When talk of a sequel to Gareth Edwards’ Monsters emerged, there were many who were sceptical. Edwards’ directorial debut had been made on a shoestring budget and become a moderate financial success, so they assumed Monsters: Dark Continent would simply be trying to cash in on that success. Fortunately, that couldn’t be further from the truth.
In lesser hands, I think the film certainly could have fallen foul of a more typical sequel trend. But under Tom Green’s direction, a great script he co-wrote with Jay Basu, and anchored by stellar leading performances from Sam Keeley and Johnny Harris, Monsters: Dark Continent is a fantastic movie that continues the approach Edwards took on his film.
More than anything, Dark Continent is a spiritual sequel, of sorts. Green brought the same kind of indie filmmaking ethos to the table that Edwards did. This is a film made on a very, very low budget, that manages to do a lot with a very small amount of money, a very small crew, and a lot of passion and commitment from everyone involved.
I saw the film at the BFI London Film Festival last year – you can read our review here – and absolutely loved it. But unfortunately, Dark Continent didn’t get the same kind of reception among wide audiences as Monsters, which is a huge shame. I think that’s at least partly down to the marketing of the film, which pitched it as a very much action-heavy, firing-on-all-cylinders affair. Those elements are in the film, yes, but like Edwards’, it’s a film that lives in the smaller moments.
We had a chance to talk to Green recently about the film, his and the cast’s processes during production, directing Channel 4’s Misfits, and about his hopes that Dark Continent will find an audience (the one that it deserves) now that it’s coming out on DVD.
When we first started hearing about the sequel, there was talk of a teacher going in search of his long-lost brother. Then we heard about a rogue soldier element being part of the plot. How did the script develop? And at what point did you come on board?
TOM GREEN: I think that’s a tricky thing sometimes, when little bits get leaked out on the Internet. There’s obviously a development process, and it can be a little bit misleading. I came on board several years ago now. Basically, the producers came to me and said, ‘We’ve got a little amount of money again, and we’d like to do something similar to Gareth’s. Would you like to go and do something similar? It’s got to be written quick and shot quickly. Are you up for going and doing that?’
I’d seen the first film, obviously, and I really thought it was an incredibly innovative film. One of the most innovative films I’ve seen for a long time. And I loved everything it stood for. So I just thought long and hard about whether I thought that I could make something in my own way and on my own terms, that felt that it stood alone completely, but that was respectful and presented the same principles of Gareth’s filmmaking. And I felt that I could. And so they said, ‘Look, it needs to have some monsters in it. And we’d like it to fit a little more squarely in genre. But other than that, go off and take the same approach as Gareth’s.’ And so that’s what we did.
Myself and Jay Basu developed the script quite quickly, really. We went off and shot the film in about four and a half weeks. We had a script, but there was a lot of improvisation, and a lot of free-form and more reportage style filmmaking. I just really wanted to make a film that completely stood alone, but that, as I say, has the same ethos as Gareth’s film. I think, if anything, our little lo-fi brand or franchise, or the precept of Monsters, it means that, really. It means supporting a young filmmaker to go off and try and make a really ambitious film in an innovative way.
You’d worked with Sam Keeley on Misfits before.
GREEN: Yeah, on the second series of Misfits, he came and played Robbie Sheehan’s brother. We found him in Ireland. He’d done something like a short film before, but he was really a musician at that point. We brought him over and I just thought he was fantastic immediately, really. He’s got this raw depth of emotion in him, Sam, and he can seemingly keep drawing from the well of that, really. He’s got a very relatable and human face, and he’s a lovely guy. And that comes out of him. I think he was quite surprised, to be honest, by the time he saw himself in the film, when he saw it for the first time. How much he’d lost himself in the part, and how method he’d become. He didn’t really recognise himself in any way, really. It was just purely a character. I know what he means, because he actually looks like a very tortured individual by the end of the film. They really, really went there, the actors. They were all in method for the whole shoot. I think that Sam’s got an amazing future ahead of him. He’s got a great depth of emotion and a real amazing physicality.
Was the idea for everyone to be method yours and something you’d talked about with the actors in advance?
GREEN: When I cast Johnny Harris to play Frater, I think it came naturally out of that. Johnny’s for me one of the finest actors working in the British film industry, and it was amazing to me that he’d never been given a lead role. Johnny didn’t do anything other than absolute commitment. He decided to go into method for the shoot, and he stayed in character and accent all the way through. Once I was working with an actor like Johnny, who gives you so much and his process is so extraordinary and powerful, it kind of ends up shaping your process.
