Christoph Waltz, the two-time Oscar winner beloved for his portrayals of tough guys and bad guys, made his world premiere as the Old Guy at the Newport Beach Film Festival Thursday night.
His new buddy action assassin comedy opened the 25th rendition of a film festival that started with humble roots in the coastal Southern California city known for modern, beachside luxury. (It was just named one of MovieMaker’s 25 Coolest Film Festivals in the World.)
Festival founders Gregg Schwenk and Todd Quartararo were on hand to celebrate raising their baby to a quarter-century old, injecting more film culture into their community while boosting local businesses. Their success earned them a surprise honorary proclamation from Newport Beach’s Chamber of Commerce during opening remarks.
NBFF is set to welcome about 50,000 attendees over the course of the next eight days and screen hundreds of films, many of which feature top-notch industry talent like Waltz, known for playing insidious Bond villain Blofeld after winning Oscars for portraying ruthless Nazi Hans Landa in Inglourious Basterds and then bounty hunter King Schultz in Django Unchained.
Christoph Waltz on Winning the Newport Beach Film Festival Icon Award
The festival honored the 68-year-old actor with the Icon Award before the sold-out theater of eager attendees witnessed his turn as good guy Danny Dolinski — an aging contract killer with a heart of gold tasked with training a Gen-Z prodigy who has a bad habit of killing innocent bystanders during hits.
“It is an incredible honor to come to Newport Beach and the first thing is being honored with the Icon Award,” Walz said inside the Regal Edwards Big Newport movie theater.
“It’s extremely flattering; I like flattery. I mean, I like to believe flattery,” he joked.
“But in any case, to be honored as an icon is a responsibility. What is an icon? I thought about my qualities as an icon, it’s not a long list, so I got a little insecure. … Until I discovered I’m not honored as an icon, I’m honored with an icon.”
The film is directed by action vet Simon West (Con Air) and written by Greg Johnson (The Last Son), casting Walz as — did I say good guy? A good-ish guy, relative to the cold-hearted standards of London crime syndicate The Company, his longtime employer which wants to replace the seasoned assassin with a younger, faster, stronger — albeit reckless — hitman, played by Licorice Pizza breakout star Cooper Hoffman.
Egos and daddy issues collide as generations clash in the field and their killer instincts are put to the test, all while Dolinski’s love interest — played by a charming Lucy Liu — rides shotgun and keeps the peace.
“To be in the festival alone, I’d be happy with, but to be the opening film is even greater,” West said while introducing his 17th feature film in the director’s chair. “It is a funny film, so it’s OK to laugh at it. And with funny films, people do ask, ‘Did anything funny happen on the set?’ I can say, well, it rained every day, and we were running out of money every week, so nothing funny happened on the set.”
Newport Beach should be considerably sunnier.
More details on the Newport Beach Film Festival are here.
Main image: Christoph Waltz displays the Icon Award. Getty Images for Newport Beach Film Festival.