Movies Plus - May 2011 - Saoirse Ronan, Hanna, Win Win, Pirates 4, Hangover 2 & more

MAY 2011 • NUMBER 111 • WWW.MOVIES.IE

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Hanna

May 2011 Watch the Trailers Online

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One Hundred Mornings

May 13th

May 20th

The Way

Pirates Of The Caribbean On Stranger Tides

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Win Win Red Hill Julia’s Eyes Blitz

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Tom McCarthy is always drawn ‘to the little guy you never really notice’. As his latest, Win Win, proves. Paul Byrne Tom McCarthy is one of those actors that you know you know but, dammit, you can’t quite place him.

Maybe you’re thinking of his duplicitous Baltimore Sun journalist Scott Templeton in the fifth and final season of The Wire?

Or Principal Caden in The Lovely Bones?

Dr. Bob in the Meet The Parents franchise?

Jeff in Fair Game, Gordon in 2012, James Bradley in Flags Of Our Fathers or Palmer Williams in Good Night, And Good Luck?

And if you’re a fan of Law & Order, you would have seen him as Donald in 2002’s The Ring, Lambert in 2003’s Bodies, and John in 2008’s Darkness.

“Yeah, that’s how memorable I am,” laughs the 45-year old, New Jersey born McCarthy.

“I can pop up in one series as three different people, and there are no letters of complaint.

Even the producers know, hey, this guy won’t be remembered from the last time…”

Then again, that’s pretty much what most actors dream of - anonymity. It’s what drove Robert De Niro to such great heights back in the beginning, back when celebrity culture was omnipresent, and a leading man could avoid the press if he wanted to. Back then, it was all about the work, not the fame.

McCarthy isn’t just a forgettable face who just happens to be a fine actor though.

He’s a fine filmmaker too, both as a writer (working on the likes of Pixar’s Up) and as a director (helming the recent HBO hit Game Of Thrones).

Combine those two talents, and McCarthy has come up with the Peter Dinklage-led The Station Agent (2003), Richard Jenkins tackling America’s immigration laws in The Visitor (’08) and now, Paul Giamatti playing a smalltown attorney raging against the dying of his jaded life and fading practice in Win Win. Q: With your own films, and in some of your acting jobs, you seem to be drawn

to beautiful losers. Are you working out some issues here?

A: Aren’t we all [laughs]? I think everyday people are the most fascinating, and most people have struggles, quiet battles that don’t exactly make the local news.

I’m certainly drawn to the little guy that you don’t really notice, because, truth is, we all have a story to tell. Whether you’re the guy who drives an articulated lorry all day, or you handle small claims, or make balloons, there are universal truths in every life.

Q: The universal truth in Win Win seems to be, hey, it’s okay to lie a little every now and then, if your intentions are good.

So, when Paul Giamatti’s Mike Flaherty becomes a guardian to an elderly client ostensibly to save him from being taken into care but also for the much-needed money, there’s a blurred line there…

A: Absolutely. There are blurred lines all over our lives, where we’re not being completely and utterly selfless, and just helping others all the time and never helping ourselves. It’s a decision most people face every day, in one way or another - do I buy the organic, free range or save $3 and buy the factory-produced eggs? There are many parts of our lives that are out-ofsight and therefore out-of-mind. Guilty pleasures, compromises, little white lies…

Q: Giamatti wears these kinds of roles well - he has the hunched shoulders of a beautiful loser. He’s basically Eeyore, partly shaven, and trained how to walk just about upright…

A: That’s exactly who he is [laughs].

Actually, Paul is deceptively shambolic in his work, to the point where you think, well, you forget he’s acting. He just becomes this guy in front of your eyes. I think it’s because the characters he likes to play often exist below the radar, so audiences quickly forget about the artifice, and therefore don’t really think about the acting involved. Which is what every actor dreams of, of course…

Q: You pulled together a damn fine supporting cast - fellow Wire and current Office cast member Amy Ryan, Jeffrey Tambor, Burt Young, Bobby Cannavale, and a find in young Alex Shaffer. Find him through his wrestling success, winning the New Jersey Wrestling Championship at 17…?

