Brie Larson is dominating the box office as a confident, capable superheroine in “Captain Marvel,” but her latest pic sees her playing a character struggling with self-esteem issues. A trailer has dropped for Larson’s feature directorial debut, “Unicorn Store.”
Kicked out of art school and unfulfilled by her temp job at a PR company, aspiring artist Kit (Larson) realizes she’s not living up to her full potential. “I don’t know how to be a grown up,” she admits. “My parents think that I’m insane.”
There’s one thing Kit has ever wanted: a unicorn. One day she receives a mysterious invitation that leads her to a magical pop-up shop where The Salesman (Samuel L. Jackson) claims that they sell what she needs. But before he orders a unicorn for Kit, he has to make sure that she’s “for real.” What exactly that means remains to be seen, though it seems like Kit will have to prove herself worthy of the unicorn. The Salesman offers some helpful advice: “You need to learn to love yourself,” he explains.
Larson won an Oscar in 2016 for “Room.” Her upcoming projects include an Apple series about a CIA undercover operative and a biopic about women’s rights activist Victoria Woodhull.
In a recent interview with us, Larson shared her thoughts about where the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements are heading. “We’re at this turning point where I feel like there’s more people understanding what we’re seeing than not, at least in my experience. And I still think we’re stumbling through, but we’re getting there, and that to me is it,” she explained. “Whether we’re talking about gender equality or discrimination of any kind or issues of safety — these are things that first require safe spaces to be able to talk about them, which we didn’t have before. Which is not to say that it’s totally safe now and everything’s great, but I feel like we’re getting closer to that. That’s my main focus at this point.”
Penned by Samantha McIntyre, “Unicorn Store” made its world premiere at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival. The coming-of-age comedy starts streaming on Netflix April 5.
