Melissa Howland

WAMG Talks To JAKE GYLLENHAAL: NIGHTCRAWLER

Open Road Films latest release NIGHTCRAWLER is already getting a lot of attention for the amazing performance given by leading man Jake Gyllenhaal… and the film doesn’t open until next Friday!

Read Michael Haffner’s Fantastic Fest review HERE.

Last week WAMG sat down with Gyllenhaal (in a small roundtable) to discuss the film. Check it out below.

NIGHTCRAWLER is a pulse-pounding thriller set in the nocturnal underbelly of contemporary Los Angeles. Jake Gyllenhaal stars as Lou Bloom, a driven young man desperate for work who discovers the high-speed world of L.A. crime journalism. Finding a group of freelance camera crews who film crashes, fires, murder and other mayhem, Lou muscles into the cut-throat, dangerous realm of nightcrawling — where each police siren wail equals a possible windfall and victims are converted into dollars and cents. Aided by Rene Russo as Nina, a veteran of the blood-sport that is local TV news, Lou blurs the line between observer and participant to become the star of his own story.

One of the good things she was just saying about you is that you would make a great director. Do you have any ambitions do to that, at some point?

JAKE GYLLENHAAL : Well, my father’s a director. My mother’s a director, too. I know from a certain amount of experience, from watching a lot of people do it, who are extraordinary at it, because I’ve had the opportunity to work with people who are really good at it, that it would be presumptious of me to say that I would be good at it. At a time when I am looking to be presumptious, then maybe, yeah. I don’t know if that’s now. But I would like to try my hand at it, at some time.

I was going to ask you, when it came together to piecing together Lewis, did you do some research in the way motivational speakers talk and position themselves? Because I saw some of the hand movements that you were doing for your character.

JAKE GYLLENHAAL : Yeah, well, the hand gesturing, all that weird gesticulation… It was a bit of… You’ve met Dan Gilroy? And I talked a lot about there’s somebody who I based a lot of the character on, who used his hands a lot. But Dan, when he talks, he stands really straight, and he’s very thin. There’s something about him, he uses his hands a lot. So no, I didn’t study anybody who does self-help. The words kind of guided me there. Because there’s these strange punctuations, about it, and I kind of followed to a t the punctuation. I did not veer off one word, or one period, or any commas, throughout the whole thing. I think, in that way, it needed me to be very specific. So if there was a period, I would make sure to say a period. Sometimes my hands did it for me.

What about that movement that you would do with your hair? I noticed that was a kind of transformative movement. Is that something you decided, reading the script, or is that something you decided, “I like that!”.

JAKE GYLLENHAAL : That just happened one day. There was one point when I had the idea with Dan. There was some point where I thought, “What if, when Luke is headed into filming, that his hair gets in his way?” Because my hair was pretty long at the time. And there was a moment in the movie, when the hair was all in my face, and I’m filming, and I just thought, so often, when you’re driving, it’s sort of more dangerous when you’re driving with your knee. So there were a lot of inspirations that were coming from all over the place, from this movie. So I said to Dan, “Wouldn’t it be great when I was talking to Rick in the car, while I’m giving him speeches, that as I’m talking, as we all do, when you’ve lived in L.A., or driven a car in L.A., I’ll drive with my knee while I’m putting my hair up.” Yeah, exactly! There’s something about it, where I thought he was a ninja, that he thought that he was a ninja. It’s like, before he did anything, where he stole that bike, he’s a ninja! He went in, and was like, “Let’s go!” That just came out. Dan loved it.

In building this character, at times it seemed like this is Norman Bates, who’s gone into TV movies. Is he a sociopath? Is that why, with this character, do you think there was that, to him?

JAKE GYLLENHAAL : My belief is, in using that word, I think it takes the onus off of us, in the creation of Lou. He’s our creation. Without our need for information, without our need for information of all sorts, in a world where unimportant information is now important, and important information is now unimportant, and it all exists on the same plane, we just need to feed and consume, in that way. That people like Lou can thrive. He’s a product of a generation where jobs are, I wouldn’t necessarily say, now, as scarce as they have been, but definitely scarce, and they are transforming the idea of what someone does, as so different. The other day, I wrote an article and I post, it’s like, there’s a job that is changing the idea of a whole generation, who are coming into the world going, “What is a job? What do I do? How do I get a job?” And Lou is a product of that. The choices he makes; he’s kind of a walking metaphor, that’s how I look at it. So I wouldn’t say, as soon as you say, “Oh, he’s a sociopath.” It just sort of makes it go, “Oh, he’s over there. Don’t worry. We don’t have to deal with it.” In a way, I think he’s a product of… he does what he does. He is enabled by Nina, Renee’s character. He’s enabled by the guys at the head of the station, and they are enabled by us. There’s a world where we maybe could live, ideally, where someone who wouldn’t end up being the head of a huge major network. But I feel like, in the world that we live in now, he probably would.

Following up with questions, this movie is kind of about two people going to the TV, and what they’re doing. How do you see the journalism, and the entertainment, as kind of so close, and journalism has changed. The journalism…

JAKE GYLLENHAAL : There’s sort of part of the same answer that I would give, the same thing that I just said. I think the difference between what Lou does, he’s dealing with life and death. Though I think that there is a sense of no one taking responsibility. We’re all just in it. We’re all just needing information, and getting it. I think whatever shocks us is what we’re bound to go towards, even if we don’t want to. We’re still terrified by it, and interested. It’s the same idea as moving past an accident.

It’s kind of understandable. The teams he’s following, and the people…

JAKE GYLLENHAAL : I think that idea is very different. When you’re talking about celebrity culture, you’re dealing with life and death. When you’re following somebody who’s going about living their life, it’s not comparable.

Can you talk a little bit about working with Rene? As a person, and as an actress, and as your partner in this? And her touching your knee?

JAKE GYLLENHAAL : Oh yeah, she did do that in one scene. Well, in the restaurant scene, that’s actually a perfect example. Her husband, Dan, gave her very little to survive with in that scene. I would say that I was given, Lou was given a figurative 50 calibre machine gun, with his words, and she’s given a spoon. So I walked into that scene, expecting to just win, just because I’d been given all those words. And eventually he does win that scene. But Renee came in, and made it a struggle for me, in that, even with close to nothing to defend with, she was like a fierce competitor. The choices that she was making, moment to moment, even when she touched my leg, she must have said that to you, that was a choice she was doing, under the table to me, that no one would see, to mess with me. Because she knew that she needed to try and win something. As actor to actor. And I love it! There’s nothing I love more than another actor who is going to sideswipe me, sweep my leg, because I mean, it’s fun! She does it in so much fun, so much play, it’s not like dangerous. It’s so playful. When we rehearsed, with her and Dan; they’re so loving, the two of them, just so positive and loving. I would come and rehearse and do a speech with her, a scene, and she’d be like, “Oh my God, you’re just so great!” And then I’d be like, “Can we just do the scene?” And she’d be like, “Nope, I mean, Danny, isn’t he just so wonderful?” I’d just be like, and he would go, “I know, I told you! I told you!” Guys, we’re doing a scene! It was like that with them, and particularly with her. She’s been very, she’s separated herself from the whole Hollywood thing, as much as she can, and she’s really creative, and very sensitive, and very loving and open. When you think about her in ‘The Thomas Crown Affair’ and stuff, there’s a real intimidation factor about her beauty, and her charisma and stuff, but I think, deep down inside, she just likes to garden, and chill out and stuff. I love that side of her, in the scene, because it’s that side of her, seeing the real human side of her, that makes her so fearless in that scene. So it was great fun to work with her.

Can you talk about the look on your face, because it looks like…? Is it some effort on the make-up person, or is it just the camera?

JAKE GYLLENHAAL : Can we talk about your face? [Laughs] Who did that?

Is that the first time you lost some weight?

