Mute may be the title of director Duncan Jones’ latest movie, but one thing comes through loud and clear: the filmmaker has become one of the most reliable voices in thoughtful, moody, human-scale science fiction.

After his much-admired 2009 debut film Moon, the clever follow-up Source Code and a foray into large-scale franchise filmmaking with Warcraft, Jones -- who as the son of pop icon David Bowie has artistry, theatricality and a keen sense of the cosmic in his DNA -- is delivering his first original film for the steaming giant Netflix, which debuted on Friday. Set in a high-tech Berlin nearly half a century in the future, Mute focuses on the desperate, determined efforts of a mute Amish bartender (Alexander Skarsgard) to track down his missing girlfriend, running afoul of two alternately amusing and deadly dangerous surgeons (Paul Rudd and Justin Theroux) who have a role in her mysterious disappearance.

RELATED: Duncan Jones Has Big Ideas About a Green Lantern Movie

Jones joined CBR for a freewheeling peek behind the scenes of his latest effort and the surprising influences that fueled it, his specific affinity for sci-fi storytelling, the kinds of films he expects to make moving forward and the as-yet-untapped material that could lure him to adapt a comic book property for the big screen.

CBR: You clearly had a lot of fun with this one. As hard as it gets making a movie, I bet you were having fun all the way.

Duncan Jones: I did! I mean, it's kind of an amazing cast to be able work with, and working with Justin Theroux and Paul Rudd, who are both very funny guys -- well, Alex [Skarsgard] is funny too, but he was quiet most of the time. But Paul and Justin, they're just really funny, great guys and it just made it a load of fun.

What was the essential thing about this project that made you say, "I have to make this film"? Was there one thing that just made you say "Gotta do it"?

I think it's really hard. In my opinion, there was an original idea at the heart of it, which just felt worth pursuing because I don't know about other writers, but I think coming up with something that feels really original is fairly rare. A lot of the time it's a riff on something, and also you are trying to reinvent something. And this felt like there was something really unique about it.

So, Leo's character being unable to talk, having a lead protagonist who didn't talk and then my solution to the puzzle of, "How do I do that movie?” Of having half the movie with him and the other half with these very talkative, witty American surgeons. It just felt like, “I haven't seen this before. This feels really unique and original, both structurally and the characters.” I wanted to try and pursue that.

Maybe it wasn't as challenging as it might sound, but the whole of Alex’s character not talking at all -- did you find that be challenging cinematically, or did it free you up in certain ways?

Not cinematically. I think [it was challenging] in the original writing phase, trying to come up with as much as possible a visual way of showing his investigation, showing the red herrings that he's led on, showing how he comes up with solutions to things and doing it all without dialogue.

That was kind of a test for myself and for Michael when we were writing it, but I think once we worked out that side of it, the onus was really on Alex to deliver. And it was really getting him on board, and making sure that he felt comfortable that he had enough variety in what he wanted to do with his performance that he could go from being Leo at the start of the story to this different guy by the end of it.

With Paul and Justin, obviously these two men are known for their improvisational skills, plus Paul's a screenwriter, Justin’s a screenwriter -- tell me about that collaboration and fleshing out these characters with guys who bring that much to the table.

I think they were a little intimidated too, only in that they knew how much I wanted to channel Trapper John and Hawkeye Pierce from Robert Altman's M*A*S*H. That was really important to me. And I think they understood, "OK, so we are riffing on those characters. We are finding ways to tweak those characters into something slightly different."

But I think they already know each other very well, and that was one of the reasons why I was so excited about casting the two of them, is that dynamic between guys who are smart and know each other, have that friendship is really what Duck and Cactus had to have, and fortunately they went along with it.

Did you sometimes just feel like, "I'm just going to get out their way."

100 percent. We would do what was on the page, and get that done as quickly as possible, and then let them improv their way through scenes, especially things like the surgeries and stuff like that. We did what was on the page, and then immediately through it out and just let them go for it.

The Blade Runner influence can't be missed in a lot of science fiction.

It's aesthetic in this one, maybe, and that's it, I'd say.

The more connective thing rather than the visual elements for me was the fact that if you strip away a lot of the sci-fi of the story, it's essentially a noir story, as is Blade Runner. Was that on your mind as you were putting it together, that you were writing a sort of noir story with a high-tech edge?

