June & John | Luc Besson

[BluBonnet]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7ONQ4l9eNU

[BluBonnet]

Luc Besson Talks Risk Averse Studios & Joy Of Making L.A. & Smartphone-Shot Romance ‘June & John’: “It Was Just Two Actors & A Director”

Four decades have passed since Luc Besson found fame as an emerging 26-year-old director with thriller Subway starring Isabelle Adjani and Christopher Lambert.

His feature credits since range from early stylized breakouts The Big Blue and Nikita; to sci-fi hits The Fifth Element and Lucy, and historic dramas The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc and The Lady, at the same time as building film company EuropaCorp and producing blockbuster franchises Taxi and Taken.

As the 40th anniversary of his big screen breakthrough approaches this fall, Besson is rolling out ultra-low budget romance June & John. Shot entirely with smartphones in L.A. during the Covid 19 pandemic with a 12-person crew, the guerilla-style production took Besson back to his early filmmaking years.

“It was very joyous. It was really two actors and a director because of the lockdown. From the time they were first in costume to the time we finished shooting it felt like two minutes had passed,” he tells Deadline. “It felt good to be uniquely creative without the pressure of money.”

The feature releases today in France on pay-TV channel Ciné + OCS, after a world premiere at Paris’ Grand Rex cinema last week, where it garnered favorable reviews from France’s tough critics corp, which has never given Besson an easy ride.

Luke Stanton Eddy co-stars as downtrodden officer worker John opposite Matilda Price as the free-spirited June.

June rips John out of his humdrum life when she turns up at his place of work, after the pair exchange looks on the subway, and pulls off a heist. It sets in motion a crime-ridden, romantic adventure played out against the tents of the L.A. homeless, luxury villas in the hills and desert motels, interspersed with tree-hugging and a skydiving scene.

Besson came up with the idea for the film after he found himself locked down in L.A. during the Covid pandemic.

“We can’t go out, we can’t film, we can’t do anything. That’s not possible for me. I’m like a wolf in a cage,” recounts Besson with a laugh. “Virginie [Silla], the producer, my wife, said, ‘Write something and we’ll find a way, or you’re going die in this cage.”

Just prior to the pandemic, Besson had been developing a project for a major Chinese smartphone brand.

“They wanted a short film of 15 to 20 minutes. They gave me carte blanche. I started writing this little story, which was just a scene of the main character suffering and then the meeting in the subway,” he explains.

“Covid hit and it didn’t happen, but I liked this little idea, and it got me thinking that shooting on a phone would be another way of filming and as well as a different approach to directing. It offered enormous freedom. It’s incredible. You take your phone in your hand, and you shoot,” he continues.

“That’s what interested me above all. I’ve done 21 films, big films, with big budgets and crew. The challenge was to take a phone in my hand, two actors, a 12-person crew and start again like I had done with my first film 40 or 50 years ago,” he continues. “The scene in the little tent, for example, that was incredible. It was just us three.”

“What excited me was to see whether I was still capable of the same naivety, enthusiasm, sharpness of vision on the actors, because that was all there was.”



Most the time, Besson was shooting with a handheld phone, although some scenes were more elaborate such as a shoot-out scene that required a bigger set up.

“I placed three or four phones around the room to get different angles and also put phones on the barrels of the guns as well as the phone in my hand,” says the director.

There is also a more elaborate skydiving scene, where John offers June the chance to explore her dream of flying.

Besson reveals the scene came from a conversation with actress Milla Jovovich, who found fame in The Fifth Element and was briefly his wife.

“One day we were talking about life and birds and she started crying. I asked her why, and she said: “Because I will never fly.” It struck me at the time because she was so emotional. It was the loss of dreams. We think when we’re 10, 12 that one day we’ll fly. Then we arrive at 18, 20 and understand we’ll never fly. It always stayed with me and came out 30 years later in a film.”

Besson took time scouting the film’s co-stars Stanton Eddy, seen recently opposite Robert De Niro in The Alto Knights, and Price, who he spotted in a music video.

“I got them to come to Los Angeles and we spent weeks together, for rehearsals and training, to make sure they were ready for the roles,” says Besson.

[joobdoob032]

Loved this one a lot, hope it gets a physical somewhere in the world that I can use in America. I'm a huge Besson fan and was really excited for this, and it far exceeded my expectations.

[ophone]

Making a movie with just a smartphone struck my mind at some point.
I need to watch this film.

[Mr. Chaverria]

It looks off for sure, so the using a phone part for sure. Kind of wish the trailer restrained itself a bit more on the character dynamic. Looks interesting for sure though.

JUNE & JOHN Trailer (2025) Luc Besson - YouTube