Matt Damon has admitted he was ‘overwhelmed’ with emotion at the premiere of his new film Stillwater, as cinemas reopened following lockdowns across the world amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
The actor was thrilled to be back in a cinema, sitting down at Cannes Film Festival to watch a preview of the upcoming drama.
He and his co-stars received a standing ovation, with Matt visibly emotional.
Asked what made him cry, he told Variety: ‘The feeling of being in a movie theatre again and how much I missed that, and why we do that’.
He added: ‘It was a great reminder that we need to go as a community of strangers and turn the lights off and have this experience all at the same time together. There’s something beautiful and valuable about that.
‘I just kind of got overwhelmed in the moment because I just hadn’t done that in almost two years. It was great. I was happy. I was just very moved by it.’
Stillwater, directed by Tom McCarthy, follows a an unemployed oil rig worker from Oklahoma (Matt) who is determined to prove the innocence of his daughter (Abigail Breslin) after she’s convicted of murdering her friend and partner.
McCarthy has said that the film is loosely based on Amanda Knox’s story, after she was falsely convicted and then acquitted of the murder of her roommate, Meredith Kercher.
Knox recently spoke out against the film, taking issue with people saying it was inspired by the ‘Amanda Knox saga’.
‘Everyone else in that “saga” had more influence over events than I did,’ she wrote. ‘The erroneous focus on me by the authorities led to an erroneous focus on me by the press, which shaped how I was viewed. In prison, I had no control over my public image, no voice in my story.’
She claimed McCarthy had not contacted her for her views, and said that ‘by fictionalising away my innocence, my total lack of involvement, by erasing the role of the authorities in my wrongful conviction, McCarthy reinforces an image of me as a guilty and untrustworthy person.
‘And with Matt Damon’s star power, both are sure to profit handsomely off of this fictionalization of “the Amanda Knox saga” that is sure to leave plenty of viewers wondering, “Maybe the real-life Amanda was involved somehow.”’
In 2008, Rudy Guede was found guilty of the sexual assault and murder of Kercher and sentenced to 30 years’ imprisonment.
His prison sentence was ultimately reduced to 16 years, and in December 2020, he was given an early release and authorised to finish his sentence with community service.
Knox and her then-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito were acquitted in 2011.
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