JAKE GYLLENHAAL : I have an extraordinary make-up artist, who’s working with me on this movie ‘Prisoners’, right now. And then he came, and he was nice enough to come and work with me on this movie. We had extraordinary department heads; from Rob Elswit, who shot our movie, all the way to our production designer. Every single department head, it was nuts! It was a 7.5 million dollar movie! The fact that we had all these people working with us was insane. So Donald, who did my make-up, I also worked on character with him. It was very important. It’s not about anything other than the creation of a good feeling inside. There’s no continuity with how we worked. There’s emotional continuity, given the scenario, and the scene and the day and the moment, has nothing to do with anything besides that. He was helpful there. We did subtle things. We made subtle choices and stuff. One of the biggest things that Lou really only sweats once in the movie, and that was a very particular thing, that we talked about often. In the times when he’s giving his speeches, or when he’s talking to Riz, or when he’s under pressure, when he’s with the police officers, when they’re questioning him, he’s in the interrogation room, he does not sweat. The only time that he sweats is out of excitement, when he’s going through that house. When he comes out of that, and he runs down that hill, and he’s driving away, is the only time that you see him sweaty. Because he’s fucking psyched! Every other exchange, there’s this cool confidence to him. So those types of things, as far as my face, and the choices that are made, losing weight and stuff. That was just months of, as we were getting into shooting, I would do stuff like run to set, and at a certain point I was just running through Griffith Park all the time, eight to fifteen miles a day, and I was just training myself as a coyote, with all the coyotes and stuff. And then my face just changed, I think. I don’t think I was really even aware, until a few months ago, and we were going through all the cuts. You start to separate from all the characters, and go like “Wow!” The place where you are mentally, it has so much less to do mentally than it does, physically. I can go back there at any moment and remember. I can go back to that Chinese restaurant, Like the scene of an accident, or something.

The way things are, like it or not, when the film comes out, you will be asked to make an indictment against this business, and how we cover stories, and how we put out information.

JAKE GYLLENHAAL : Just like you get to make an indictment of us, and what we put out.

Are you comfortable being put in that position? Have you thought about what you will say, or how you feel about that? Obviously, it’s a work of fiction, but is there reality in there, and do you define it as okay? I’m just thinking of this question as I’m saying it, but I can see it now, on CNN, or one of those shows, assuming we stop getting ebola, and say, shooting each other? Is there possibly some conversation on that?

JAKE GYLLENHAAL : Well, my form of communication is through the movies that I make. That’s one thing that I can say. I consider that to be, as much as I consider that to be entertainment, and it should be entertaining, that’s why I think, this movie is actually really fun to watch, and entertaining, as well as I feel like it’s some kind of commentary. I feel like when you can get the two in a movie, I feel like those are the types of movies I want to make. I believe that movies are political, no matter what. I think that if you’re going to escape, or you’re going to overtly deal with something political, it’s still political, because there’s stuff going on all the time. And I think I was taught and raised that it’s important to know, to be informed, and to make choices based on that, from a number of different standpoints, not just one. So I don’t think it’s necessarily, I don’t think any story’s good unless there’s a bit of indictment somewhere. There’s a… unless there’s some kind of comment; I would say indictment is the wrong word, I would say commentary. Dan Gilroy has a point of view. And I think he’s created this character, as i’ve said before, to shine light on the fact that I don’t think a character like Lou could exist, unless we really created him. There have been people who have seen the movie, and have come up to me, who do work in the media, and said stuff like, “I would buy the footage that Lou…” I’m like, “Wow! That’s interesting to me. That’s fascinating,” but at the same time, it’s true. You can go anywhere, on any news site, and scroll down, like you even said, we don’t want to read half of the things that we have to read. And I’m sure you don’t want to cover it. But it’s important that people know it. I have been more moved by the media, emotionally, my heart has swelled, as a result of stories that I’ve read, and I’ve been disgusted at the same time, in different stories that I’ve read. And I think that’s what’s beautiful about the job that you all do. That we’re all part of it. I feel the same way about movies. There are movies that do the same thing to me.

In the movie, L.A. is kind of its own character, and it’s beautiful. Can you tell me how you describe L.A., and how that played into your character?

JAKE GYLLENHAAL : L.A. is where I was born, and where I was raised. So it’s filled with all of that stuff for me, my childhood and stuff, driving around L.A… it means that, everytime I’m here, I live in New York, now, I flew here just a few hours ago. Every time that I fly in, it’s… I love L.A. I don’t want to quote Randy Newman, but… The movie would not have been able to been made, anywhere else. This is a Los Angeles movie. It’s a movie about the world, and I think that L.A., from my experience of L.A. has every single culture in it. I mean, it’s just this extraordinarily vast melting pot. And also the topography of it is really important, because there’s also the desert outside, and there’s the city, the metropolis. And Dan and I talked a lot about this, that the borders from space of Los Angeles, it goes from like electric to total darkness, into the desert. You know, there’s the green grass, and the lawns we created, are all man-made, and outside of that, is wilderness and the animal kingdom, and the wild. They come in, these animals come in at night. Who, who lives in L.A., has not had an exchange with a coyote? You know what I mean? Anytime that I talk to somebody who’s seen the movie, and said that I based this character off of a coyote, they go, “Oh!” Because it’s like, who hasn’t been eyefucked by a coyote. You know? They are not intimidated by you at all? In fact, they’re looking for the most vulnerable aspect of you. And they’re a beautiful animal. I have grown to love them, because I’ve done so much research, and felt like I was one of them, while I was playing this character. But they are ruthless, you know? And because they are also starving.

Are you living in New York because you’re living there, or are you living there because it’s a cool city?

JAKE GYLLENHAAL : I live in New York because my family lives there. My nieces live there, my mother lives there. My family all lives in New York. And my family is more important to me than where I live, but they all happen to be there, but it happens to be a wonderful city, too.

Are you excited about Broadway?

JAKE GYLLENHAAL : Am I excited about Broadway? I’m so excited, I can’t wait! I did a show about a year and a half ago, with the same writer and director, on a different show. It’s my favorite place to be, is up on stage. Like every musician gets to go on tour, you know what i mean? In my acting, the movie is my album. The theater is the live show, and so I can’t wait. That’s a different animal! That’s the animal, I always want to come out and they say, “Cut!”

What’s the name of your play?

JAKE GYLLENHAAL : It’s called ‘Constellations’ by Nick Payne.

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NIGHTCRAWLER opens in theaters OCTOBER 31

THE BEST OF ME Prize Pack Giveaway

THE BEST OF ME – based on the book by Nicholas Sparks and starring James Marsden, Michelle Monaghan, Luke Bracey and Liana Liberato opened in theaters last week and to celebrate WAMG and Relativity are giving away a THE BEST OF ME prize pack. Enter below!

Their bittersweet reunion reignites the love they’ve never forgotten, but soon they discover the forces that drove them apart twenty years ago live on, posing even more serious threats today. Spanning decades, this epic love story captures the enduring power of our first true love, and the wrenching choices we face when confronted with elusive second chances.

One lucky winner will receive:

Branded hoodie
Branded lip balm
Branded tote bag
Branded Kleenex box
Branded coffee mug
“The Best of Me” book by Nicholas Sparks
Soundtrack from the film
Mini Poster
$25 Fandango gift card

TO ENTER:

1. YOU MUST BE A U.S. RESIDENT WITH A U.S. SHIPPING ADDRESS. NO P.O. BOXES.

2. PLACE YOUR NAME, A VALID EMAIL, AND ANSWER TO THE QUESTION BELOW IN THE COMMENT SECTION OF THIS POST.

3. What is your favorite Nicholas Sparks book or movie? Why?

WINNERS WILL BE CHOSEN THROUGH A RANDOM DRAWING OF QUALIFYING CONTESTANTS. NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. PRIZES WILL NOT BE SUBSTITUTED OR EXCHANGED.

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Hashtag: #TheBestOfMe

THE BEST OF ME is in theaters now

THE BEST OF ME – The Review

Nicholas Sparks latest romantic flick THE BEST OF ME has finally proven that the same, formulaic love story doesn’t always end up successful.

THE BEST OF ME tells the story of Dawson and Amanda, two high school sweethearts that run back into each other after returning to their hometown after 21 years for a funeral. Soon, their romance reignites, and the two seem to finally be back on track. The only problem is that the trouble that caused their initial split begins to loom. Can their love survive another trip down memory lane?

If you’ve ever seen a Nicholas Spark film you already know the answer to the above question.

Let me start off by saying that I do not hate the work of Nicholas Sparks. I enjoyed THE NOTEBOOK. I might not have gone gaga over it like the rest of the world, but I really enjoyed it. I also liked this more than NIGHTS IN RODANTHE, which is on my list of most hated movies. This film did not make that list. I think Sparks is a passionate guy that can tell a great story. My complaint is that he needs to stop telling the same one and give us something new!

THE BEST OF ME follows the same formula as every other Nicholas Sparks film. I will dub this formula ‘SPARKANOMICS’.

1. Opposites Attract: A couple who shouldn’t be together throw caution to the wind and fall for each other.

2. Letters Galore: Despite the year, this head-over-heels couple contain their feelings, and must express themselves by putting pen to paper. Even if that beautiful envelope doesn’t see a mailbox, the person addressed on the front will always find it.

3. The Obstacle: No one can remain happy. Something tragic or crazy always has to show up and pee in everyone’s Cheerios.