A: Yeah, Alex was an incredible find. His skills as a wrestler were crucial here, given that his character is pretty skilled as a wrestler, but the ability to act was more important. And Alex just held his own, beautifully, alongside all these seasoned pros. In casting, you really do look out for people who are right for the role, and Alex was perfect.

Q: Fox Searchlight have a reputation for turning small American indie films with a black heart into box-office giants - thinking about Sideways, Little Miss Sunshine, Juno...

A: Yeah, Fox Searchlight have been great.

They know how to market a film, and how to find the right audience. I don’t think we’ve got a Sideways on our hands here, but it’s comforting to know that Win Win is getting out there. The fact that I’m talking to a journalist in Ireland about it is a good feeling. You guys make up about fifty-percent of the European market, right?

Q: It’s actually fifty-five-percent. Finally, you’re a fine actor too, but like all actors, sometimes, you have to take the money and run. Feel ready to apologise for Little Fockers yet?

A: I would never apologise for a film [laughs] - especially someone else’s. I think audiences know what they’re going to get with certain franchises, and there’s no harm in that. It was pretty standard back in the early days of cinema, when you’d have the Road To… series with Bing and Bob, or the Thin Man franchise. No one got hurt, and there were a few laughs along the way, so, what’s to apologise for…?

Words - Paul Byrne Win Win is in cinemas from May 20th

Director Conor Horgan talks about his debut movie - a chilling vision of a postapocalyptic Ireland.

Q: You started out as a photographer, moving into adverts and short films, has your career been building up to making a feature length film?

A: Well, I’d love to tell you with a lot of hindsight that of course it has. But I haven’t necessarily had this carefully mapped out career path, just each thing has led to the next and it’s been great. I have always wanted to make a film. I mean ever since I was 15 and in transition year in school and we made a little film. Actually, it was so long ago; it was on video so it was a super 8 films. I’ve always just been fascinated with what goes into making a film in general. I didn’t always know I was going to make a film, but I did always want to.

Q: How much time did you spend developing the story of a post-apocalyptic Ireland?

A: Like with most people, you read up and you try and keep abreast of the things that are happening in the world as well as the possibilities, which could cause difficulties near to home and the near future. They may not be the most comforting

things but it’s better to know about them than not.

I mean everyone knows that there are major problems; it’s just a question of how much or whether you want to know or not. So, to answer the question, I would have been thinking about, making films set in this kind of situation for quite a number of years, but when it actually came to making this film, I had to write the script very, very quickly. The first script was written in four and a half months. I didn’t stop then, that was enough to get us the money, but a year later, when we shot it, I was still writing all the way up to when we actually were shooting it and as we shot it. And of course you had to go back depending on time lines and change it again.

Q: It’s never fully explained, the circumstances of how the characters find themselves in a post-apocalyptic world, were you ever tempted to include that, or did you want to leave it open to viewer interpretation?

A: When I first started writing the script, I wrote the first 28 pages and then it came to a grinding halt and I couldn’t progress.

When I went back to it I thought ‘you

know what, page 1 is actually page 29’ kind of thing. So all of that other stuff I wrote, I didn’t want it, or need it. And in a way I wanted to start at the aftermath.

I wanted to make a film about what happens when things fall apart, the actual falling apart really isn’t as important as how we react when it does. I think the, there’s clearly a number of possible causes but we don’t know what they could be. Look at today’s newspapers, what if any of those things come to pass there would be some level of a breakdown of society. And that was the thing that I was interested in. The particulars as to what causes it or not, weren’t really relevant to this particular film.

Q: Were there any movies that you watched to get the tone and feel of the kind of story that you were going for?

A: I didn’t watch that many, there’s one French-Austrian film called ‘The Time of the Wolf’ which I watched, and certainly that had a very realistic view on how things could go in those circumstances, and that really appealed to me and was something I set out to do and so I hope that I did it. I saw ‘The Road’ after we finished our film, but it didn’t feel realistic, it was almost biblical in a sense.

Q: The movie is very much an actor led piece, relying heavily on strong performances.

Was it a tough movie to cast?

