'Warfare' directors Alex Garland and Ray Mendoza chat with THR at the red carpet premiere and talk about why it was important for them to have the first screening of the film to be at the American Legion with an audience of veterans. Plus, They emphasize why it's always necessary to give an honest account of history and casting actors with the right attitude.
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00:00You guys so tonight's not the first screening the veteran screening was the first one
00:03Tell me why that was so important to have that that be the first screening in LA
00:07Yeah, I mean American Legion is a home for all veterans where we come if we need help
00:12We need to get together to help each other out
00:14And so I think I wanted them to be the first ones to see it
00:18It was made for them alley is a veteran played by Cosmo Jarvis
00:22So I thought it was important that they'd be the first ones to see it
00:25Everyone that's come down the line tonight has praised you guys, but also just said what a singular experience this has been for them
00:32I mean you've made a lot of movies in your life
00:34Tell me how this one why you feel like this is just obviously so much different and what this brotherhood means to you
00:39it was a
00:41Absolutely a singular experience for me, too
00:44The reason it was singular was him. It was working with right
00:48You
00:50Know because I know you hired him before on Civil War when did this conversation turn into something more?
00:57we were in the post-production period of Civil War and
01:03You know, I'd worked closely with Ray during that film and while editing stuff
01:07I just pulled Ray up and said hey, are you interested in doing this? And he said yes, and we just work
01:15From that day pretty much and you live this and I and I love what you had to say about to hire these actors
01:21They had to have fire in their guts and they had to have the right attitude. Tell me about that
01:25Yeah, I think that was important based off the schedule that we were gonna be running
01:29We didn't have a lot of leeway for error
01:31And so I needed everybody firing at all cylinders, which includes the crew included us
01:36And so yeah, we all worked in concert to achieve this great objective
01:40You put a movie out of it last year that landed at a certain time in our political landscape
01:44This one is also coming out at a time when people are thinking a lot about politics
01:48I think also thinking a lot about war. I think
01:53my feeling was
01:55That there is never
01:57Like a bad time to try to make an honest
02:01war film or book about war or play or
02:05Home or whatever it is. The thing that was available to rain myself was to make a film
02:10And I would also say it is a particularly strange time because conflict
02:17feels
02:18So close and so present
02:21But to be honest
02:24It would always have a place an honest account of war any decade any year and then can I ask you to
02:32I really loved what you had to say because it felt honest as well about you weren't even able to process
02:37What had happened until many years later put the pieces of your memory together to actually have a conversation
02:42How are you feeling now about it after you know being knee-deep in the trenches on this film for the past couple of years?
02:48And then on the eve of its release. Yeah a lot better. It's been therapeutic along the way Alex was critical in that
02:55But I think at each time we show this
02:58Getting like that stamp of approval. It's like less weight on my shoulders
03:02Till finally, you know
03:05You know, we'll see what the public has to say about it
03:07but from a veteran standpoint where I think we're united for the most part in that that front and
03:13That's the most important thing to me not to embarrass this guy
03:16But I got it. I got to change some positive energy here after what I did. What did you learn from him?
03:24I learned a lot
03:25from obviously film techniques
03:28And how do you you know extract emotion, you know out of scenes no, I mean I learned
03:38It was so much what I learned from it as it what he provided for me
03:41Which is like a platform to someone to trust to express, you know
03:45Those emotions and trauma that I've like pushed down for a really long long time
03:49So it was more of a I think just like a group effort and the trust that we built that means more to me
03:58You