'Eddington' hits theaters: Learn more about the New Mexico-based film by 'Hereditary,' 'Midsommar' writer-director Ari Aster

It was in Santa Fe that Ari Aster began to cultivate his love for film.

A fan of the horror genre, he wrote several screenplays before graduating high school.

While studying film at the College of Santa Fe, where he graduated in 2010, he began sharpening his skills as a filmmaker.

He burst on to the international scene in 2018 with the hit “Hereditary.”

Aster is back again with “Eddington” — which will hit theaters Friday, July 18.

The project — Aster’s fourth feature film — marks the first time Aster has returned to New Mexico.

“Eddington” is a modern Western and paranoid thriller set in the American Southwest — Eddington, New Mexico, population 2,345 — during the summer of 2020.

The film stars Joaquin Phoenix as small-town sheriff Joe Cross, who runs for mayor when progressive incumbent Ted Garcia, played by Pedro Pascal, attempts to modernize the town by attracting a new artificial intelligence data center.

“We all know that we’re in our own echo chambers because we’re trapped in a system based on feedback,” Aster says. “The problem is that people can’t remember that they know that. ‘Eddington’ is about what happens when feedback ramps up beyond control and the bubbles collide.”

The cast is rounded out by Emma Stone, Austin Butler, Luke Grimes, Deirdre O’Connell, Micheal Ward, Clifton Collins Jr., William Belleau, Amélie Hoeferle, Cameron Mann and Matt Gomez Hidaka.

According to the New Mexico Film Office, the project filmed in Albuquerque, Santa Fe County and Truth or Consequences. The production employed over 300 New Mexicans — 230 crew members, 59 principal actors and 105 background talent.

Aster says “Eddington” is set during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic and everything that came out of that summer.

“Make no mistake: I don’t think anything that’s happening right now is funny, but it is all absurd,” Aster says. “And the insidious thing about our culture is that it’s scary and dangerous and catastrophic, and also ridiculous and stupid and impossible to take seriously.”

Despite that absurdity, Aster says, “I wanted to make a film that felt like the country we live in without necessarily villainizing anyone or propping anyone up. I hope it’s democratic in the way that it gives equal weight to every instrument in the cacophony. And in the end, whatever our differences of opinion, we have to find a way to reengage with each other. The powers of tech and finance have kept us frozen and in our individual silos, but we’re all in the same situation. We all know that something’s very seriously wrong.”

Aster, who was born in New York but grew up in Santa Fe, had long wanted to make a film in New Mexico. After considering it for his feature debut, he shelved the idea.

Then, when the world went on lockdown, Aster found himself living in New Mexico again with his family just outside of Albuquerque.

It was during this time that the idea for the film began to take shape. But in August 2020, Aster put “Eddington” on hold to begin filming “Beau is Afraid” with Phoenix.

When that project wrapped, Aster took a road trip through the Southwest to draw inspiration and to find the perfect town.

As he drove through New Mexico, he was attracted to the intricacies and complexities of the state, including the separateness of the pueblos, Indigenous tribal lands operating like a parallel universe with their own law enforcement and judicial codes.

“I didn’t care for New Mexico growing up, but I’ve grown to love it as an adult,” Aster says. “I did a lot of research going from city to city, town to town, pueblo to pueblo, talking to as many people as I could to get the fullest picture of state and local politics.”

Filmmaker Ari Aster makes his first feature film set in New Mexico — 'Eddington'