Film Review
Issue 581, May 1999
Wanted! Dead or Alive
Director Jake Scott describes his $15 million debut feature
Plunkett and Macleane as an 'anarchic buddy movie about two
highwaymen". He's assembled an enticing cast top-lined by Robert
Carlyle, Jonny Lee Miller and Liv Tyler and, despite the grimy
locations, the film has a succulent visual style that seems kind of
familiar. Maybe it's in the blood, since Jake is the son of gloss-
meister Ridley Scott and nephew of the equally eye-pleasing Tony.
"Because nepotism is so rife in the film industry I lived in
terror that my father or uncle would stride on set and there'd be
reports that they secretly 'made' my film," laughs the 33-year-old
man, a man who isn't one to play his cards close to his chest.
"The one time my father did come on set everybody was terrified
because he is a real hard-work ethic Northerner and we didn't want
to be caught napping by him!"
Scott Jr's first contribution to the film industry came 23 years
ago, wearing a badly designed helmet in his father's sci-fi classic
Alien. After art school he plied his way through the
industry as a general dogsbody, his first proper directorial job
being a commercial for Blaupunkt. He later made a name for himself
directing music videos, picking up a pair of MTV awards for his work
on REM's traffic-themed Everybody Hurts. So how did he
choose the all-important first feature?
"I became involved in Plunkett and Macleane when the first
version of the script was circulating," he says. " I was looking
specifically for a highway project and was developing one that
probably would have ended up as a $1m film shot on Wimbledon Common.
When I read the original screenplay by Selwyn Roberts it was a
'zounds!' and could have been a feature-length Blackadder.
But it was a damned good story and I thought 'yes!'"
Set in the middle of the 18th Century and based on real-life
characters, it's the story of two notorious highwaymen - the rough
Plunkett (Carlyle), who the actor describes as a "bag of scum" but
with the brains and the know-how to be pretty good at his chosen
profession, and the smooth Macleane (Miller), a "gambling,
philandering drinker", who has the social connections to make the
rich pickings readily available. Together this unlikely couple
infiltrate wealthy society, holding up the coaches of the
aristocracy and ripping them off at their banquets or in their beds.
Known as The Gentleman Highwayman, Macleane also steals the heart of
the niece of one of their victims, the lip-smacking lovely Lady
Rebecca Gibson (Tyler).
Film Review met Carlyle and Miller against the appropriate
setting of London's Amourers' Hall, surrounded by authentic
historical weapons and amour.
"I wanted to do this film because it was subversive," says Robert
Carlyle in his broad brogue. 2 The period genre tends to be quite
clinical and tends to come from a particular class point of view,
so this was an opportunity to take that and subvert it in some way.
Jake contacted me about 25 years ago! It feels like a long
time ago . . . no, actually we first met a year before we started
filming!
"Plunkett is a driven character, driven basically just by money,"
he adds. "He wants to make enough money so he can escape to
America, away from the grime and the poverty. It's a very different
piece for both Jonny and me because the analogy - if you read this
film - is like it's a moving train that you jump on and you jump off
at the end. There's not a lot of time for very deep
character study. Although it's not all just running around and
jumping on horses. We got quite a lot of chances to do some
acting!"
For Jonny Lee Miller one of the main attractions was working again
with Trainspotting co-star Carlyle, who was the psychotic Begbie
to his Connery-fixated Sick Boy.
"I met Jake a long time ago too and when I herd that Bobby was
already attached I wanted to do it! But I had to audition a million
times! I got lucky. It fitted me to be Macleane," he laughs.
"He's a real selfish guy who just wants to have a good time and ends
up finding a bit of the hero inside himself.
"We had a real ball making this film although I must say the
hanging scene was not great to do. It was the film's nightmare
scene. Shot over four days, in a bean field full of extras, we did
it in November and it was bloody damned cold. It was all done with
a pick-up truck that drove away and stopped in time. There I was,
25 feet up in the air, pretending to choke. That's all I could
think of: 'I am pretending to choke'. Then I dropped to the ground
in a cloud of smoke which meant you couldn't see anything, couldn't
see whether I was dead of alive. I wasn't sure myself which I was."
So, for Miller, what were the benefits of having previously shared
screen time with Carlyle?
"It was really good that Bobby and I had worked together before
because it cuts that 'getting to know you' stuff. You can save a
lot of time and also, for Jake, it being his first feature film, we
could help him because we worked with each other easily. Bobby had
to slap me about quite a lot which could easily have been difficult
with somebody you don't know."
"You have to build up trust," adds Carlyle, grinning like a demon.
"Trust is the main thing about actors anywhere in the world. You
have to trust each other when you're working close together and we
certainly do."
Miller agrees. "Trainspotting was without a doubt the best
experience I've had making a film, especially being an Englishman,
as I am, and not feeling like an outsider around all those Scots.
That says a lot!"
