Tearfully shedding the premiere of the new film, Matt Damon lamented that it is not easy to get out of the epidemic

The Paper's reporter Cheng Xiaojun

On July 8, local time, "Spotlight" director Thomas McCarthy's latest work "Stillwater" was screened as an exhibition film at the Lumiere Hall in Cannes. After the screening, the audience gave a five-minute standing ovation, which also made the film's lead actor Matt Damon can't help but blush. At the media conference held the next day, Hollywood Stars, who have always shown the image of tough guys such as "Bourne", first explained to the reporters present what their tears were shed last night.

"I can't help it. This year's Cannes Film Festival can be held smoothly, and we are really happy to be here, because I believe that looking back on this history in the future, we will find that this is really an important historical moment, marking that we have finally begun to come out of the epidemic. Damon said, "The experience of the past year or so has changed each and every one of us forever." We are forced to accept many very harsh realities and lose the bonds that people should have. I've been to Cannes many times in the past and attended the premiere of my films many times, and if I hadn't experienced all of this, I certainly wouldn't have cherished this moment as much as I did last night. Last night, more than a thousand people who were strangers to each other but had the same hobbies and belonged to the same group got together again. This makes us deeply feel that the reason why we want to engage in this industry is precisely for such a moment, so that we can be together! ”

The story of StillWater was inspired by the true story of Amanda Knox, an American woman who was imprisoned in Italy in 2007 for murder. This adaptation of Thomas McCarthy sets the story in France and tells the story of an American oil worker played by Matt Damon who rushes to the rescue of his daughter to restore his innocence.

To prepare for the role, Matt Damon said he and the director did a lot of preparation in the oklahoma oil workers community. These workers are exactly a group of big bosses who have always been referred to as "red necks" in the media, but after this close contact, Damon said that he has a new understanding of them. "They have their own culture, which is very different from what I've been exposed to since I was a child, but only understanding these backgrounds can help me play this role well." These people have been particularly kind to me throughout the process. ”

In the film, his limitedly educated character is helped by a French mother and daughter, and in the face of each other's questions (did you vote for Trump), he replies that he did not vote, but only because he once spent time in prison, and the right to vote has not been restored. At the press conference, when asked about the plot, he replied: "He is an oil worker, so of course he is a Trump supporter, which is in line with his personality." He comes from that background, and our film gives a lot of empathy to a character like him. The director and I drove through Oklahoma, and along the way we were invited into the homes of these oil workers, where we had a barbecue with them in the backyard and got a lot of help from them. ”

In addition to this new film, Damon also talked about many of his most memorable experiences since the film. He revealed that he was the first choice for the male lead of "Avatar", and director James Cameron warmly invited him to join, in addition to the generous salary, he also promised to give him a 10% profit dividend. Thinking that the film eventually grossed $2.8 billion at the global box office, Matt Damon may have accidentally missed hundreds of millions. "I'm definitely going to go down in history, and no actor has ever voluntarily turned down that much money." Damon quipped, "But I was always working on the Bourne series, and for work ethic reasons, I didn't abandon them halfway, so I had to turn down the offer for Avatar." Later, Cameron had to find Sam Worthington, who was far less famous than Damon, to play the male number one, and of course, he also saved the 10% dividend.

In Hollywood, Damon can be regarded as a model of low-key actors among the first-line actors, except for filming for publicity, the rest of the time rarely appears on the media page, which is the opposite of his good buddy Ben Affleck. "Yeah, the media gave up on me a long time ago, because I'm so boring." Damon quipped, "Newspapers and magazines have to have fishy content to sell well, but I, everyone knows that I am a married man, the father of four daughters, relatively speaking, there is no scandal, paparazzi also have to consider the return on investment, squatting with me this line is too uneconomical." ”

To prove himself, Matt Damon also recalled an anecdote when he went to Monaco's Formula 1 racing scene with Brad Pitt and George Clooney to promote Eleven Fury. "The security guards at the door just raised their hands to stop me, which drove me crazy, and finally I had to tell them: I actually came with Brad Pitt!"

Editor-in-Charge: Zhang Zhe

Proofreader: Zhang Liangliang