A: I saw Rory Keenan in a play a couple of years ago and I wrote the character of Mark specifically for him. I just thought, I really wanted him to do it and that was the most difficult audition of all - he came in and I thought what if he doesn’t want to do it and what if we don’t get along!

But you can’t scream ‘I wrote this for you, so you have to do it!’ We really did

a very exhaustive casting and we got really great people. We were all down on the location for over a month of the shoot and by the end of it we were all feeling like we were almost living in that world.

Q: It’s interesting to see the film showing at London’s sci-fi festival, were you surprised to see it being included in that genre?

A: Not really, I devoured Sci-fi as a kid, though I haven’t really read very much since. It’s not a futuristic film though, it’s a very realistic film, extremely I hope.

But it is showing things that haven’t yet happened… and hopefully won’t. It actually won an award at the Rhode Island Film Fest for ‘Best science fiction film or fantasy’ and I couldn’t help thinking that I wish it was a fantasy!

Words - Vincent Donnelly

ONE HUNDRED MORNINGS is now showing in Irish cinemas

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In recent years, Carlow’s Saoirse Ronan has worked with some of the World’s best directors - Peter Jackson (‘The Lovely Bones’), Peter Weir (‘The Way Home’) and in her latest film ‘Hanna’ she’s reunited with ‘Atonement’ director Joe Wright - In fact, it was Saoirse who first suggested that Wright would be the perfect filmmaker to tackle the project. “We did stay in contact a little after Atonement,” she explains.

“And I was really hoping we would work together again.

Here the actress who turned 17 last month talks about the demanding role of ‘Hanna’ and her plans to go to college.

Q: You’ve made a lot of films now, how does ‘Hanna’ compare? It was obviously a very physical role, so was it hard for you in that respect?

A: Yeah, it was a hard film to make - physically it was hard. It was great fun to make and the people, the cast and crew, were really great. Working with Joe again was lovely and obviously we already knew each other and on Hanna we got to know each other even better, which was nice. He brought a lot of the crew from ‘Atonement’ and the other films that he’s worked on and so that was lovely too. But physically it was tough. I had a lot of fight scenes to do and I did everything myself, and then if there was something that was very dangerous, the stunt double would take over. But I was very much involved in that side of it, so it was tiring. But it was fun, too.

Q: Hanna is only 16, so she’s younger than most male action heroes.

A: Yeah, most of them, except for Chloe Moretz (laughs).

Q: Do you think there will be comparison with your performance in ‘Hanna’ and Chloe’s performance in ‘Kick-Ass’?

A: Yeah, that’s the one that’s going to come up the most, I think. But I think once people see the film, they’ll see we are so different.

For a start, I don’t have that awesome purple wig (laughs). But I don’t think they are that similar really. Hanna is a strange character - even if she wasn’t an action hero or whatever you want to call her. We worked on her appearance and we thought she was quite similar to a white wolf or some sort of fox. She’s been brought up in the forest her whole life and she’s only ever had human contact with her father. She trains every day, she hunts for her food and that seemed very relevant to her as a person. So that was the first thing that we worked on and we built up the character from there. It actually helped me to find her as a character.

Q: What kind of training did you do?

A: It was hard especially for the first week or so. I’d never trained in a gym before or done anything like that. I did athletics and other sports when I was younger but it’s not really the same as this kind of training because you are using your whole body and you are trying to build up your strength and your physical appearance as well. So it was hard to start with but I did get used to it.

Q: Were there days when you thought ‘I’ve had enough?’

A: Every now and again I kind of felt like “God, can I just stay in bed today? (laughs).

But I am a very motivated person I think and especially when it comes to work. If I know something has to be done, I’ll do it.

And I knew this had to be done, so I did it. I trained in Ireland before I started on the movie and I’d go to the gym during the day and then I’d have martial arts training in the evening and it just became a routine.

Q: You grew up visiting film sets with your dad but when was the first time you thought ‘that’s it, I want to be an actress?’

A: Ever since I was born my Dad always had the camcorder out and I’ve always

liked being in front of the camera. I also enjoy being behind the camera as well, and but yeah, it’s always been something that’s been natural for me to do. When I did Atonement, I was only 12 at the time, and I worked with great people, and Joe is a brilliant director for any actor to work with. I had a great experience because of that and it was something that I just at the time couldn’t imagine giving up.

