In 2009, 16-year-old sailor Jessica Watson set out to attempt to set a world record by sailing around the world completely alone. Save for a sailing coach she could only talk to on the phone, the Australian native set out to become the youngest person to accomplish the feat solo.
The trailer for the film True Spirit starring Australian actress Teagan Croft (Titans) as Watson was released this week. In it, the teenager is shown aboard her pink sailboat, navigating the ever-changing sea completely by herself.
Watson ultimately fell just short in her quest. After her return to Sydney in 2010, the World Sailing Speed Record Council (WSSRC) said that despite sailing 18,852 nautical miles, she needed to get to 21,600, which would have allowed her to achieve the record.
Her sailing coach is played by Cliff Curtis (Avatar: The Way of Water), and her parents are played by Anna Paquin (Flack) and Josh Lawson (House of Lies).
"Prior to having a family, my taste in roles skewed pretty exclusively dark and R-rated," Paquin told Entertainment Weekly.
"But having sat through some ... less than stellar content for kids, projects like True Spirit are very exciting to me creatively. I'm excited that I can share this with my kids ... and I really feel like this is a story that will connect to and inspire anyone who sees it."
In an interview with Brief Take, Croft said playing a real-life person was very different than her usual role as a superhero on Titans.
"But I had a lot of fun with it exploring the bits that were similar between Jess and I," Croft said of Watson, who was on the set as an adviser. "We were able to find the similarities."
She said, "Learning to sail and learning how to navigate, I was able to really connect with Jess in that aspect, too, because I really like math[s] and math[s] is a big part of navigation."