Filmmaker Dee Rees is back with their followup to Mudbound that has Anne Hathaway acting tough as nails in The Last Thing He Wanted, based on the 1996 Joan Didion novel of the same name.
Hathaway stars as a veteran journalist investigating an arms deal that becomes personal. The official synopsis from Netflix goes on to explain things further:
“Adapted from the Joan Didion novel of the same title, ‘The Last Thing He Wanted’ is set against the nebulous milieu of the Iran-Contra scandal. Veteran D.C. journalist Elena McMahon (Hathaway) abandons the 1984 campaign trail out of a misguided sense of duty to her father, Dick McMahon (Willem Dafoe). Guilted into running a dangerous fool’s errand on his behalf, Elena leverages the moment to pursue her own investigation but instead gets tipped into the confounding center of the very intrigue she’s trying to expose. Answers turn into questions and wrong turns lead to dead ends in this stylish political thriller as Elena becomes increasingly lost on a map of someone else’s making and the possibility of return — to home and to herself — slowly narrows.”
The film also stars Ben Affleck as Treat Morrison, a high-level U.S. government official who was romantically involved with Hathaway’s character. Rosie Perez also stars as an unnamed character who appears to be either a former colleague or confidante to Elena.
The film is set to premiere out of competition at the Sundance Film Festival next week ahead of its launch on Netflix on February 21.