Yeah, absolutely, and the references that we were using in the writing were Paul Schrader's Hardcore, M*A*S*H for obvious reasons, and Lee Marvin's Point Blank. It was really those movies, especially the Paul Schrader one. That was really a touchstone for us, but that film is incredibly dark. And we were trying to balance the darkness of that with our own humor. And M*A*S*H is kind of a blend of dark and has humor. And that's kind of where we were trying to go, trying to find that tension point between the two.

Tell me a little about layering in the science fiction elements to a story like this, because it is a very grounded human story at the core, but also there's parts of it you can't tell without the futuristic aspect.

Yeah, absolutely, and I think that was part of the fun of it. Rather than having like a single technology changing the world, it's a small intimate kind of localized story that takes place in a science-fiction world. And the science fiction really just kind of is something they kind of bump up against once in a while, but it's not the reason for being for the story, which is taking place.

Obviously, Leo's character being sort of Amish, there was this backstory, which is not really in the film, but was there to sort of wrap our heads around while we were writing the film that in the same way that Israel has sort of called back Jews to come to the homeland that the swing of the pendulum from Angela Merkel who's allowed and invited mass immigration into Germany swings the other way to sort of more right-wing parties who basically said to those around Germany, "If you have German heritage, if you have German customs and traditions, come back to the homeland." And so, Amish and various other have sort of come back to Germany.

That's kind of the backstory of why Leo and his family are there. And Leo just doesn't fit in this world, this very technological science-fiction world where he just basically lives in this little sort of apartment that has no real technology in it. That was kind of the backstory foHavr him.

What got you creatively charged up, as far as the world-building aspect of this film?

I have a fairly unique relationship and experience with Berlin because of my dad's work. I was back there in the 1970s when he was working there when it was in the heart of the Cold War and the wall was very much up, and you really felt a sense of flying into this incredibly isolated island of Western civilization within the Soviet Bloc. So there was a sense of what Berlin was back there, which I definitely remember and feel and was able to kind of measure up against the Berlin that I saw over the decades after that.

And one thing you can definitely say about Berlin is its one of the most dynamic and fast-changing cities I'm aware of, certainly in the Western world, that's just changed dramatically decade to decade. And so setting a science fiction film there kind of feels right, because it is kind of this clashing point between Eastern and Western cultures.

Page 2: [valnet-url-page page=2 paginated=0 text='How Mute ties into Moon, possibility of taking on a franchise']

It's safe to say science fiction has become an inherent part of your milieu. Tell me why science fiction and you go together so well.

I think I'm angry. I am. I'm getting older. I've got kids, now -- I've got one boy and a little girl on the way. I do feel like I'm more angry, now, than I've been in a long time for various reasons, personal and geopolitical. I want to be able to say stuff and communicate things, but I don't want to be just lecturing.

And I think one of the benefits of science fiction -- and I've always felt this even back when I did Moon -- is that you can talk to people about very personal human stuff, but because it's science fiction I think they open themselves up to it in a way where they don't feel like you are judging them, or specifically trying to lecture them. I think that's one of the reasons I like science fiction.

A lot of the press materials that I've read make this reference to Mute being a sort of “spiritual sequel” to Moon. Tell me your perspective on that. Do you feel that way?

No, not a sequel. I mean, I think it's a parallel… There is a Sam Rockwell cameo, which I don't consider a spoiler, but there's a Sam Rockwell cameo which at least anchors the idea that this takes place within the same future as Moon took place in. And if I'm fortunate enough there is a third film I'd like to make, which also takes place within that same future.

But other than that, it's just tonal, and I think the types of stories that I wanted to tell. They kind of tie together more in kind of theme and what they are about, but they are not connected in any thing more than that.

Most of your work has been this blend of sci-fi on a very humanistic scale, and then you've done Warcraft, which is on a much bigger, splashier scale. What do you think is in the future for you? Does one lure you back more than the other?

Well, even with Warcraft, I really, really spent an awful lot of effort and time trying to bring out the familial ties and the relationships between characters on a very basic, very close level between husbands and wives and brothers and sisters, things like that. So even though it was, you're right, a big fantasy film that's where my interest was even in that project. I think that will always be the case.

