Dystopia, delivered as only Ridley Scott can

Ridley Scott is returning to science fiction for the first time in almost a decade with a new dystopian thriller that the director and his cast say is ultimately a story about hope, Hanna Rantala reports.

The Dog Stars, based on Peter Heller's 2012 novel of the same name, is set in a post-apocalyptic world and marks Scott's first foray back into the genre since his string of earlier hits including Alien, Gladiator and The Martian.

Jacob Elordi stars as Hig, a mechanic who survives a pandemic that has killed most of humanity, including his wife, and lives in an abandoned airport in Erie, Colorado, with his ageing dog and an ex-military companion, Bangley, played by Josh Brolin. Hig flies an old yellow Cessna in search of supplies and other survivors, and eventually picks up a radio signal leading him to a mountain hideout occupied by Cima (Margaret Qualley) and Pops (Guy Pearce), bringing both respite and trouble.

Speaking at the film's world premiere in London on Thursday, Scott said he took on the project after being sent Mark L. Smith's screenplay, and that a script that works on paper on a science fiction project demands attention. He said he reacts intuitively to strong writing and had worried midway through reading it that the writer might lose his nerve, but that Smith had not. Scott noted that, unlike the many zombie films that have come before it, his film contains no zombies, and that he had deliberately built in a sense of optimism, which he called essential.

Most of the film was shot on location in Italy using multiple cameras. Elordi, who also stars in Frankenstein and Euphoria, described the shoot as huge in scale, saying Scott's reputation as the “king of epic” showed in the size of the production. He said he had enjoyed spending much of his time filming outdoors, and working alongside his canine co-star, Rak Jasper, whose team of trainers handled the animal's performance while he mainly needed to keep a treat on hand.

Heller, the novel's author, said he had placed no conditions on the adaptation and was blown away by the finished film. He said cinema was a different discipline with its own demands, but that the book's central message – that people must keep their hearts open and take risks to love one another – had made it into the film, calling that the main thing that mattered.

Benedict Wong, who plays a member of a Mennonite community in the film, said the story centred on hope, human decency and connection in devastating times, and that it offered a lesson audiences could draw on given how much that message is needed today.

The Dog Stars begins its global theatrical release on 26 August.