Q: How cold was it when you were filming ‘Hanna’ in Finland?

A: Minus 30 degrees - it was really, really cold in Finland. We all freak out in Ireland when it’s like minus 5 or something and believe me, that’s nothing compared to minus 30 in Finland. And the harsh thing was that everyone else had these thermal suits on and Eric and I would be in costume wearing fingerless gloves. I was very cold! And then we went to film in Morocco in May or June where it was starting to get pretty hot, like 48, 50 degrees, so it was quite a contrast on this film.

Q: The early part of the film is just you and Eric Bana, who plays your father. That must have been intense, so what was he like to work with?

A: Eric is lovely and very down to earth and he’s a good actor and very funny. He’s hilarious to be around - we were in minus 30 degrees and he’d keep us laughing though the whole day. So it was great to work with someone who would keep everything sort of light. And he is very much a family man and his kids came on set a few times with his wife. He’s such a lovely guy.

Q: When filming ‘The Lovely Bones’ you said that you wanted to go to college at some point. Is that still what you hope to do?

A: I do want to go to college. I’d like to study film history or something like that but that’s not the only thing I want to study because I want to know about the world and not just film. I’d like to study philosophy and art and things like that - things that interest me. I think it’s really important that if you get the chance, you should have the experience of going to university. So that’s what I hope to do.

HANNA is now showing in Irish cinemas

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There’s an old acting adage that goes, ‘Dying is easy, comedy is hard’. That could, and should, be modified to, ‘Dying is easy, playing drunk is hard’.

With the release of the unstoppable ‘The Hangover Part II’ this month, we’re reminded once more of just how tricky it can be to realistically and convincingly render the condition of being properly locked on the big screen.

So, with full acknowledgement of how tasteless it might seem to some, Movies Plus raises a glass to toast these superior lush performances of yore. Hic! Nicolas Cage - Leaving Las Vegas: There’s nothing remotely funny about Cage’s Oscar-bagging performance as an alcoholic screenwriter determined to drink himself to death in Sin City. The proper antidote to the jaunty drunkenness

of The Hangover movies.

Billy Bob Thornton - Bad Santa: A vulgar, skirt-chasing, pants-wetting drunk, who also works as a department store Santa? That’s, like, doubly traumatic for any kids that cross his path! For that alone, we salute you Billy Bob! Richard E. Grant - Withnail and I: Not surprising that this one is a perennial favourite of beer-swigging, drinkinggame-loving students everywhere. Grant’s performance as the titular unemployed actor in Swinging ‘60s London is a masterclass in tottering, bleary-eyed, booze-and-drug-swilling self-destruction.

Dudley Moore - Arthur Arthur 2: On The Rocks / 10 Cudley Dudley’s most famous performances were as oddly endearing imbibers at a time in Hollywood - the late 70s and early 80s

- when alcoholism could be portrayed, with something akin to a clear conscience, as quirky and fun.

Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

The late, great couple piled on the pounds, uglied up, and let rip with ferocious bile as a warring, sozzled couple tearing each other apart over one long dinner party evening.

It’s Taylor’s greatest ever performance.

Peter O’Toole - My Favourite Year: O’Toole has a blast as a drunken actor, Alan Swann, who is trying to stay sober long enough to stage a comeback on a live TV variety show. Features some classic retorts, such as when someone comments that Swann is plastered. “So are some of the finest erections in Europe,” he replies.

Jack Nicholson - The Shining Homer Simpson -‘The Shinning’

(Shh, do you want to get sued?!

Jack takes an axe to all notions of subtlety with a manic turn as an alco writer slowly going mad in a haunted, snow-bound mountain hotel. The Simpsons’ Halloween parody - “No beer and no TV make Homer something something” - is one of the most perfect things you’ll ever see.

Jeff Bridges - Crazy Heart / True Grit: Bridges’ recent double-whammy as, respectively, a country singer trying to stay on the wagon, and a permanently-blitzed US Marshall offers audiences all manner of guilty delights in watching a superb actor play dissolute mayhem with charm, humour, and a startling lack of glamour.

