big thing, the Strait of Hormuz. If there was a blockade, it’s this very sensitive area, this sort of Achilles heel, in the sense of global security and access to oil, and how everything could sort of explode.” Dude called it from downtown.

Southland Tales wound up predicting a lot of things: the outsized role of comedians (or podcasters that ostensibly are funny) in politics, Tesla Cybertrucks, the Rock being a movie star. “I don’t think I ever could have predicted how so many things in the movie seemed to track with current events,” Kelly says. “Even the Baron von Westphalen [played by Wallace Shawn] being kind of an Elon Musk type character.” Krysta Now even feels predictive of Cassie’s storyline in Euphoria season 3. The Strait of Hormuz conflict in Southland Tales leads to a nuclear assault on America, so that’s not great. But Kelly sees the (apocalyptic) end of the film as actually optimistic. “There is a cynicism baked into the movie, or anger baked into the movie, but there’s a hopefulness to the conclusion,” he says. “The metaphysical resurrection that happens at the end of the movie is meant to try and button the thing up with some degree of emotion.” Cling to that.