4. Kissing While Wet: This can happen at any point in the movie. At some point, it’s going to rain, or these crazy kids are going to go swimming. What goes with water? Face eating. Always. Someone grab the towels!

4. Reunited And It Feels So Good: Screw everything that has, is or will happen! Love is stronger than anything, and this is the ‘rush into each others arms’ moment.

5. Duhn-Duhn-Duhhhhhhn! You guessed it. Doom. For some odd reason Nicholas Sparks feels the need to kill off one, or both of the main characters in all of his films.

6. Life Is Beautiful: This is the conclusion where the final lesson is presented to the audience. Despite all of the horrible obstacles, love is still more powerful. It’s a gift and we should appreciate it while we have it. Aww!

There you go. You have now seen every Nicholas Sparks film without ever having to actually watch them. This predictable formula is present in every one of his films. How are we, as the audience, still falling for it?

I guess I should talk about this film, even though you already know all about it based on the formula. THE BEST OF ME follows ‘SPARKANOMICS’ to a tee. The story itself is watered down, and feels like it was half-assed and slapped on a screen. When you have a tried-and-true method to make money I guess you don’t really have to try anymore. What makes this sad is that the acting was great. James Marsden and Luke Bracey were incredible as Dawson and younger Dawson. The same goes for Michelle Monaghan and Loana Liberato as Amanda and younger Amanda. Both pairings, Marsden and Monaghan, and Bracey and Liberato had incredible chemistry together. They pulled the audience in with their emotional ranges. Unfortunately, there is only so much they can do to help the film. By the time one of the characters dies (Calm down. This isn’t a spoiler. It happens in every movie!) I found myself scoffing at the screen. I actually hoped that this one would be different. Sigh.

I don’t know why, but timelines are completely thrown out of the window in terms of costume and set, much like every other film. Crap! Add that to the list! The flashback scenes are supposed to be happening in 1992, but feel more like the 50’s or 60’s. The same odd sense of time happens during the present day scenes, with the exception of one iPhone. I get wanting things to have a sense of timelessness, but I like the feeling of a realistic decade on-screen.

There are only two things that I will congratulate this film on. One is being the first film to stray as much as it did from the book. I’m not saying that it’s good for the story, but at least director Michael Hoffman tried. The second is the use the Cowboy Junkies version of ‘Sweet Jane’ deserves a high-five. That’s a damn good song!

If you are looking for movie that feels like you’ve seen it before, then this is the film for you. If you want romance, I suggest you save your money and just re-watch THE NOTEBOOK.

OVERALL RATING: 2 out of 5 stars

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THE BEST OF ME is in theaters now

WAMG Talks With MICHAEL CUESTA: KILL THE MESSENGER

KILL THE MESSENGER, the dramatic thriller based on the true story of Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Gary Webb is in theaters now, and gaining a lot of buzz.

Read Jim Batts’ review HERE.

Recently, I had the chance to sit down with director Michael Cuesta, along with a small group of press, to talk about the film. Check it out below.

Two-time Academy Award nominee Jeremy Renner (“The Bourne Legacy”) leads an all-star cast in a dramatic thriller based on the remarkable true story of Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Gary Webb. Webb stumbles onto a story which leads to the shady origins of the men who started the crack epidemic on the nation’s streets…and further alleges that the CIA was aware of major dealers who were smuggling cocaine into the U.S., and using the profits to arm rebels fighting in Nicaragua. Despite warnings from drug kingpins and CIA operatives to stop his investigation, Webb keeps digging to uncover a conspiracy with explosive implications. His journey takes him from the prisons of California to the villages of Nicaragua to the highest corridors of power in Washington, D.C. – and draws the kind of attention that threatens not just his career, but his family and his life.

This is such a fascinating true story. At what did it come about that you wanted to tell this in film form?

MICHAEL CUESTA : From the moment I read the script. I was raw last person to come on. Jeremy [Renner] was already attached to the project as a producer and an actor. When I read it I remembered the story, but I was really taken by… he was brought down by his own kind. That, to me, was a great, tragic irony, and something that I felt was really worth talking about… that injustice. Also, his own passion. The legality. The character, or the real guy… his belief in… He believed in journalism, and getting the truth out in such a deep, personal way. Then to have that turn on you… that one thing. That euphemism. I was really taken by it.

It’s also relevant to a lot of things today. Not only to the political genre, but all kinds of businesses. Did you take that into account when you were making it? Or was it something that just kind of sat in the background?

MICHAEL CUESTA : The rabbit hole? Yeah. Of course it’s relevant. Today, as far as… some stories are too true to tell. That idea is extremely relevant as far as that… What I loved about Gary’s character, and I remember directing the scene in the movie with Jeremy, was when Michael Sheen says ‘Some stories are just too true to tell.’ and Gary just sort of laughs it off like it’s bullshit… like ‘I don’t get that. I don’t even comprehend that. ‘ That, to me was just ‘Wow!’. It takes a guy like that to continue to dig into a story like that. It really takes that person that’s a bit of an outsider, and he was an outsider. He was a David and Goliath. He was David, even though he doesn’t win. I think that’s incredibly relevant. I think what you just said about it being in this business, or in the business of Hollywood… In any business it’s relevant. The story, I think, is universal because of that. I think people have no problem getting on Jeremy’s shoulders in the movie and relating to what he does with satisfaction. You’re right with him through it.

What were some of the challenges while you were creating the film?

MICHAEL CUESTA : Challenges? I would say… The typical film logistics is like ‘Ok. The studio wants to shoot in Atlanta and this takes place in San Jose.’ or ‘I can’t go to Central America because we can’t afford it, so how do we make this look like Nicaragua?’. All of those filmmaker production-y issues are challenging, but I figure it out. That’s my job. It’s the movie makers, filmmakers job to do. The casting wasn’t that much of a challenge, I have to say. People really liked the script. Each part was very clear on how it played into the story, and I think… You’ve got Ray Liotta coming in for a couple of days, Andy Garcia coming in for 2-3 days, and Tim Blake Nelson… They all knew… Well, they probably knew that they wouldn’t be cut out of the movie because you can’t not have that scene because it’s such an important part of this guys story, and piecing the story together. I would say that that wasn’t that challenging, because we were able to get the actors. We sent the script out and they were into it.

Prior to making the movie, during or even now were/are there any concerns about your own safety since this goes pretty deep with the CIA and drug dealers, and naming of names?

MICHAEL CUESTA : You know, I haven’t really thought of… No. [Laughs] A lot of these people aren’t around. We did change some names. ‘Freeway’ Ricky Ross obviously is in the film, and he’s going to be at the screening tomorrow night, and he’s going to be in the Q&A with me. There’s a documentary coming out about him called CRACK IN THE SYSTEM that Mark Levin made. As far as the CIA… I guess they just ignore it. It’s so long ago. They’re not going to start sending people out. It’s only going to bring attention to it, so they just ignore it. There have been a lot of filmmakers who have been down this path. I don’t know if any filmmakers have been threatened, or anything like that, but I was never worried about it. It’s been written on. There have been books.

Did you use any other source material other than Gary’s writing to inspire the filmmaking process, or the actors?

MICHAEL CUESTA : Let’s see… The main sources were Gary’s book ‘Kill The Messenger’, Nick Schou, Peter, who wrote the script was an investigative reporter a few years back, and then went on to write scripts, and direct movies… I think he’s directing another one now. He checked into some sources. I don’t know specifically his own work beyond working off the source. I went into a lot of books, and it’s no secret that the CIA had their hand in the drug trade. It dates back to the Vietnam War, and the Afghan wars. That’s all been written about. It’s more of the story of Webb being turned on the way he was. Obviously no one knew about this one connection through these few dealers where that cook was sold wholesale to Ricky, and Ricky didn’t know where it was going. I made it a point to show that in court, and show him go [Cuesta makes a stunned face] ‘Holy shit!’. So, that’s the big, new thing that came out.

FOR MORE INFO : http://www.focusfeatures.com/kill_the_messenger

KILL THE MESSENGER is in theaters now

WAMG Talks THE BEST OF ME With Nicholas Sparks : Exclusive Interview

It’s fall, love is in the air, the leaves are changing color, and Relativity’s new love story THE BEST OF ME hits theaters this Friday. We know you love a good love story, so recently I attended a press day for the film in Los Angeles for the film where I sat down with writer / producer Nicholas Sparks for an exclusive interview. Check it out below!

Based on the bestselling novel by acclaimed author Nicholas Sparks, THE BEST OF ME tells the story of Dawson and Amanda, two former high school sweethearts who find themselves reunited after 20 years apart, when they return to their small town for the funeral of the beloved friend. Their bittersweet reunion reignites the love they’ve never forgotten, but soon they discover the forces that drove them apart twenty years ago live on, posing even more serious threats today. Spanning decades, this epic love story captures the enduring power of our first true love, and the wrenching choices we face when confronted with elusive second chances.

