Laura Dern (left) and Liam Hemsworth in Lonely Planet (2024). Photo: Anne Marie Fox/Netflix

Laura Dern couldn’t have asked for a better onscreen partner in Lonely Planet than Liam Hemsworth — especially when it came to some of their more intimate scenes.

The two play lovers in Netflix’s new romance film, which takes place amid an idyllic Moroccan backdrop and stars Dern, 57, as Katherine, a famous author trying to get past her writer’s block (and some inner demons) in a less-distracting environment, away from home.

Enter Owen (Hemsworth, 34), a young man who is at the retreat to support his author girlfriend, Lily (Diana Silvers), but begins questioning their relationship after a series of mishaps. When he and Katherine meet, sparks fly instantly — and at one point, culminate in a steamy bedroom romp.

Dern tells PEOPLE that there was “definitely an intimacy coordinator” on set, but even aside from that, she “was so lucky” to work with Hemsworth, whom she calls “literally the safest person I could ever talk through everything in my life with.”

Laura Dern (left) and Liam Hemsworth in Lonely Planet (2024).

Hilary Bronwyn Gayle/Netflix

“By the time we were doing those scenes, there was nothing we couldn’t talk about together and work out creatively, professionally, all of that,” she explains. “But we also had a lot of support. We had much, much discussion.”

She also calls it “incredible … that film and filmmaking have changed so that everyone is comfortable in their voice and can set boundaries comfortably without fear of losing a job or being unpopular.”

“We both, as young actors, have had a lot of other kinds of experiences on movies,” Dern says.

And their closeness also came in handy during more remote-feeling pockets of filming. As Hemsworth recalls, “There were times when we were shooting in the Marrakesh markets where we couldn’t even see the camera. … We were completely immersed in it.”

“The whole experience of filming was that it just felt like we were hanging out and it was getting captured at the same time,” he adds, noting that it felt at times that they were just “hanging out as Laura and Liam, and someone was filming it somewhere.”

Though they clearly enjoyed working with one another, it’s not as clear whether there will be a follow-up to Katherine and Owen’s story.

But Dern tells PEOPLE she’s optimistic: “I’m feeling a sequel for sure.”

“We go to Tahiti and become scuba-diving instructors,” Hemsworth pitches, to which Dern replies,
“I like it. That sounds perfect.”

Lonely Planet is now streaming on Netflix.