Burning Bright

Burning Bright screened in Cannes

Burning Bright was screened at the Cannes Film Festival last week. (No, not in competition. Sobini Films were probably just looking for distributors.) The version screened was 89 minutes long. [Cinando.com]

Burning Bright Cannes poster

Sobini Films has a page up with a bunch of stills from the film. The set is also available on Flickr.

First pics of Johnny Gavineau below.

Garret Dillahunt as Johnny Gavineau in Burning Bright (2009)

Garret Dillahunt and Briana Evigan in Burning Bright (2009)

Garret Dillahunt in Burning Bright (2009)

Garret on BlogTalkRadio.com – The Last House on the Left

With The Last House on the Left premiering this week, Movie Geeks United interviewed Garret yesterday. Among other things, he talks about seeing the film at the first screenings, how he landed the part, how he got cast in Burning Bright, what he talked about with David Hess, what some of his favourite 1970s movies are, what he read (possibly something like this) while preparing for Last House, and a bunch of other stuff.

Hit play below to listen to the podcast:

The Geeks also talked to Riki Lindhome and they’ll have David Hess on their show tomorrow.

The Road: Garret talks to SCI FI Wire

Garret talked to SCI FI Wire last week. The article is here, quotes below:

About The Road:

“No one writes better stories than Cormac McCarthy. I think Cormac had just had his son [when he wrote The Road]. He had his son fairly late in life, and there was a fire on the hill, and he was watching it from his back door, and his mind just started to wander (…) I think he thought because of these feelings of protectiveness for his son, he just started thinking about what he would do. That fire made him think about what if that was the end coming. What if that was a meteor shower that disrupted the whole atmosphere? This story started to develop about this boy who would then grow up never knowing anything but that [bleak] world. It’s heartbreaking and beautiful. He started to see the world again, and its magic and mystery through the eyes of this boy, and that’s what the book’s about. “

About his character in Burning Bright:

“A hurricane is coming, and I need some insurance money. Again, I’m a bad father.”

About the science fiction genre in general:

“That’s my whole job. I ask ‘What if?’ all the time. What if I was this guy? What if I was that? I just like good stories. I am a science fiction fan. I have 11 boxes of comic books at home. I read Isaac Asimov when I was in eighth grade, and all these incredible, mind-bending kinds of things. I think it’s an excellent way to think outside the box. The most intelligent people I know are science fiction fans and writers.” [SCI FI Wire]

Burning Bright – more info, from Briana Evigan

Briana Evigan talked to Bloody-Disgusting.com about her role in Burning Bright. A few snippets below.

About the setup:

“She can’t go outside, and the tiger’s in the house, how long can she hide from it? She [also has] the autistic brother that’s just as bad as the tiger. He doesn’t respond to her, he makes noise, he yells, he wants to pet the tiger. She has three major obstacles to get around, it’s like, how can it be worse? It’s such a simple concept and that’s what I really loved about it when I read it.”

About the film’s rating:

“It is very suspenseful, it’s not gory. There are a couple of little things that happen with myself and the tiger…but nothing extreme. It’s definitely not a gory movie. I think they’re actually going for a PG-13.”

About the step dad (Garret’s character):

“The step dad has a ranch of animals. It’s a beautiful house they chose to film out and he has other animals there like alligators and orangutans, all different types of animals . He gets the tiger as an investment. The whole family is miserable, the step dad has the responsibility of my character and my brother, and that is because the mom has killed herself. It puts a damper on the family; it’s a whole new way of living. I would say from my perspective of my character that the step dad is trying to kill us so he has nothing else to worry about. He can move on, be done and blame it on the animal – blame it on whatever he wants, move on and get his life back.”

More about Burning Bright, from the writers

Burning Bright writers Julie Prendiville Roux and Christine Coyle talked to Ryan Rotten at ShockTillYourDrop.com about how the movie came to be…

Roux: The way this all happened is that we had a screenplay out there called Chance and it was Altman-esque because it was different storylines intersecting. A producer read it, David Higgins, and he asked our agent to send us over so we went. I’ll never forget the call because our agent said Higgins had this thriller idea, two kids trapped in a house with a tiger. We thought that was random.

… the tone of the film…

Roux: We all had the like mind of making it as tense, taut and real as possible. You know in Das Boot where you feel like you’re in the boat? We have that similar situation in Burning Bright because you’re trapped in this house, the windows are all boarded up and it’s dark and scary because there’s a wild animal in the house. It’s starting to feel like it’s going in that direction. As you know, through editing it could change. Miklos Wright, the editor, is making it very Hitchcockian which I’m thrilled about.

… Garret’s character…

Roux: They have a stepfather, and he’s evil, of course.

Coyle: He’s the kind of guy who has had a million ideas, none of which have ever really worked out. So his latest idea is he’s going to have a bed and breakfast and a safari park together. Her mother had really bad choices in men, Johnny is at the top of her list in bad choices. Kelly is supposed to be leaving for college and what happens is she can’t because of circumstance. She winds up in the house, it’s boarded up and she can’t get out. Part of the question is: Who put the tiger in the house? Was it Tommy her brother? Kelly, in some suicidal way? Johnny the stepfather?

… the tigers…

Roux: Which they did do. The tigers were really on set with Briana.

Coyle: And they were just gorgeous. There were three tigers to play one. Huge paws. When we went to the set up at Magic Mountain where they did some of the tiger stuff, there were rules. Every body had to stand in a group, if you’re not in a group you’re potentially dinner. No sudden movements. No children.

Roux: The tigers will train their eyes, it was fascinating.

Coyle: David brought his little kids, five and six, to the set. The tigers were in a cage. The little girl said something like “Wow, this is neat!” and the tiger just fixated on her. At that point, the trainer told everyone no kids under 18 when the tigers are out. And like I said, there were three tigers. One was a pouncer, one runs better…

Roux: One was for beauty shots.

… and the way casting could have gone.

Coyle: They were talking about some other actors for the part like Jeff Bridges.

Roux: Bill Pullman.

Coyle: Jeff Daniels. But there are certain expectations you have when you see them on the screen. Garret, certainly from Deadwood and Terminator, he’s got a cult following, but you buy him as this stepfather with a rather antagonistic relationship with this 18-year-old girl.

For the full interview, go here.