What do you think it is about you that makes you able to look beyond the tragedy and find the good in your writing, or even in life?

NICHOLAS SPARKS : Well, I think it comes from a little bit of my world view… in that tragedy isn’t the end of the world. I started my career with the idea that all great love stories, by definition, have to end in tragedy because at one point or another one of them dies. It doesn’t matter if you’re talking about the love of your life, or your parents, or your siblings, or your friends, or your pet. Great loves, by definition… it has to end in tragedy, so it’s inevitable. That doesn’t mean that you can’t find joy in life. Even if you know it’s going to end tragically, that doesn’t mean that you have to have a tragic life. You enjoy love, and the moments that it’s in your life because it provides you with everything you live for.

It seems like a prop in the background of all of your stories are letters, regardless of the timeframe. Are you hoping to preserve the art form, or is it strictly for the romanticism?

NICHOLAS SPARKS : Both. Yeah, you know, I still write letters. I still hand write letters, and I still receive hand written letters. So, it’s still out there, and I think it’s a wonderful… As far as a novel goes it’s a wonderful way to – perhaps if you’r writing a third person novel – to shift into first person for a little bit to provide additional depth and emotion for that particular character. I also admire the craft of writing a good letter. When people reach out to me because they are struggling, for whatever reason, my first instinct is ‘Ok. I shall write them a letter.’ as opposed to necessarily sending flowers, or something. I do that as well, but my first instinct is to write a letter because there is something beautiful in the written word if it’s done in a meaningful, authentic way. It’s sad to me that people don’t do it as much, but there are those that do, and those that do find great meaning in it whether they are writing them or receiving them.

Building off of that, we’re living in a time where social media is all over the place, and people are living through their phones. How do you balance bringing your films up to date with keeping the nostalgia?

NICHOLAS SPARKS : Well, I think technology changes. Technology obviously changes but the emotions don’t. For me, I don’t necessarily focus in on any sort of technology. I don’t think it’s necessarily intrinsic to the stories that I’m wanting to write. Emotion changes so incredibly slowly. If you were in love in 1950, or falling in love in 1950 it felt the same as falling in love today. You can go watch CASABLANCA, right? They write this film, and it’s this deep ache… You could see the depth of love they had for each other. That doesn’t change. It just doesn’t change. So, whether they have cell phones, or look up something on the computer rather than a novel… the emotional connection comes from one-on-one interaction.

The internet was buzzing last week about a statistic released by the U.S. government. According to their tracking, this is the first time that there are more single adults than married. I’m just curious if you think that this, or factors relating to it will, in any way, affect your writing in the future.

NICHOLAS SPARKS : Not necessarily. I don’t think it will. It’s certainly known that there are challenges for people who are single that may not have been married.

What do you think makes a love story that appeals to a broad audience?

NICHOLAS SPARKS : It’s something that I keep in mind as I’m writing. I have tried to vary everything in the novels with the exception that if they take place in North Carolina, there may be a love story, and it’s probably going to be in a small town. Everything else is different, from the theme, the ages of the characters, the dilemma… In my most recent novel they were Jewish, and they were ninety years old, and I did A WALK TO REMEMBER. They were teenagers. I did THE NOTEBOOK. Well, he way eighty! He was also 28, or something like that. I’ve done characters in their early fifties, or their late forties. I do try to vary it to bring in, I guess the concept that love is possible at any age, and that when it’s right it’s right. I think that’s timeless at twelve or timeless at eighty.

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THE BEST OF ME opens in theaters everywhere this Friday, October 17th

WAMG At The WHIPLASH Press Day

WHIPLASH has had the film festival circuit buzzing for some time, and is finally in select theaters, with a wider release this Friday. Recently, WAMG attended the Los Angeles press day where writer/director Damien Chazelle joined stars Miles Teller, J.K. Simmons and Melissa Benoist talked to a small room of press about the film. Check it out below!

Andrew Neyman is an ambitious young jazz drummer, single-minded in his pursuit to rise to the top of his elite east coast music conservatory. Plagued by the failed writing career of his father, Andrew hungers day and night to become one of the greats. Terence Fletcher, an instructor equally known for his teaching talents as for his terrifying methods, leads the top jazz ensemble in the school. Fletcher discovers Andrew and transfers the aspiring drummer into his band, forever changing the young man’s life. Andrew’s passion to achieve perfection quickly spirals into obsession, as his ruthless teacher continues to push him to the brink of both his ability—and his sanity.

Do you think artists actually want this kind of pressure that Fletcher delivers?

MILES TELLER : I do think that for me the greatest success that I’ve had on a particular project or in exploring a role does come through collaboration. I wouldn’t want to do a movie where everything I do the director just says, “Good job,” and then I am under-directed. At the same time, I’ve done movies where I felt like I was kind of over-handled and over-directed and I didn’t feel like I was able to do some stuff that I wanted to. So I think it’s a fine line but at the end of the day you do, at least I do, need somebody to kind of see what I’m doing because, especially in film, even though I’m feeling it right here, it’s not playing that way in the camera. So for sure, for me, I do like directors that really will kind of inspire me with ideas and give me something to kind of chew on during the scene and something to get a better performance.

J.K. SIMMONS : God, I hope not. I mean, masochists do. I completely agree with feeling the need or the benefits of being pushed and of being directed on a project and collaborating. The kind of manipulation and abuse, I think, has no place in life.

Can you talk about putting your blood, sweat and tears into this film? And was what we heard in the film all you or was it sweetened?

MILES TELLER : I guess Damien could talk to you a little bit about that because I was not in the editing room for all of it. I hope it was sweetened a little bit because at the end of the day Andrew becomes a much better drummer than Miles was, although I have a pretty good skill set with it and it’s something that absolutely through hours of practice I got to a pretty good place with it. I started getting blisters. It’s funny because when I read the script there’s all this talk of, “And the blood splatters on the cymbals,” and all this stuff. I would come onto set sometimes and I would look at the drum kit and there’s all this blood there. And I literally to Damien would be like, “That’s too much. No way. Let’s get that off. It’s too much blood.” And he goes, “No, man. When I was playing, all my drumsticks were covered in blood. This is real. This is truthful.” So yeah, I started getting some bloody blisters and I was bandaging them up and stuff. Just the nature of filming a movie like this in 19 days with very intense drumming sequences, a lot of that sweat is real and that’s great because you don’t have to act when you’re actually kind of playing to exhaustion. I remember J.K. told me to hold back a little bit. He’s like, “Man, we’re going to have a couple takes of this. You should save some.” And then I was like, “Yeah, you’re right.” “Damien, what are you doing, man? I need to save some.” So a lot of it was kind of life imitating art which was nice. As far as the sound goes…

DAMIEN CHAZELLE : I think Miles said everything. Certainly we did a lot of work in the editing room. So a lot of it is just sort of raw stuff from on set and a lot of it is from pre-records. But everything that you see in the movie pretty much with the exception of a few shots is this guy.

How much rehearsal prep was there for the acting scenes and how many takes did you do?

DAMIEN CHAZELLE : [Laughs] They like to joke about… Certainly when you have this kind of schedule we didn’t have that many takes at our disposal. We didn’t have time to rehearse. So the first time Miles and Melissa ever met was the first day of shooting. First time Miles and J.K. met was… I think we did one read-through, we were able to do of the script.

MILES TELLER : J.K. didn’t even remember I was there. Or did you not remember doing it?

J.K. SIMMONS : Was I there?

MILES TELLER : [Laughs] You don’t remember doing it?

DAMIEN CHAZELLE : This is how much my actors really care about these things. So certainly everything was kind of short-changed and you worry about that in the moment. But when you have people like the people at this table, they just sort of brought it every day. There’s a lot of stuff in the movie that we knew we had to get in one or two takes in order to allow for the things that we just knew we’d have to do many takes of. For example, referring to the scene where J.K. is circling through the three drummers was done mainly kind of as a single take that was done over and over and over again without cutting. We sort of set it up so that we would just roll the camera and the camera would just roam around it — two cameras, actually, roaming around — and we did probably 12 or 15 takes of that and it’s like a five-minute scene. So by the end, I think you were pretty pissed, Miles, by the end.

What about the drum solo, did you do it more than once?