Sandra Bullock - 28 Days: Oh bless your plucky heart, Sandy B. Years before she took home an Oscar for The Blind Side, Bullock made a deliberate play

for some shiny doorstoppers by taking the role of an alcoholic journalist (imagine!) going into rehab. Total Hollywood tosh, but a guilty pleasure nonetheless. Just look at the tagline: “The life of the party… before she got a life”. Deep.

Paul Newman - The Verdict: Playing a washed-up, drunken, ambulance chasing lawyer taking on a medical malpractice suit, Newman gives one of his greatest screen performances. His hangovers seem particularly painful. Newman’s closing argument to the jury packs a real punch.

What a star.

Julianne Moore - A Single Man: Dodgy Cockney accent aside, Moore was a great big ball of pathetic drunken fag-hag magnificence opposite Colin Firth in Tom Ford’s achingly stylish drama.

Josh Brolin - W: Brolin does justice to the early frat-boy drunken days of the 43rd US president, George W. Bush, in Oliver Stone’s unintentional comedy, squaring up to his old man, crashing cars, and getting thrown in the clink for causing trouble at football games. Astoundingly, terrifyingly, Dubya never received professional treatment for his alcoholism. He just decided to stop with God’s help. The last decade makes so much more sense now.

Mickey Rourke - Barfly / Matt Dillon, Factotum: Both Rourke and Dillon give brilliant performances playing versions of the same character, drinker, writer, lover and fighter, Henry Chinaski, who was the semi-fictional alter-ego of cult writer Charles Bukowski.

Dennis Hopper - Hoosiers: Incredibly, this was the only Oscar nomination Hopper ever received throughout his career, and it’s a doozy, playing the town

drunkard who tries to turn around the fate of a struggling high school basketball team.

Gene Wilder - Blazing Saddles: Wilder brings a spaced-out, borderingon-catatonic-madness edge to his quietly hilarious turn as the whiskey-guzzling gunslinger ‘The Waco Kid’ in Mel Brooks’ classic Western spoof.

John Belushi - Animal House: Frat-house party boy John “Bluto” Blutarsky is one of cinema’s all-time great drunken degenerates. If Belushi seems too perfect in the role, then it’s probably because the man himself was a raging addict who died from an overdose a few years after this movie’s release.

Jack Lemmon Days of Wine and Roses: Nobody could do sad-sack loserdom like Lemmon, and, boy, does he deploy it to great effect here playing a drinker so lost in his addiction that he destroys an entire greenhouse trying to find a stashed bottle of booze.

Ray Milland - The Lost Weekend: One of the earliest movies to deal with alcoholism, Milland won an Oscar for playing a New York writer out to obliterate himself on a four-day bender.

Words - Declan Cashin

The Hangover 2 is at cinemas from May 27th Read our interview with Hangover star Ed Helms on Movies.ie

Y 11 IN CINEMAS MA

HIGHLIGHTS THIS MONTH ON MOVIES.IE

Want more? Irish cinema website Movies.ie is updated every day with movie news, features & competitions. Here are some highlights to discover on Movies.ie this month

‘BURLESQUE’ DVD COMPETITION We have copies of the wickedly fun Cher & Christina Aguilera movie to give away.

Full details are on Movies.ie this month.

WATCH OUR PIRATES 4 INTERVIEWS

WIN ‘MORNING GLORY’ ON DVD

Johnny Depp returns to his iconic role of Captain Jack Sparrow this month. While searching for the fabled Fountain Grab yourself a copy of the of Youth he crosses paths with a woman from his past quirky comedy starring (Penelope Cruz).

Rachel McAdams, Harrison Ford & Diane Keaton. Full Later this month, we are meeting the cast & crew of details are on Movies.ie PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN - ON STRANGER TIDES, you can watch the video interviews online on Movies.ie

ATTACK THE BLOCK Win tickets to an advance screening of the new movie from the producers of ‘Hot Fuzz’ on Movies.ie this month.

12A www.ifco.ie

OPENS IN CINEMAS MAY 13

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MAY 18