That's the building block of society, those closest relationships between human beings. So I think whatever I do, that will probably always appeal to me, and maybe there will be something unique that takes me out of that zone, but it seems like that's what's worth talking about.

Did you have all the tools that you wanted at your disposal to make this movie working with Netflix?

Yeah, and the biggest of those was the freedom to do it. No, I don't think this is a film which could be made by a studio these days. I feel like studios used to have independent arms that would make more original content in that $20 to $40 million range. Most of those are gone now, and I think studios [have made] a business decision to focus on four-quadrant, franchise, sequel, reboots of things, which the audiences are already familiar with because they need those opening weekends to kind of justify their existence.

I think because of that, studios don't really have any support mechanism for original content, and I think streaming has filled that place up. I think Netflix, Amazon, Apple are there and are willing to make the films that the studios no longer make.

Are you happy with the screen sizes and what people can watch a film like this on at home now?

Listen, I've seen people watch Warcraft on their phone! It doesn't really matter anymore. I think opening weekends on the big screen are something that are really good fun when you are a filmmaker, and being able to buy a DVD or a Blu-ray is great to be able to put it on your shelf. You don't get that with streaming, or at least you don't get that with Netflix.

That's a small price to pay, I think, for the opportunity to make films that you wouldn't be able to make in any other way. And I do think that TV, or the opportunity to have home entertainment systems of a standard where you can really get a really great experience… for most people it's attainable. And if it's not, they know someone who has one if they want to watch a movie in an environment like that, but not go to the theater. I like going to the movies because I like going with a crowd, but I think you can still have a great movie-watching experience even if you do it on your own home system.

Your movies are so much your own, for sure. Would you be interested working within those bigger franchises? Look at what Rian Johnson did with Star Wars: The Last Jedi: That's definitely a Rian Johnson movie, but it's definitely a Star Wars movie, too. Is that the kind of thing that interests you?

Well, I'm seeing Rian in a couple of days. We're doing a screening here in L.A. with a Q&A afterwards, and Rian is doing the Q to my A, so that should be really good fun because we've got lots to talk about!

I don't know. I like Star Wars. I loved the original trilogy as a kid, obviously, and whether it's Star Wars, or Marvel, or DC, or Fast and the Furious, or whatever it is; I think Warcraft would have been one of those, had it been successful in the US, and I would have been happy to continue making those, because I feel a certain creative ownership in that even though it was based on something preexisting. I felt like I'd had the opportunity to bring enough of myself into it that I felt a connection to it beyond it just being a franchise I liked.

You were defining it, essentially.

Yeah, I was helping to define it. So I think if something like that could come about, I think I could see myself doing it.

I don't know if I could do preexisting characters, or preexisting franchises. The DCs and the Marvels of the world, I respect how successful they've been. I feel like to my tastes there is a collection of comic book characters in the UK from 2000 A.D., which they've experimented doing Judge Dredd and the Dredd movies to varying levels of success, but there's a lot of characters that have never even been done. The question is, are they well known enough to justify the size of the movies that would be necessary to make them work as movies?

I don't know, but those I could see myself doing because, again, I think that would be my opportunity to create a sense of ownership of those. Sorry, it's a very long-winded way of saying, “Probably not the existing franchises.”

RELATED: Marvel TV Addresses Netflix Series’ Future

You talked about some of the influences on this particular film. What are some of the all-time influences on your work, where you can say, "I'm always trying to make my version of that movie, these seven movies?”

I don't know if I can say movies, but I could certainly say people. I have a huge fondness and respect for Terry Gilliam. I don't know what that says about me, about whether I have a masochistic streak, but like him with Don Quixote, I have spent an inordinate amount of time trying to make a movie, which is rally more for me than for anyone else. Fortunately, Terry has managed to make his movie, too, so I can't wait to see that. I have a huge amount of respect for him, and love how much of himself he puts into his movies.

I don't want to go all film school but I'm a fan of Akira Kurosawa and filmmakers from before my time. I don't know if there's any specific films, but I respect Terry Gilliam an awful lot.

Mute is now available for streaming on Netflix.