DAMIEN CHAZELLE : Yeah, the big drum solo, we did one kind of master of it and then everything else is so fragmented. I had storyboarded everything out and done an animatic to it and everything so I knew kind of, “Okay, Miles, we’re going to do measures 16 to 18 right now.” “Okay, cut. Now, we’re going to go to the cymbal and do the coda of the song.” “Okay, now we’re going to do the bridge twice through from this lower angle.” So we kind of played it out that way. But I remember the real trick with the solo for J.K. and for Miles was continuity because we only had extras as audience members in the theater for six hours so everything pointing in that direction had to be done at once. And then you kind of flip around. These band members we wanted to let go and then we wanted to let Miles go and do the band members and let J.K. go. So you wind up scheduling everything…

MILES TELLER : I’m so glad I didn’t have to think about all that crap that you have to think about when we were doing that [laughs]. Oh my God. It’s stressing me out just hearing you talk about it.

DAMIEN CHAZELLE : You’d be like on Miles and be like, “Okay, now we’ve got to do the end of the solo right now, so Miles has to be dripping with sweat.” “Okay, now we’ve got to go back to like the very beginning of the song so Miles doesn’t have sweat yet.” I just have these wonderful images of an entire like posse of makeup people descending on Miles every time we’d re-set up.

J.K. SIMMONS : Just one dude with a hose. [Laughs]

What did you draw on for inspiration to create these characters? What was your reaction when you first read the script?

J.K. SIMMONS : There was no conscious role model or anything that I used. I read the script and it was all there on the page. It was all there. I just felt like I understood it and I would be able to be the guy to help lift it off the page. Then once we started shooting, Miles and I just really settled into a rhythm and had a good time in, as we’ve referred to, 19 days. It was pretty much bing, bang, boom. We just went and did it. Damien turned on a camera or whatever the hell he does [laughs].

MILES TELLER : For me, same thing. A lot of people have been asking me because this movie is pretty autobiographical for Damien, they say, “Well, did you ask him advice about the character?” and all this stuff. I said, “Not really.” I asked Damien absolutely some technical questions with drumming because he is a better jazz drummer than I am. So I was using him for that as much as I could. But for the character, it was all there on the page. It was very clear what Andrew Neiman was all about. It was probably the most clear for him as any character that I’ve ever done — a lot of characters, a lot of different things going on and this and that. But for Andrew, he wants to be the greatest drummer of all time and that’s really his sole desire. And then other than that, just dealing with this guy every day on set.

Your musical background… if you didn’t have rhythm on this movie would be a disaster.

MILES TELLER : You would be really surprised because J.K. did a pretty good job.

Is there anybody, a coach, director, teacher that drove you in your career?

MILES TELLER : Yeah, my mom use to drive me everyday to school for a long time, and then I started driving, so I drove myself. [laughs] I started piano when I was like six and my two older sisters both played instruments. My sister Danielle was like 18 months older than me. Anything I would do she would do and vise versa. I mean she was the only girl playing in boys little league baseball and she played on my team, she was really good. She was just…she was better at piano than I was, she played the clarinet I played the saxophone, she was better at woodwind player than I was. Then I started moving away from that stuff into guitar and drumming and playing in some bands and stuff. Everywhere I went my drums went with me, I went to NYU, a very small dorm and I had my drum kit, and now in my house, three miles from here I have my drum kit. Yeah, I never really had a music teacher like that. There is a piano teacher that tried to push me, but I was eleven and I say “Its not worth it,” so I quit, taking lessons and just started listening to music. And then with sports I had a baseball coach that yelled just for the sake of yelling, It seemed like, and that did nothing because we did not respect him because we just did not know where he was coming from. With J.K. you can understand where he is coming from he is not just a guy yelling you know, kind of very funny vulgar statements at people all day, because nobody cares about that guy.

J.K. SIMMONS : You are talking about J.K. not…

MILES TELLER : Yeah, no I am just talking about J.K. off set [laughter] when they didn’t have [can’t make out] at craft services, or when they ran out…

J.K. SIMMONS : And I think it worked out, okay.

MILES TELLER : I had a driver ed teacher that had severe issues with anger, as if it was going to make us a better driver. I was like “Dude, we are like 15 we just trying to get our licence.” This guy was so pissed.

At the end of this movie was sort for remarkably poetic, how eager or maybe reluctant are you personally to romanticise the notion of being subjected to something that you not only survive, but you sort of transcend and reach another type of artistic or personal level?

J.K. SIMMONS : Damien that sounded like a smart guy question.

DAMIEN CHAZELLE : Okay. I mean yeah, I will jump in first. It is tough because the movie operates in teh screen differently than it did not the page for me, and I think that is because the music itself is not on the page. When writing it i think in my mind it was certainly more a tragic ending than a victorious ending, and really it ended in someone kind of gladly returning to an abusive relationship, and on the screen it is interesting, because on the screen you film a great drum solo to that kind of music and it does something. So I hope that there is still the question that is kind of you know, my hope through the scene it to give you a certain amount of a kinetic rush, but leave you with a question that maybe makes that rush a little more troubling. You know my hope is that that still kind of lingers in there.

J.K. SIMMONS : That was something that I know Damien had in mind from the beginning. as you just said that was one of the first things we talked about when we met and sat down, and thought that we were pitching ourselves to each other for the job, because I wanted to do it and he wanted me to do it. We were like, anyway… It was the ambiguity, that his point was to inspire discussion and debate and not decide are we happy for Andrew, or are we lamenting his loss of humanity at the end of the film? And I think based on the reception and the discussions that we have been involved in so far, I think that is what we have achieved. Plus, it is just like, awesomely entertaining to end a film with a ten minute drum solo.

One thing that I thought was really beautiful of Andrew’s was his determination…

MELISSA BENOIST : I definitely think, for me the whole digital technical age is really overwhelming and kind of a terrifying thing, so I hope there is a way to remain an artist and to not have to publicise yourself on so many fronts, just let it speak for itself. I think that is what I think is so special about this movie, you know that it’s all Andrew is doing, and I don’t know.

DAMIEN CHAZELLE : I think it is also funny, certainly it was also very conscious in terms how I wrote Andrew and how Miles played him. Andrew is kind of an acronyism, I mean he is not really interested in contemporary drummers, and I wasn’t when I was growing up. I was interested in Jo Jones and Chick Webb and Buddy Rich and Sid Catlett.

MILES TELLER : Travis Barker…

DAMIEN CHAZELLE : Miles and I differ there. [laughter] And so it was important to me that this was a kid that the pictures on this wall were black and white; the music he was listening to was mostly from the 70’s or earlier; he held his sticks with traditional grip whereas almost all drummers today use matched grip; he angles his snare drum down, like the old military style whereas most modern drummers angle his snare drum up. So all these little things were important, he is a guy who lives with in this artistic bubble that almost has nothing to do with temporary life. Which means that every time he exits his bubble and goes to the dinner table, or goes to… he is met with indifference, or worse.

MILES TELLER : I think what’s tough for an actor, especially a young actor, is you just want to work. Very few actors, I think, are truly steering their career, because it is tough. If all you want to do was independent films, do they give you the most control over a character, and a lot of times do they have the most integrity? Yeah. You don’t make any kind of money really from that. I remember Joe Pantoliano came to my class when I was in college and people were asking his advice on how you do movies, and he said, ‘My advice for you guys is do three movies a year – do one for the money; do one for the art; do one for the location,’ and he said you’ll be happy. So, hopefully you can balance it out or can do some things – maybe you want to go on vacation, maybe you want to live in a bigger apartment – so you can hopefully do something to make yourself happy, but at the end of the day, we picked art as a job and as an income, so the line gets a little blurry there sometimes.

J.K. SIMMONS : Yeah, the art/commerce line definitely gets blurred. But as far as modern…I’m not on Facebook or Twitter or any of that just because I’m a dinosaur and I’m lazy.

MILES TELLER : But you have started DJ-ing. (Laughter)

J.K. SIMMONS : Oh, yeah, I’ve been doing that a lot. (Laughter) Me and my 15-year-old. Yeah.

MILES TELLER : Have you been pressured to get on Twitter and that stuff?

J.K. SIMMONS : Just by Twitter. (Laughter)

In drum corps world, instructors worse than Fletcher…how important was it to convey the pressure put upon students?

DAMIEN CHAZELLE : It is interesting the different, even as a script, reactions the script would often get. People who hadn’t been drummers or hadn’t been to music school or hadn’t been in that kind of competitive world, the question was always, ‘They can’t…they can’t be like this.’ And I remember at the same time I was showing it to drummers, one who was a drummer at Lincoln Center and worked with Wynton Marsalis, and he had complained as well, but the complaint was exactly the opposite; it was, ‘It doesn’t go far enough,’ and, ‘It was worse for me.’ So, I think what’s fascinating is that there’s this whole side of the world that most people just don’t know about. A lot of music movies fit into a certain mold, but it was important to me that, if nothing else, this music movie was going to showcase things I hadn’t seen before in music movie – the blood, the physicality of it. We don’t think of instruments as physical – we think of dance as physical; we think of sports as musical; but music we don’t. Trumpeters screw their lips up, violinists screw their backs up, and drummers screw their hands up. So that was really important. And otherwise, I had a teacher like J.K., and it made me a better drummer. But I also, as a humanist, can’t condone what he does, and I wanted to make the character as monstrous as possible so that it’s as hard as possible to condone what he does. It’s undeniable that it’s a big part of jazz and music history, this kind of streak of tyranny leading to great musicianship.

