Brad Pitt has been a Hollywood superstar for more than two decades, and the 55-year-old actor has received great attention throughout his career for his performance in "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, directed by Quentin Tarantino."
In the film, he plays the stuntman Cliff Booth, who is a bit weird and has a crush on actor Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio). The role was a perfect fit for Pete, giving full play to his gracious and easy-going personality as well as his abundant charm.
On the other hand, in James Gray's film Interstellar Quest, a more taciturn and emotionally restrained character is a testament to Pitt's full-fledged potential.
The Chinese trailer for Star Quest
The film premiered at the Venice Film Festival at the end of August and is currently being screened in Chinese theaters. In the film, Pitt plays Roy McBride, an aerospace engineer who is sent on a mission to outer space amid a worldwide surge in deadly power, trying to reconnect with his long-lost father, H. Clifford McBride (Tommy Lee Jones), whose boss believes his father is responsible for the energy reaction.
There are some ingenious action scenes in the film, but Gray's film is generally a highly thought-provoking, thought-provoking, and lyrical work that is directly aimed at adult audiences who are now less likely to appear in theaters.
Not long ago, Time.com had the opportunity to meet Pitt face-to-face in Los Angeles to talk about his work in this challenging film, his long-standing friendship with Gray (who worked together on Lost City Z 2016), his life behind the scenes, where he wants to live in the next decade, and so on. This dialogue is summarized as follows:
Mtime: As a child, did astronauts have a special appeal to you?
Brad Pitt: Well, I remember reading a lot of stories about adventurers, and I mean people like Edmund Hillary, who was the first to reach the summit of Mount Everest. I remember adventures like space exploration (in a broad sense), they were very romantic for a kid, even though you don't really understand exactly what kind of pain everyone has to go through to get there.
Mtime: So what appealed to you more about this film was the exploration of paternity than the elements of space travel?
Stills from "The Twelve Monkeys"
Brad Pitt: I think it's all there. I've never really dabbled in science fiction. Although I guess you could call Twelve Monkeys (1995) sci-fi, it certainly has nothing to do with space travel, and it's definitely my favorite genre of movies.
Alien was one of my favorite movies as a child, and my father took me into the theater when I was very young. It's something I really love ,I just haven't found the right one for me, or something I feel like I'm up to.
When I talked to my old friend James Gray about that, I felt like he had the ability to do that. He and I have been friends for decades, and he is a very humble person who is also willing to blacken himself. And in the most fun way, really. He and I started talking from our childhood, expecting us to be fathers now. This conversation was three and a half years ago, so the film really took a long time.
Mtime: What was the first time you met Gray?
Brad Pitt: I called him after watching Little Odessa (1994). I was looking for a new director to see what everyone was doing and who had different expressions, and that's when I found him and Guy Ritchie, who directed Two Smoking Guns (1998), and I became friends with them.
But you know, James was a very lovely guy from the beginning, we both loved movies, and of course he knew movies better than I did — about its history. So it's always very pleasant to talk to him and he always brings something to learn.
You might listen to him, and after a steady stream of quotes, quotes, and quotes, you'll ask, "Who is that?" But we were always joking together and always talking about doing something together. I think he's a very smart and elegant director, and that's always been the case. We all love the movies of the 1970s, and the characters who are a little flawed and the plot lines that are a little bit blurred always fascinate us.
Mtime: Going back to the conversation you mentioned earlier about the idea of this film, what did you think were the most surprising and interesting ideas?
Pete and James Gray
Brad Pitt: Well, in order not to reveal too many details, I can only say that this is a very frank conversation, and of course it means a lot of privacy. During filming, as a start to each day, he would email me every morning to tell me about moments in his life. Some were painful or shameful, or something he had mistakenly thought at the time, or the effects of a particular event, or even something he had done wrong in his family life last week.
These start to get me into shape because they always correspond to any one day's scene, and we start talking about that and then we're going to polish that scene all day long, because we always want to delete something or add something else, and that's going to be in our conversation.
Mtime: The film is about fathers and sons, and what's moving is not only that this exemplary behavior, but also the tendency to genetic presuppositions, because Roy talks about how he recognizes his traits from his father.
Brad Pitt: That's right.
Mtime: In your life, what kind of character traits do you feel you inherited from your father?
Brad Pitt: I think that's a very interesting question. Growing up, in my home, I understood us as pioneers, people who ventured to try to build their homes on the edge of established civilization. There are many dangers in doing so, and therefore there will be reasonable paranoia, protection and the need to protect, as well as suspicion. I find that these are still in our blood, it may all be nonsense, I may have pulled far. [Laughs]
But it seems to me that we are still running this pattern (as human beings), and I can see it in my family, I can see it in myself, and I wonder if these have been... I don't know how that works in our DNA, that kind of survivalist mentality, but I do feel it.)
Mtime: This movie has some weightless shots, I heard that it is not very comfortable to shoot, it is said that a lot of people have vomited, what is your experience?
Brad Pitt: I don't know if you grew up in a snowy climate or remember the clothes your parents prepared for you on a snowy day, it's kind of like that. [Laughs]
You're actually in a plastic hood, because during the break we still need to come out, we need to breathe. They will pull you up with sets and ropes.
What they asked us to do in the beginning was to let us go up before we put on our costumes and spin as much as we could until we felt sick (before we were going to throw up). And then they said, "Well, we know that's a bit too much, and we're not going to do that on the day of shooting." ”
Then they put us on the tedious clothes and did it again, and the set is different, and the gravity situation that we need to deal with is that you can only rotate this way, or you can only rotate like that, so we need to keep changing according to the needs of the shooting and the needs of the shot.
There's always something uncomfortable with every movie — at least not having to spend 6 hours of makeup to play Vice President Dick Cheney, as Christian Bale did.
Mtime: You've mentioned self-examination before and getting caught up in your own thoughts. How often do you find yourself talking to yourself?
Brad Pitt: Oh my God, that chattering thought goes on all day, it seems to go on while you're sleeping, and it goes on when you wake up. For me, I think the biggest challenge is to calm these voices, to shut down these thoughts, to live in the moment, with other people. I feel, of course, that this is one of the greatest challenges for humanity.
Mtime: So how and where did you escape?
Brad Pitt: Where did I flee? I spend a lot of time in the art studio. Filmmaking is a collaborative sport, it's a magical thing, it's like a band, when everything comes together, the film is formed, because that's the essence. But spending time alone in an art studio, everything is up to you. I'm curious about what the subconscious mind produces, and I love that exploration.
I also go to nature, I love going out for picnics with my friends, the kids bring a lot of energy and fun. For me, it's about doing a lot of outdoor activities or immersing yourself in the world of old art. Architect Frank Gehry is a good friend of mine, he is 90 years old, I see that he is still creating, he is still passionate about his work and exploration, I feel that is the true meaning of life. I think I'll go back to meaning, purpose, and stay interested and curious about things. And he was like that, full of great enthusiasm. It was a great surprise to be able to see that he was still doing some of his greatest work.
Mtime: As part of your career you've traveled the world, living in Europe and currently in Los Angeles. Where is your favorite place to live and where do you think you will eventually settle down?
Pete and his own children
Brad Pitt: Favorite place to live? I do not know. But I've been thinking about that because I'm thinking about death. It means where you most want to spend the last part of your life. Because we settle down in a place, we enter the place, whether it's because of work or family, and then there's change.
My kids will probably still be in school for 8 years, which requires us to stay in one place relatively steadily. And then you think, "Well, where do you want to spend your last time?" To me, I think it could be somewhere in the mountains.