Director Werner Herzog, actors Christian Bale and Steve Zaun in RESCUE DAWN(2007).
© MGM
Zaun, Bale Talk RESCUE DAWN
By: Jarrod Sarafin, News EditorDate: Thursday, July 05, 2007
Source: Edward Douglas at Comingsoon
MGM's RESCUE DAWN starring Steve Zaun and Christian Bale has been tracking very well in its reviews so far. Just going by the Online Film Critics Association's reviews alone, there are 11 reviews and the rating is 100% positive. People are already whispering about it being Oscar nomination material for next year's Academy Awards ceremony.
Edward Douglas over at Comingsoon had a chance to sit down and talk about the experience of portraying factual based war P.O.W.S (based on the 1999 documentary Little Dieter Must Fly) with stars Zaun and Bale
ComingSoon.net: Had either of you seen the documentary about Dieter before hearing about this movie?
Christian Bale: Not prior to meeting with Werner. That was the first time I'd heard of Dieter at that point, but I did research him, watching the documentary numerous times, and then I got in touch with his family as well. Actually, I bumped into his son at a supermarket out of nowhere, that was a weird coincidence. Then obviously I talked with Werner, because Werner and him were good friends. Werner was never interested in describing him too much to me. He wanted me to kind of invent it myself and said to just feel free and take license and do whatever I wish with it. I just felt that he was such an interesting character and he had some peculiar mannerisms, which in many ways were too strong for me to actually perform in the movie, because his voice for instance was something as he got older, he really had tried to reduce the audity of his voice, but he had a very strange tone to it when he was younger, this kind of uneasy dorkiness that I saw in him as well, this kind of prankster naivety and childlike nature, but not entirely comfortable in his own skin. Certainly not your typical tough-as-nails wartime hero. I just took bits and pieces from the various resources at my disposal and then just made up the rest of it.
Steve Zahn: I was very familiar with his work, I was actually a big fan of "Little Dieter Needs to Fly," it's one of my favorite documentaries. That was brilliant, partially because he's so cinematic with his work and he directs his documentaries, even Dieter he directed in that, you can tell. It's fascinating and I had so many questions for him on that, and I was so moved and inspired by that story, so when I heard it was going to be a movie I just jumped on it. I had to be a part of it, and I was fully prepared to not get it. That's the kiss of death, being into it, and there's plenty of jobs that I've been that excited about and never got.
CS: Can you each talk about your first meeting with Herzog?
Bale: I met Werner first of all—I wasn't really very familiar with his work. I'd seen in video stores like "Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe" and that sort of stuff. I met with Werner after reading the script which I liked a great deal, met with him and liked him. Some of his first questions were (puts on a German accent) "Would you like to swim in snake-infested waters and eat snake and have leeches all over you?" I thought that was kind of an unusual job interview, and then, it happened pretty quick. He seemed to think I was up for it. I was down in Tierra del Fuego with my wife backpackin' around down there and I got an Email from Werner sayin' "How about playing Dieter?" and that was probably back in late 2002 or something like that. I was working, he was working—because Werner never stops working on different things and documentaries. Werner's also just perverse, like we got offered money by reputable production companies and things like that, and he just had no interest in working with them, so we waited until we'd get somebody that it was going to make the movie very tricky, and said that those were the people he wants to work with. It took until 2005 to get it off the ground.
Zahn: Werner called me and said, "What do you like to eat?" and I thought it meant something other than eating, and I'm like, "F*ck, what do I say? Peanuts?" He said that he just wants to know what I want to eat, so I said, "Steak" and he said, "Come over to my house and I'll cook you a steak" and I stood in Werner Herzog's kitchen as he cooked a steak for me in his skillet. And it was wonderful. We talked about a lot of stuff. I had two dinners with him, and then he said, "I want you to play Duane in the movie", and I was thrilled. That was before they got financing, and I was just waiting for it to get greenlit and get financing and when they did, I was more into this truly than anything I've been involved in as far as artistic reasons.
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