J.K. SIMMONS : That kind of pisses me off actually that [other instructors] were worse than me. Especially after I met Miles, I wanted to go farther. (Laughter) I think Damien and I have very similar philosophies there, and again, that’s the debate; I love that this movie is inspiring that debate: How far is too far? How much is too much? Is it worth it? I’ve made the comparison before, this kind of relentless abuse might be necessary and appropriate if you’re training Navy SEALs; I don’t know if it’s appropriate in music school. But it’s there! And it can be productive. There’s no denying that. From my own perspective, I’d rather have a pretty girlfriend than go work with this guy and my hands bleed all the time. I would’ve made a different choice.

For More Info : http://sonyclassics.com/whiplash

WHIPLASH is playing in New York and Los Angeles now, with a wider release Friday

FURY: The Press Conference

FURY, the all new David Ayer film, hits theaters this friday. Recently, WAMG was invited to attend the film’s press day where writer/director David Ayer joined stars Logan Lerman, Michael Peña, and Jon Bernthal in a press conference to discuss the accuracy of the film, boot camp, and working with Brad Pitt and Shia LaBeouf. Check it out below!

FURY takes place in late-war Germany, 1945. As the Allies make their final push in the European Theatre, a battle-hardened army sergeant named Wardaddy (Brad Pitt) commands a Sherman tank and her five-man crew on a deadly mission behind enemy lines. Outnumbered and outgunned, and with a rookie soldier thrust into their platoon, Wardaddy and his men face overwhelming odds in their heroic attempts to strike at the heart of Nazi Germany.

The film also stars Shia LaBeouf, Logan Lerman, Michael Peña, Jon Bernthal, Jason Isaacs, and Scott Eastwood.

Logan, I was going to ask you about your character, because he goes through this transformation from somebody who is just a clerk typist to becoming a die-hard soldier. I was just wondering, for you, did you feel like you were going through a kind of boot camp yourself in terms of being involved in this? Did you guys hang out beforehand? Did you feel like buddies?

LOGAN LERMAN : Yeah! We had a long, long training period on this film. A lot. David is kind of known for putting his actors through a pretty tough training process. We had, you know, months where we did so many different things to feel comfortable with this world that we were living in, and then also get to know each other. We had a good, solid month where we spent every day fighting each other in the mornings, and learning about the tanks, and our positions in the tanks. Most importantly was that last week. We had a boot camp, and we got to know each other very well, and we did become close in that period of time.

MICHAEL PEÑA : I just wanted… I remember Logan came in, and we started sparring. I think, from my point of view, there’s something that changed in him. I mean, a couple of times we’d beat him up, you know what I mean? Not gonna lie. We had gloves on, and gear, and all that good stuff, but there was, at one point… I don’t even know when it happened… You don’t try to really beat each other up, but you try to get some good shots, and you can tell when you get hurt, or you hurt the other person, and he learned. He’s like “I don’t care if I get hurt. He’s going to hit me once really good.” and that’s the change. Something, because we did end up in the barrage together, and there’s something that happens when you spar. It really does activate this kind of animalistic instinct that you have, and you really get to bond in a weird way. I did it with Jake Gyllenhaal, and I did it with these guys. There’s something that brings out a lot of honesty when you’re getting punched in the face.

LOGAN LERMAN : And it just breaks barriers, you know? Once you feel comfortable with punching someone in the face, you can do anything with them.

MICHAEL PEÑA : Yeah, so David Ayer has that weird, like- You know how, instead of theaters moves, or whatever it is, it’s trust exercises! Yeah!

My question’s for Jon. So, killing zombies or killing nazi’s? What kill is better? It’s a joke question, but… [Laughs] What was your mental preparation for some of you guys for just getting into – you said almost animalistic – for just getting into that zone?

JON BERNTHAL : Since you asked me a joke question I guess I’ll take it. You know, look, to echo what these guys said I think we were all enormously grateful for the preproduction on this movie. It’s not about putting us through hell, or anything like that. This movie mattered so much to our boss, and it mattered so much to all of us. The level of commitment and the level of investment, you know, three-four months before we started, was there. We were all kind of asked to go outside of our comfort zones, all asked to take steps together that we might have been a little afraid to do on our own, but we all kind of pushed each other and got there. We were constantly being tested, and constantly being pushed. I really feel like we became a unit before we walked on set. I’ll never forget the first time we came out for our screen test. Normally screen test is a kind of serious day on most movies, but I remember this time it was sort of our day to meet the crew, and I think – and I don’t mean this in a weird way – but I think people were genuinely afraid, you know. We came out there, and…

MICHAEL PEÑA : We also smelled…

JON BERNTHAL : Yeah. We had really been through it by that point. Through the boot camp, through the fighting, through the tank training… Honestly, our rehearsals were really more violent than the fighting… to be honest with you. Anything and everything happened there. Again, I think that part of David’s genius is that he gets you to commit, and gets you to take steps and go way beyond your comfort zone, and this thing was like life and death before we started.

My question is for Logan. Was your character’s relationship with Brad Pitt seems more like a brother relationship, or more of a father relationship? I couldn’t really decide. How do you see it? On the set between takes, what is it like to work with Brad Pitt?

LOGAN LERMAN : There’s definitely a father-son relationship there, and he is critically, in this very short time of a day, educate his new recruit… this son, on how to survive. Working with him was great. He was really generous with everything that he gives when you’re working with him. He gives a lot and asks for very little. It’s incredible to work with him.

Is he a funny guy?

LOGAN LERMAN : Is he a funny guy?

Did you laugh?

LOGAN LERMAN : We didn’t have many laughs. No. Not a lot of laughs. There wasn’t a lot of levity. He’s a nice person, though. We definitely worked hard together.

I really enjoyed the film guys. Congratulations. David, I thought Shia’s performance was fantastic. I thought he gave a great performance, and it’s much different than what we’re use to seeing him do. Could you talk about casting him, and casting him as that type?

DAVID AYER : I’m trying to remember how he ended up in my kitchen, but he did. I’m a big believer that there is a right role for the right actor at the right time in their life, and in our conversation, what I got from him was the sense of commitment, and a willingness to commit and transform, and be immersive, and really submerge himself into this role… let the role take over his life. To that end, he did a vast amount of prep work. He embedded himself in a National Guard unit, he shadowed the military chaplain so that he could understand how to minister the troops, and how scripture related to the soldier’s life. He really went deep with it. He understood the time period in a great way. He’s a fantastic actor, and there’s an incredible rawness to him. One thing he did… it’s easy to show up as an actor. You get to set, and you wanna be seen. His goal was to disappear into the fabric of the film, and feel like the mother of this family, and become the emotional center of it… this sort of conscious of the tank. He really did a fantastic job at being that.

David, in preparing for this film, both as writer and director, what type of mental preparation did you do to take on such a project? And with such talent?

DAVID AYER : Well, it’s interesting. For me, when I’m on set and we’re shooting I tell my director of photography my big joke… we’ll, it’s not really a joke. “Don’t think! Just do!” and for me, it’s kind of the same thing because as a director you’re a manager. You have this huge amount of resources, this incredible pressure, this timetable… You come up with a series of complex plans that you develop with your department heads. You hope it all works out. You hope the tanks don’t break down. You hope the weather’s favorable. It’s a vastly expensive endeavor, and the world’s watching so it’s really easiest to simply put one foot in front of the other and take it day by day, and to have a vision and to have a goal. The shorthand answer is don’t think.

My question is for David. I was just curious about the logistical aspects. The tanks in this are quite specific to the reality of what happened. I’m curious what kind of help you had? Maybe from the military? Also, if you kind of consulted with any World War II tank vets in getting the authenticity as real as it was?

