Mel Gibson: Mel's Moves

Q: What sparked you to play the wacko cab driver in Conspiracy Theory with Julia Roberts?

A: It was risky and prompted the "Should I do that?" question. The character was this bag man. You see them all the time. I've known these guys. But it's one of those films that might have worked better with people you'd never heard of. It wouldn't have gotten a big weekend, but it would have played.

Q: It's the downside of casting stars. Fight Club never escaped the focus on its cast.

A: I don't know. I went to see Fight Club, and I thought it was really funny. For the first hour or so. Then I just wanted to get out of the theater.

Q: It suddenly takes its message so seriously. And then comes Edward Norton's brutal pummeling of Jared Leto.

A: That was their ice cream truck scene.

Q: Since you seek out risky roles, why, after years of resisting, did you star in a fourth Lethal Weapon, in which Riggs, the once-suicidal cop, is getting married, having kids and getting the crap kicked out of him by Jet Li?

A: It is a bit like episodic TV, isn't it?

Q: So, were you thinking, "I know people want it, I'll give them what they want"?

A: You're thinking of seeing if you can make it fly the fourth time. And I think we might have just caught the cliff by our fingernails. Just. I certainly wouldn't try it again.

Q: Let's go back over some of your earlier choices. Did Mad Max, one of your first films, seem extraordinary to you when you chose it?

A: Oh God, no way. I was straight out of drama school, I didn't know what to think. I had virtually no experience with a real film. I'd been involved with some half-assed fly-by-night organizations that had turned out some pretty bad, quasi-- I don't know what it was, horrible stuff. Mad Max was made on a shoe-string, but had the feel of an independent film you might see now.

Q: The sequel, The Road Warrior, was a dramatic improvement.

A: That one is really timeless. Very simple and powerful. All these rip-offs of it don't have the simplicity.

Q: It's still being ripped off.

A: Yes, there was the one on the water. The Road Warrior, though, was real simple and rough.

Q: The film you made after The Road Warrior, Peter Weir's Gallipoli, holds up remarkably well.

A: I liked that movie. I was so fortunate early on to be able to work with guys like [Mad Max and The Road Warrior director] George Miller and Peter Weir. They were 10 or 12 years older than me and had more practice in filmmaking than I did. I was into stagecraft at the time. My expulsion from the university-- well, it was more like an honorable discharge--coincided with what was happening in the film community at that time in Australia. I was there at the right time.

Q: Why did Weir pick you?

A: I'd auditioned for an earlier film and he told me right up front, "I'm not going to cast you for this part. You're not old enough. But thanks for coming in, I just wanted to meet you." He told me he wanted me for Gallipoli a couple years later because I wasn't the archetypal Australian. He had Mark Lee, the angelic-looking, ideal Australian kid, and he wanted something of a modern sensibility. He thought the audience needed someone to relate to of their own time. That's really smart. It makes perfect sense to me now. Of course, I didn't understand it then.

Q: What was Weir's strength as a director?

A: He had a very strong vision, knew exactly what he wanted to say. And he had an extraordinary way of communicating. It was romantic, bordering on spiritual. The atmosphere he created, the way he'd shoot something, the way he edited it, his way of looking at stuff was unique and interesting. And he so loves what he's doing. Gallipoli was amazing for what he managed to do with no money. It helped a reemergence of the film industry in Australia. It was a great indigenous story that presented itself to the world, saying, This is a real motion picture and we're not apologizing for anything just because we come from a place that's not known for motion pictures. George did the same thing.

Q: How do you feel about your other film with Weir, The Year of Living Dangerously?

A: What I loved about that film was the atmosphere that Weir evoked, and he did it very simply. I didn't necessarily see my role as a great challenge. My character was, like the film suggests, a puppet. And I went with that. It wasn't some star thing, even though they advertised it that way.

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