Robert Carlyle came late to acting. Now 36 (and with an OBE!) he
was already 28 when, as a talented bit-part actor from the Royal
Scottish Academy of Music and Drama, he was cast by Ken Loach in
Riff Raff, a comedy about a Scots labourer seeking work on a
London building site. Having worked as a painter (his father's
chosen profession), the role must have come as a gift from the gods.
His appearance in Loach's film hit the spot, Carlyle got to go to
the Cannes Film Festival and the rest followed fast - TV shows such
as The Bill, the unforgettable 'Hillsborough' episode of
ITV's Cracker, the BBC TV series Hamish MacBeth and
movies like Trainspotting, Carla's Song and, of course,
the pants-dropping phenomenon The Full Monty, about which
he is now pretty sick of talking.
Yes, taking his clothes off at the end of the film was a
terrifying experience, and no, he doesn't want to talk about how
he - or his wife Anastasia - feel about him being treated like a sex
symbol.
"I don't wish to go around talking about my private life. I still
live a couple of miles away from where I was born in Glasgow. I
don't want my life to change and I think it only changes if you
want it to. Perhaps things are going to happen in Jonny's life and
in my life, but I can't see that happening right now. But as Sean
Connery once said: 'Never say never'."
Jonny Lee Miller, in contrast, comes from a theatrical family.
His grandfather on his mother's side was the late Bernard Lee who
made over 100 movies (his most famous role was as the original M in
the Bond movies), his great-grandfather was a variety performer and
his parents are in film production.
Born in Kingston, London, he says his childhood was spent either
in TV studios or theatres. He's had an agent since he was a kid and
started acting at nine "in BBC dramas with parts for nine-year-olds
".
At 17 he left school to act full time. His highly varied CV
includes theatre (Beautiful Thing, Entertaining Mr Sloane
, Our Town) and TV work (Rough Justice, Prime
Suspect III, Bad Company), while films he has made -
besides the ubiquitous Trainspotting - include the cyberpunk
thriller Hackers (where he met his now-estranged wife
Angelina Jolie), Regeneration and Julie Christie's object of
desire in Afterglow.
He is also a part of a production company called Natural Nylon
with fellow actors that include hot British talents Jude Law, Sadie
Frost and Ewan McGregor, which is currently in pre-production on a
film about the notorious Hellfire Caves.
On reflection, Scott admits that he may have bitten off more than
he could chew, picking a historical movie as his first.
"Period films are a very involved process and it was all more than
a little bit awesome for me. But we really prepped it well and
rehearsed a lot. And with Gary Oldman as executive producer, I had
to have his okay on certain things, which was good for me. Ten
years ago he and Tim Roth were interested in doing the film and he
took a very active interest in the project."
From the start, Scott actually had Carlyle and Miller in mind as
the leads for his movie.
"I went up to Scotland to have tea with Bobby while he was
shooting Hamish MacBeth. We got along fine and that was it
really. I later met Jonny in the States and he seemed a perfect
match. And Liv I cast after thinking of various English actresses,
because of her modernity and her look that goes against the English
Rose. She is a classic beauty but an odd one. Which suits her
leading men."
Liv Tyler received much more attention following her photogenic
appearance in Bernardo Bertolucci's Stealing Beauty and went
on to star in That Thing You Do! and Inventing the Abbotts
. She was last seen as Bruce Willis's daughter in the mother of
all disaster movies, Armageddon
The actress found she had something in common with the upper class
Lady Rebecca.
"I could really relate to her being in this rut, not wanting to go
along with everything that was expected of her," says Tyler. "She
ends up with no family except this horrible uncle, Lord Gibson. She
wants the freedom to do things that please her and is prepared to
fight for it. Her ray of light comes when she is grabbed by this
robbery and instead of being scared and terrified, she is completely
taken and excited by it. It really changes her life because she
sees it as an escape."
As is the current trend amongst American actresses, Tyler had to
affect an English accent.
"I acquired my English accent for her from dialogue coach, Barbara
Berkery, working on it for about a month beforehand and every day
during the shoot. I was never really conscious of my voice of how
I speak and had to train my tongue to move differently and drop my
jaw."
Of her 'leading men' the lovely Tyler reveals, "Both Jonny and
Bobby were great. I didn't have as many scenes with Bobby as I did
with Jonny but we all spent a lot of time together. I admit I had
to listen very carefully to what Bobby was saying but I understood
him most of the time!"
So what was Tyler's lasting memory of working on her first British
movie?
"Shooting on location in Prague was amazing," she replies, "and it
was such a nice part of making this film. Between takes we'd all
be in one trailer, laughing and joking. And all the other cast, as
well. Michael Gambon [her screen father] was absolutely brilliant
and really funny too. I'm not sure I'd be attracted to dangerous
types like Macleane or Plunkett I real life, but they certainly are
attractive characters to work with.
Plunkett and Macleane opens on April 2 and is distributed
by Polygram.
Review of Plunkett and Macleane from Film Review
Back to Articles Main Page
Back to Jonny Main Page
Home