DAVID AYER : So, one of the complaints that you see in a lot of movies about World War II is that the armor’s inaccurate. It’s interesting because the film takes place at the end of the war, so you have this sort of admixture of every iteration of the Sherman tank in the film, which is accurate. As far as accuracy goes, you could try to build tanks but it’s never going to be correct. There’s a lot guys out there that are fans of the World War II genre, we call them rivet counters, and they’re gonna wanna look up the foundry marks, and serial numbers on the turrets, and figure out where each tank actually was because all of those records are out there. Every bolt, every detail… is the aircraft gun mount correct? Is that the right shovel in the shovel slot? Is it the post war version? Is it the 1951 British export version? People note these details, so that accuracy is important. We worked with certain European collectors. As we started researching the movie, we started realizing that the movie’s in Europe because a lot of this armor and these vehicles weren’t out during the London lease program during World War II, but it’s actually illegal to re-import any of it. This material that went overseas stayed overseas, and there it is now in the hands of these collectors. It’s interesting in working with a collector…

‘Can we paint your tank?’

‘No.’

‘Can we light it on fire?’

‘No.’

So, it becomes a challenge but fortunately we found people who were really game, and they let us paint their tanks, and modify them, and get them absolutely correct to April, 1945.

David, what do you pinpoint as the toughest day of filming? And Logan, considering the lack of experience and knowledge about what he’s been thrown into, what would you say was the most difficult thing to understand about the character and his situation?

DAVID AYER : So as far as the toughest day of filming, it’s interesting; one would think that standing in the mud at 3 a.m. with the rain and pyro and explosions and tanks and all sorts of things like that happening would be the toughest day. That’s actually where I’m at my happiest. The toughest day for me was the dinner scene that we shot in the apartment. It’s…nobody came out of there in tact, let’s just say. It was bare-knuckled acting, and it’s the kind of thing where the next day you shuffle over to the actors and look at your feet and [say], ‘Hey, are we…are we still buddies?’ I still don’t know the answer to that.

LOGAN LERMAN : I would say the toughest aspect to working on this film and figuring out how to portray Norman was mapping his arc and his change from afraid to kill to killer. There’s a lot of things that happen to him on this day that this movie takes place, and to make it realistic, you try to have a gradual change and pick the right moments. That was probably the most difficult aspect to portraying Norman.

When you made HARSH TIMES you took a financial risk in mortgaging home. Looking back, was that the best risk you’ve ever made in your career?

DAVID AYER : Rule #1 in Hollywood is: don’t make a movie with your own money. I’m going to follow that rule in the future, and it’s going to make my wife happy that I do that. It’s still terrifying to think about that and that risk that I took. I’m not a film school grad. I’m sort of a wrong-side-of-the-tracks guy. No one was going to hand me a directing opportunity unless I created it for myself.

Have seen plenty of WWII movies, great tank warfare, and the first I can recall with a Latino in the lead. What kind of research did you find on Latinos in the military?

MICHAEL PEÑA : It was actually way harder than I thought it was going to be, to be honest with you. It’s good to have a buddy who has written a Latino in every movie he’s had. END OF WATCH was an amazing role, and I had to read it three times to make sure I did have that part. But there’s not a lot on Wikipedia; there’s not a lot just in standalone newspaper clippings. It was shocking, to be honest with you, because there was about half-a-million Latinos that actually fought in World War II. So we just started creating a character, really, and estimating what it would be like. So we made him a zoot suit-er; that’s why he was wearing the chain outside. I had a lot of help on this, because every time he would give me direction, he would speak to me in Spanish and for the cadence, because there’s not a lot of that way of talking in any other movie or in videos that I saw. I started watching some of the older movies – if you guys remember, there’s a top hot [reference], and I thought Gordo probably watches all of these movies and thinks they’re really cool. So I tried to put in a lot of stuff that I think would be cool in ‘30s and ‘40s movies. I think the biggest one is just us talking about this guy, how it was tough at home, because it seemed nobody really liked him at home, and then here he is getting shot by Nazis. So there was a level of depression I try to deal with, with drinking in the film; that’s the way he was coping. It’s hard to imagine somebody being hated on both sides, so that was my crutch in the movie.

You have some funny lines you say in Spanish…in the script or ad libbed?

MICHAEL PEÑA : That’s David going, ‘Hey, say this shit, dude.’ I’m not kidding. But it would be funny.

DAVID AYER : But it’s a little bit sad that Latinos made a huge contribution to the war effort in World War II, not just in uniform; between 250,000-500,000 served and there’s no records, so it’s hard to say. And then obviously on the home front as the white boys went to fight, they had to fill these jobs in the factories, and it was really the first period of franchisement for the Latino community in America because they had jobs, they had money, and they were fighting for their country and their freedom. What people don’t realize is there are 17 Hispanic Medal of Honor winners in World War II that won our nation’s highest honor. It was an incredible contribution. As I looked at the period photographs of these tanks crews, you start to see more and more Latinos. I’d show Mike and [say], ‘Hey, look at this guy!’ and you start to see it once you look for it. You realize how prevalent and how present they were in the war, but unfortunately in a lot of these films they just haven’t shown that aspect; they haven’t shown that diversity.

MICHAEL PEÑA: But also what was interesting…I did End of Watch, and that was a completely different character. I remember reading it and being like, ‘Oh, man,’ I was really excited and was like, ‘Thanks for writing me the part.’ And then I was like, ‘Shit!’ It just seemed like a very difficult part to do because he wasn’t like a – me, Jon Bernthal and Shia would get together and say, Logan’s got a storyline, Brad’s got a storyline, use three have to form Voltron in a way. Shia was like, you’re the head, I’m the – I was like, wait, let’s figure this out. But literally, months and months of that. It was really cool that it wasn’t like anything I’ve seen of Shia. He really didn’t care, shining or not. We basically made a pact – you’re as strong as I am, and I’m as strong as you are – and tried to form that triangle and really help the scenery for the movie and paint the picture of war.

For Michael, I liked the Gordo name, which wasn’t really explained. But considering your contribution to the Latino community, do you have plans for doing a Spanish or Mexican film production?

MICHAEL PEÑA : Oh, yeah. I worked with Alejandro Ińárritu, and I worked with Diego Luna, and I’d like to keep on working with those guys. I remember growing up and people changing their names and turning their bank on Latin roles, and I just decided a long time ago that I wasn’t going to do that, that I wanted to do something for my people and be inspired just like Edward James Olmos did in STAND AND DELIVER. I ended up doing calculus in high school because it was just a strong image in my head that that’s what I wanted to do. But I would love to do movies in Spanish. I might have to get better at Spanish; I’m not too bad. He can tell you how the name Gordo came about.

DAVID AYER : There was a comic strip that came out in 1941 called “Gordo,” and it was one of the actual first positive depictions of Latinos in U.S. media. The author of the strip – I don’t remember his name – actually ended up serving in World War II, but because of that comic strip, it was sort of common for Latinos to be given that nickname, Gordo.

Brad is one of the most famous movie actors, someone people think they know a lot about. During the early bonding period, what was something intriguing, unexpected or fun you learned about his during that?

JON BERNTHAL : Look, I’ll be honest with you, man – I can’t say enough good about Brad. I understand a lot of people kiss his ass, and I guess if we’re here I’ll just have to kiss it. I felt like he was completely, not only willing, but eager and desperate to dive in every inch as far as the rest of us. At no point did he try to separate himself or hold himself on a pedestal. I respected him immediately for that. And it seemed to me that the colder it got and the wetter it got or the tougher it got, the bigger the smile on his face was. I don’t know what it’s like to be a big movie star and all, but I would imagine that he enjoyed the fact that David in no way let him get away with anything. He was one of the guys and had every bit as much responsibility as we did – that goes for the bootcamp, that goes for the fighting, that goes for the tank training – and he wanted that; he craved that. Any time the chips got down at all in bootcamp or whatever, I’m not gonna lie to you, it’s kind of cool just looking over and being like, ‘Man, that’s Brad Pitt. If he’s doing this shit, I better do it, too!’ You know what I mean? And there’s something to that. He’s a lovely guy, he’s a family man, and I’m proud to call him a friend.

This film has been rated R by the MPAA for strong sequences of war violence, some grisly images, and language throughout.

FOR MORE INFO : www.sonypictures.com/movies/fury

FURY opens in theaters on October 17

ALEXANDER AND THE TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD DAY Press Conference

Disney’s ALEXANDER AND THE TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD DAY opens in theaters today, and in celebration of the films release WAMG attended a press conference with stars Jennifer Garner, Steve Carell, Ed Oxenbould, Dylan Minnette, Kerris Dorsey, and Bella Thorne. Check out some of the highlights below!

ALEXANDER AND THE TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD DAY follows the exploits of 11-year-old Alexander (Ed Oxenbould) as he experiences the most terrible and horrible day of his young life—a day that begins with gum stuck in his hair, followed by one calamity after another. But when Alexander tells his upbeat family about the misadventures of his disastrous day, he finds little sympathy and begins to wonder if bad things only happen to him. He soon learns that he’s not alone when his mom (Jennifer Garner), dad (Steve Carell), brother (Dylan Minnette) and sister (Kerris Dorsey) all find themselves living through their own terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. Anyone who says there is no such thing as a bad day just hasn’t had one.

