Leave the World Behind Director Explains Barack Obama’s Involvement Following Conspiracy Theories

Summary

• Director Sam Esmail offers some insight into Obama’s involvement in the movie “Leave the World Behind” following the emergence of several conspiracy theories.
• Obama became involved due to his love of the book and movies, focusing on cinematically capturing its themes and messages.
• The film, featuring a star-studded cast, has received positive reviews and has become a popular choice on Netflix.

Sam Esmail, the director behind the recent Netflix apocalyptic thriller, Leave the World Behind, has offered some insight into the involvement of former President of the United States, Barack Obama. In response to conspiracy theories that have since begun to emerge surrounding the movie and Obama’s involvement (many have claimed that the events depicted in Leave the World Behind are a warning from the former POTUS), Esmail reveals that Obama did not get involved in the project until after the script was already written.

“I think the silly thing about the whole thing is President Obama really came on a couple of months before we started shooting, so the script had basically been written and done. He obviously gave notes on the script, but the bones of the story and the sequences were already written. I would just say they’re pretty wrong in terms of his signaling. It had nothing to do with that.”

Based on the 2020 novel of the same name by Rumaan Alam, Leave the World Behind is produced, written, and directed by Esmail, and follows two families as they struggle to survive and make sense of a mysterious cyberattack. Seeking refuge together, the two families reckon with a looming disaster that grows more terrifying by the minute, forcing everyone to come to terms with their places in a collapsing world.

RELATED: Leave the World Behind: 10 Things in Netflix’s Apocalyptic Movie that Conspiracy Theorists are Obsessing Over

Sam Esmail Praises Barack Obama’s Love of Movies

In the conversation with Collider, Esmail went on to explain that Obama became involved due to his love of the book and his love of movies, with Barack and Michelle Obama executive producing the thriller through Higher Ground Productions.

“Because President Obama is such a movie lover, he really focused his notes on trying to cinematically portray what was in the book in a really interesting way. The book was on his reading list, it’s one of his favorites, and he really wanted to do justice by the book and this theme about mistrust and this being a cautionary tale about what could happen if we don’t have that community or bond that holds us together. So he really gave notes with regards to character, empathy, and also the disaster elements. It was really across the board. And again, it was all in pursuit of making it into a good movie. That was his main focus.”

Leave the World Behind features an all-star cast that includes Julia Roberts, Mahershala Ali, Ethan Hawke, Myha’la, and Kevin Bacon and has since been met with positive reviews from critics thanks in large part to the powerful central performances.

Leave the World Behind was released in select theaters before landing on Netflix earlier this month. The movie now stands at a “certified fresh” rating of 76% on the review aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes and has seen high viewership for the streaming service, becoming the number one movie with 41.7 million views.

Leave the World Behind is now available to stream on Netflix. Check out the trailer below:

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