Vitals

Brad Pitt as “Ladybug”, anxious assassin

Tokyo to Kyoto, Japan, Spring 2021

Film: Bullet Train
Release Date: August 5, 2022
Director: David Leitch
Costume Designer: Sarah Evelyn
Brad Pitt’s Personal Costumer: Craig Anthony

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Happy 60th birthday to Brad Pitt, born in Shawnee, Oklahoma on December 18, 1963. In addition to many acclaimed dramatic and romantic roles, the Oscar-winning actor has long excelled in playing comedic roles as recently affirmed with his performance in David Leitch’s action comedy Bullet Train, adapted from Kōtarō Isaka’s 2010 novel Maria Beetle.

Pitt’s introduction in Bullet Train is scored to a Japanese rendition of the Bee Gees’ disco-era anthem “Stayin’ Alive” (one of many Japanese versions of popular songs featured on the soundtrack), framed just like Travolta had been 45 years earlier in Saturday Night Fever as we start on Pitt’s kicks hitting Tokyo’s neon-lit pavement before we meet the man himself, his shoulder-length hair contained to a dirty bucket hat with a graying goatee framing his beaming smile. Indeed, his new therapist Barry has helped him develop a positive outlook to overcome his anxiety about being unlucky—a particularly unfortunate trait for a contract killer:

My bad luck is biblical. I’m not even trying to kill people and someone dies.

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