Sam Mendes
Sam Mendes
Samuel Alexander "Sam" Mendes, CBE is an English stage and film director. He is best known for directing the comedy-drama film American Beauty, which earned him the Academy Award and Golden Globe Award for Best Director, the crime film Road to Perdition, and the James Bond films Skyfalland Spectre. He also is known for dark re-inventions of the stage musicals Cabaret, Oliver!, Company, and Gypsy. He directed an original stage musical for the first time with Charlie and the Chocolate...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionDirector
Date of Birth1 August 1965
I froze for a bit, in truth-for about six months after the Oscars... There were lots of scripts landing on my desk.
As I got everything wrong at the same time-costume, design and performance-it made it easier in a way, because I could see the film I didn't want to make.
Everything about that war seemed so far away, ... The media never really was allowed in. All you'd see were these tiny little bombs like they were hitting toy towns. There was no sense that this was actually a war, that there was a human toll.
You do things bit by bit. That's the only way to play something really original, where the details stand out. You're not just showing us a cliched, generic character that you've seen before.
Violence is something that's very deliberately chosen - who sees it, the effect it has on the person watching, and the person performing the act of violence is more important than the violence itself. It's not about a gore-fest or how much blood you can show.
There's no such thing as speech that is free.
He really went from being a boy to being a man. It happened to him during the shooting of the movie, so a lot of it surprised me and I was really thrilled with what he came up with.
I don't think anyone realized how important that war was,
I'd like to think there's a huge interest out there because it's part of our daily life.
Obviously, there's a good bit of irony to that scene, ... A lot of what began in that first war (in 1991) can be extrapolated to what we're seeing today. I think those remain issues we should be talking about, even arguing about.
You have to have a secret... There is a hidden movie in all the best films. The secret is in every frame... in a good movie, there is always a shadow movie underneath the text, which allows the film to float above reality.
We did ask, ... And luckily, instead of saying, 'Well, maybe, if you make a few adjustments,' there was some intelligent person at the Pentagon who flat-out said, 'No way.' Which is what you want, because there are lots of stories about them saying yes, then at the last minute wanting changes and, before you know it, everything's compromised.
It's very hard doing a period movie. You have to do everything, from the streetlamps to covering up the road markings. Every bystander has to be in period costume. You have to plan very carefully.
It's a risk casting anyone against type or what they're known to do. But there's one thing better than having a great actor, which is having a great actor who's never done what you're asking him to do. He's hungry to get out of the trailer every day and hungry to test himself.