IR Interview: Joel Kinnaman For ”Silent Night” [Lionsgate]

The Inside Reel

Actor Joel Kinnaman talks to The Inside Reel about approach, training, energy, texture, humor and drama in regards to his new action film from director John Woo: “Silent Night”, being released by Lionsgate.

Transcript

00:00 (screaming)

00:02 (dramatic music)

00:05 (dramatic music)

00:07 (dramatic music)

00:37 - My first question to you is, you know,

00:39 you've done different kinds of action films over the years.

00:42 Everyone has their own identity.

00:44 Everyone has their own cadence.

00:47 Could you talk about that?

00:47 'Cause obviously "Woo" is different than most,

00:50 but it also, there's an emotional resonance

00:53 that his films have that, you know,

00:55 sometimes other action films don't have, per se.

00:58 - Yeah, especially this one.

01:00 It was, you know, it was a very emotional film

01:05 and, you know, the scenes with the family,

01:10 you know, of course, this film is about a father

01:13 whose son gets killed by a stray bullet

01:16 from a gang shootout and is unable to sort of reconnect

01:21 with love, really, and with, unable to reconnect with life

01:26 and his wife, and just gets consumed by this idea

01:30 of making the people that took the light of his life away

01:34 pay for it.

01:35 And, you know, so it's a very emotional, dark journey,

01:40 you know, into that hole.

01:44 And the way John shot the film, you know,

01:49 he gave us a lot of room to explore.

01:53 And, but then, you know,

01:56 because there's no dialogue in the scene,

01:58 it gave him an opportunity to really, you know,

02:01 design a beautiful shot that tells the whole story

02:05 of a scene.

02:06 So, you know, as you saw the film, so, you know,

02:09 there's a lot of like very cinematic long takes

02:13 that sort of balance up the hardcore intense action.

02:16 So it becomes a really interesting and unusual film.

02:20 And the response that we've gotten is that the people are,

02:23 you know, sitting at the edge of their seat.

02:25 So it's really good to hear.

02:27 (dramatic music)

02:30 - Shots fired, shots fired.

02:38 - All units, please respond.

02:40 (dramatic music)

02:42 (beeping)

02:57 (dramatic music)

02:59 - Well, because the thing is, I mean, he, you know,

03:17 this is a, and nothing is, it's slightly smaller budget.

03:20 So more creative decisions have to be made.

03:23 I mean, that there's not as much coverage,

03:25 but that requires, you know,

03:26 you exactly knowing what he's doing.

03:28 Can you talk about that collaboration,

03:30 knowing how he does either the fight sequences,

03:34 the gun sequences, or like the car chases?

03:36 Could you talk about that?

03:38 Because it has to be very precise.

03:40 - Yeah.

03:42 So when it came to the action part of it,

03:45 I spent a few months before we started shooting,

03:50 training with this stunt crew that I've been working with

03:55 over the years.

03:56 So that was sort of my contribution to this,

03:59 that I was able to bring that team into this film.

04:03 And it became a really nice and beautiful blend

04:06 of sort of the new and the old,

04:08 where, you know, with John's like, you know,

04:11 incredible OG master visual storytelling,

04:15 but then with the fight coordinators and stunt performers

04:19 that are, you know, very, you know, they're cutting,

04:22 they're the best in the world.

04:24 And we blended these things together,

04:28 and we trained a lot leading up to the film,

04:31 and we wanted to make all the fight sequences really messy.

04:35 Also because my character,

04:36 he's not some special forces guy or some martial artist.

04:40 So to make the fight sequences exciting,

04:43 we just wanted them to feel very gritty and realistic

04:47 and not choreographed.

04:49 So what we did was we choreographed sort of anchor points

04:53 in the fight sequences.

04:55 And then the way that we got from one end to the next,

04:59 that was somewhat improvised and a real scramble,

05:04 as you talk about, if you talk about fights.

05:06 And it makes for like messy,

05:11 but fights that have an intensity.

05:14 And John really embraced all of that.

05:16 And also I was really impressed

05:19 of how he wanted to shoot the action,

05:21 'cause he also really wanted to shoot the action

05:24 in longer takes without cutting.

05:26 And that's the more modern side of action filmmaking

05:30 that Chad Stahelski showed to perfection

05:34 in the John Wick movies.

05:35 And it demands that the actor does the majority

05:39 of the action because it's in the cuts

05:41 that you switch out from the stunt to the stunt guy.

05:43 So if you don't cut, the actor's got to do it all.

05:46 So we had to design the fight

05:48 so I could do the whole fights.

05:51 And yeah, I was really happy with how it turned out.

05:54 It feels realistic and dynamic.

05:56 [dramatic music]

05:59 [clicking]

06:03 [gunshots]

06:13 [gunshots]

06:15 - Well, yeah, it makes everything else feel earned.

06:25 I mean, the thing is, is that obviously your character

06:27 can't speak because of what happened.

06:30 And it's sort of interesting,

06:31 those silences mean just as much when he's pondering stuff.

06:35 You know, either a little bit of the humor,

06:37 but mostly it's like, if anything, it's a gallows humor.

06:40 Like when he's watching the video,

06:42 in order to learn how to fight,

06:44 you know, those little things make it feel earned.

06:47 Can you talk about looking at the psyche

06:48 of those silent moments?

06:50 'Cause the silent moments make everything

06:52 he does later earned.

06:55 - Yeah, so, I mean, the big challenge was,

06:58 you know, always having the emotional intensity,

07:03 but not being able to use any words to sort of express it.

07:08 So it puts even more pressure on the, my internal life,

07:12 because it's, everything has to be in the eyes.

07:16 And the thing that I realized really quickly is like,

07:18 you can't hide, you know, actors hide a lot behind,

07:22 like how you say something.

07:23 And then they, you know, they say it with an intensity,

07:27 but it's not really filled with emotion behind it,

07:31 but you get away with it because, you know,

07:33 because you know how to say the line, the delivery's good.

07:36 But here, because it all has to be in my eyes,

07:38 like I couldn't get away with anything.

07:40 So I had to prepare emotionally a lot more intensely

07:44 than I would for other films.

07:46 And I found myself having to prepare for like almost

07:51 every take of this film in the same way that I would prepare

07:53 for the most emotional scene of a film in another film.

07:57 So I was acting like a madman on the set.

08:00 I was like screaming and, you know, kicking things

08:04 and crying like right before the camera would start.

08:06 And then, and then when the camera rolling, you know,

08:08 I got quiet, but then you have that sort of inner fury

08:12 and desperation, because it just,

08:16 you have to create that intensity in the eyes

08:19 and also to create those little facial movements

08:22 that you only get when you're filled with a lot of emotion

08:25 or intense thoughts.

08:26 (dramatic music)

08:29 (growling)

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08:49 (dramatic music)

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09:03 (growling)

09:05 (dramatic music)

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