Lexus has announced the formation of a creative partnership with EuropaCorp, the Paris-based film studio founded by the director, screenwriter and producer Luc Besson.
One of the early outputs of this collaboration will be witnessed in the new science fiction feature Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, directed by Besson and scheduled for release next year.
Lexus designers have joined the film’s creative team to bring to life the SKYJET, a single-seat pursuit craft that appears in the movie.
The production team says it wanted the SKYJET to be a vehicle grounded in the real world, but appropriate for life in the age of Valerian, 700 years in the future.
They took advice from Lexus chief engineer Takeaki Kato and the Lexus design team on how to incorporate imaginative technologies and contemporary design cues into the final iteration of the spacecraft.
The SKYJET design also recognises Lexus’s influence with an interpretation of the brand’s signature spindle grille and a headlight design similar to that of the new LC coupe, which is also set for launch in 2017.
Valerian is the most ambitious film yet from Besson and has the largest budget of any European-produced film. The feature is an adaptation of the French comic series Valérian, written by Pierre Christin and illustrated by Jean-Claude Mézières, and is produced by Virginie Besson-Silla.
The film stars Cara Delevingne, Dane DeHann, Clive Owen, Ethan Hawke and Rihanna.
Source: Lexus