In the film, the characters are put to the test and find out just how important sticking together as a family is, so it’s no surprise that the central theme of the press day was “family”.

Being parents themselves, Jennifer Garner and Steve Carell were hands on with how their characters were portrayed on-screen. Garner says “We just piped up and made our thoughts known. ‘Um, at our house, we wouldn’t even do this…’ and that’s usually how it went.”

Steve Carell’s character keeps rather optimistic during the film. He says “It’s a state of mind. There’s nothing wrong with letting your kids know there is hopefulness. I don’t think that’s a bad thing to give a child. The reality in life is that things are not always going to go as well as you planned or expected or wanted. I don’t see anything wrong with being optimistic.”

Carell showed his playful side when talking about working with his younger costars, “It was the worst experience of my life. [Laughs] And I know in print that will play really well, because you can’t read irony in print. They are so much fun, including the babies that were in this movie, which we all fell in love with.”

When it comes to working with his onscreen family, Ed Oxenbould jokes “I like my film parents more than my real parents!”

Kerris Dorsey shares the enthusiasm for working with Carell and Garner “I’m such a huge fan of both of them. Being able to have them as parents was really cool, and it was surreal as such a fan.”“

The press conference ended on a surprising note when members of the Thunder From Down Under male review came dancing down the aisles. Don’t worry! They kept it PG since there were kids in the room. Maybe next time we’ll get a full show!

FOR MORE INFO:

Like ALEXANDER on Facebook: Facebook.com/DisneyAlexander

Follow ALEXANDER on Twitter: @DisneyPictures (#VeryBadDay)

ALEXANDER AND THE TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD DAY opens in theaters everywhere on October 10th

ALEXANDER AND THE TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD DAY – The Review

I love family films. I love movies that are directed towards children. ALEXANDER AND THE TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD DAY made me want to leave the theater within the first twenty minutes.

ALEXANDER AND THE TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD DAY follows the journey of Alexander (Ed Oxenbould) and his day, which hasn’t gone according to plan. Feeling like his family doesn’t understand his daily struggles, Alexander makes a birthday wish for his family to go through their own terrible, horrible bad day… which happens to be on his birthday. Now, his family struggles to make it through their series of bad luck as Alexander looks on in worry and self blame. Will today ever go right?

Like I said previously… I love family movies. I support the idea of a movie that is built with almost every audience in mind so that both children and adults have a great cinematic experience. Having said that, I am a thirty-something single living in Los Angeles with no children. This film was not made for me. I feel like they tried to include my demographic, but missed the mark. The jokes were bad, the beats of this film were more than predictable, and it felt entirely too ordinary and boring. When I said that I wanted to leave within the first twenty minutes, I mean it. I tried to give the film a fair chance, and even sat through the whole thing. It didn’t get better. It didn’t get funnier. It didn’t feel more relatable. It got worse. The story is less than genuine, and the humor is forced. Allow me to elaborate…

Let’s start with casting. The young actors were great. Ed Oxenbould is a fantastic Alexander, and his older siblings Dylan Minnette and Kerris Dorsey really round out an amazing, realistic family dynamic. They didn’t go for the perfect, pretty Hollywood family, which I really enjoyed. Having said that, they didn’t develop the character of Alexander nearly enough. I’ll go into this more in a minute. As for Jennifer Garner – her character of Kelly was boring. She’s in good, under-appreciated company though, because they didn’t utilize the talents of Steve Carell at all! They had two Hollywood heavyweights on-screen together and did nothing with them. We have seen Jennifer Garner’s Kelly role before. At best, it’s a weird combination of her mother-like character in THE ODD LIFE OF TIMOTHY GREEN and her business savvy, robotic character from DRAFT DAY. Nothing new was brought to the table. In fact, I didn’t even believe her as the mother of these kids in the film. Her role, most likely from the screenplay, lacked heart. The film did nothing to help the audience care about her character. Why was she even there? The same goes for Steve Carell. They gave a great comedic / dramatic actor a role that was the “potty humor” level to his acting genius. He had no freedom to showcase his talents, so his character was left stale and forgettable.

This seems like a good time to talk about the screenplay. Let’s start with the Kelly character. SPOILER ALERT : Kelly, Garner’s character is fighting for a promotion at her job – a job which she doesn’t seem to really care about, and takes up an overwhelming amount of her time. At the end of the film, she gets the promotion that the film paints as evil. (Her boss looks at a photo of her child on a screen, after Kelly tells her that she needs to carve out time for her family, and says something along the lines of “You’re spending time with your child now.”) I’m all for women in the workplace. Heck, I’m an advocate of equal rights across the board. That isn’t the issue. Why is this film painting Kelly’s job like it’s a terrible thing, and then wrapping everything up with her getting the promotion that will take even more time away from her children? Nothing was ever shown in a positive light about her job. If they are trying to show audiences a realistic family portrait, they failed. This is not the film to do it in. Everything else is wild, crazy and unbelievable. Now, to the more obvious observation… Why wasn’t more time spent on Alexander so that we, the audience, could build up an empathy for him? Rather than speeding up the runtime of this film (81 minutes), take an extra twenty to make the audience really care what is going on to Alexander! Why does he feels the need to make a wish for his family to experience what he feels on a daily basis? I’m not sure. They hinted at the isolation, and lack of connection with his family, but didn’t take the time to explore it. Alexander is such a beloved character from the pages of a book. His fans deserve less of a formula-driven family movie and more of a compassionate story treatment.

Between the male strippers, “dump” jokes, and slapstick shenanigans, the beloved book version of ALEXANDER AND THE TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD DAY becomes lost. They made an attempt to make this film enjoyable to all viewing ages, but by trying too hard the film loses its focus, and becomes a boring, cluttered mess.

I wish I could give this film a good review. I feel like audiences deserve a fun, enjoyable family film. Unfortunately, this is not it.

OVERALL RATING : 2 out of 5 stars

Like Alexander on Facebook: Facebook.com/DisneyAlexander

Follow Alexander on Twitter: @DisneyPictures #VeryBadDay

The Third Annual SAN DIEGO COMIC FEST Is Coming Soon

SAN DIEGO COMIC FEST, one of the comic book communities best kept secrets, is fast approaching and tickets are still available!

The San Diego Comic Fest is the friendly comic convention with a casual atmosphere and an intimate scale that allows fans to mingle directly with professionals and exhibitors. It’s the place where you can indulge your love of comics, science fiction, and films, and meet an outstanding array of professional creators without high-priced tickets, crowding, or long lines. San Diego Comic Fest was even featured on an episode of ‘The Simpsons.’ How cool is that?

At the San Diego Comic Fest you’ll find an extensive and eclectic program with things for every fan to enjoy. As you would expect of a comic con, there will be panel discussions; guest programs; an artist alley; tabletop gaming; cosplay; steampunk; an exhibitor hall full of your favorite comics, books, toys, and collectibles; and much, much, more. All of this takes place in a relaxed setting that enables fans and professionals to hang out and enjoy good times talking about comics, science fiction, films, animation, and all the other things that fans love.

Comic Fest’s origin story: Back in 1969, when he was a teenage San Diego comics dealer, Mike Towry was part of the small group of fans who founded what became known as the San Diego Comic-Con. After the celebration of the 40th Comic-Con in 2009, he and other Comic-Con veterans agreed that San Diego needed a second convention, one reminiscent of the early Comic-Cons. Thus, San Diego Comic Fest was born in 2012.

As a convention produced by fans for fans, San Diego Comic Fest is sure to please. This all-volunteer comic con is a gathering of the tribe where each fan in attendance plays an important role in creating a memorable experience shared by all. We hope that you will join us this October 17-19, 2014 for a great, fun time at our third annual San Diego Comic Fest!

FOR MORE INFO CHECK OUT : http://sdcomicfest.org

NIGHTCRAWLER opens in theaters OCTOBER 31

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THE BEST OF ME is in theaters now

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OVERALL RATING: 2 out of 5 stars

THE BEST OF ME is in theaters now

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KILL THE MESSENGER is in theaters now

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THE BEST OF ME opens in theaters everywhere this Friday, October 17th

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WHIPLASH is playing in New York and Los Angeles now, with a wider release Friday

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FURY opens in theaters on October 17

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ALEXANDER AND THE TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD DAY opens in theaters everywhere on October 10th

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OVERALL RATING : 2 out of 5 stars

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