In a film like this, where it was quite experimental and quite free-form, it became about embracing Johnny as an actor and working him in that way, and allowing him to shape the drama through his character. It is ultimately quite a character study, the film. Of both Sam and Johnny’s characters. That naturally bled into the process and into the other actors. All actors have different processes. But I think Johnny being the leader in the film and the older actor on set, I think it naturally created a dynamic where the other actors fed from his energy. And it created quite a method scenario. Myself, I was always trying to create an atmosphere and a scenario where it felt as truthful and believable for the actors as possible. We were shooting the film in Jordan in the Middle East, and we were often 20, 25km from the Iraqi border. We were up in Black Hawk helicopters, and we were walking through Palestinian refugee towns, and working with real Bedouin tribesmen and women. Usually, if you’re in a studio and surrounded by green screen for a monster movie, it’s harder to create that visual quality. So I think the environment and the commitment of the actors made for a very intense shoot, and hopefully a very authentic process.
Definitely. Like the original, you had some locals around you that were in the film as well. How did that work in practice, in terms of finding people to cast?
GREEN: The start of the film, we were working with real troops as well. Undercover officers between tours of Afghanistan. We cast a little kid who’d done two tours of Iraq who was from Detroit. We had two US marines on set a lot of the time, blocked out all the action sequences with them. The medical processes. Things like that, the evac process. Trying to get that right, whilst at the same time trying to create drama and narrative out of that.
The idea of the film, why the film was unique, the original, was to try and have a reportage style quality to the film with the scientific element, and have it feel very authentic in terms of the military angle. And then Jordan opened its doors to us, and we managed to get into their military bases and a very short time up in a Black Hawk helicopter. I think putting the guys in that situation helped the actors a lot. But in terms of the locals, we were just working very, very closely with the local people. They were incredibly generous to us, and incredibly kind, the Jordanian people. We went into some extraordinary situations. I was lucky enough to go to a Palestinian refugee town and patrol there, as if it were really happening. It was a bit of a riot, almost. Kids were surrounding the troops. We just kept shooting and kept going, and it was exhilarating filmmaking, really. For me, it was blurring the line of documentary and fiction at that point. But that would be just one day. So I think the film, through all the sum of its parts in that way. Then the next day we might be doing something that was a little more structured, in terms of a visual effects sequence.
I suppose one of the more memorable moments for me, and the cast and crew, was working with the Bedouin tribes in the southern deserts of Jordan. Going into that community and placing the actors within that community, and just allowing them to live with them for a couple of days. Myself and the cinematographer [Christopher Ross] shooting in a documentary style way. Trying to find, obviously the scene there represented a moment of humanity and tranquillity in the film, and the idea of coexistence. And that these ancient people have been living in that land, embracing the creatures rather than fighting them. Within that, that was what the scene was representative of narratively. But we were sort of allowing the actors and them to find sequences. And we were trying to find form and scenes within that, in a very organic way. Amazing experience, really, in terms of how we worked with them.
So some of the film you found while shooting, as well as having a script in place.
GREEN: That’s right, yeah. We took a script, but sequences like that, we couldn’t really write. It was about what the scene was representative of, and the moments perhaps we wanted to hit, in terms of the characters. Where they were at at that point of the story. But then, as I say, placing them within a community and eating with them and hanging out with them. Moments arose that I went with, and we worked with the local people in a very natural way. Not talking about science fiction and creatures. Just on a human level. We were finding, and along with an actor like Johnny, who gives you all these other ideas. A lot of other ideas coming even leading up into ‘Action’ almost, because he’s sort of in character the whole time, that you are able to find new ideas. Some of the writing on the set was definitely happening.
Because it looks, the trailer and everything, is misleading. I think the misconception about the film is that it’s a cynical shoot-’em-up movie off the first one. It’s not. It’s deeply nothing to do with that. It’s not a cynical film, it’s a film that is exactly about the same principles as Gareth’s film. It was really about the sort of integrity of that filmmaking.
It was a bit of a shame how the marketing pitched the film. Because the advertising focused a lot on that war and shoot-’em-up aspect, like you say. Presumably you didn’t have much of an input on that?
GREEN: Not too much, no. I think I can understand why the trailer was cut how it was cut. It looks exciting, it looks cool. It’s great moments, it’s jam-packed full of visuals, and all the exciting moments of the film. I think that’s what ultimately trailers usually do. And I think there’s a lot of that in the film, and I think people who want some of those elements in the film will get that.
But I think, on the negative side of that, it’s not representative of the film as a whole. I think it is a more poetic film, and it is a more experimental film. It is more about the ideas that people would associate with Gareth’s film. I think because it’s more of an obvious genre film, in that it’s a war film; if you’re doing a war film, there are obviously shoot-out sequences, or gung-ho elements. But that was about the exploration of what’s truthful there. In terms of the nature of the film there, all of our research, all of the first-hand interviews I did with troops, that’s what came out. That’s what they did, that’s what they do. They get messed up the night before they go, they go to war, and they go with this certain attitude. Not always, not across the board. But through my research, and through the interviews I did with troops, there were certain truths that seemed to present themselves. I think because it’s a war film, it’s naturally going to have more shoot-’em-up elements. But it’s really not that film. I think it’s much more hopefully elegant and poetic, that explores human psychology. And has some very beautiful sequences, as well as moments of action and genre. That was the intention. That was the film we were trying to create.
You really succeeded on that. Going back a bit, the kind of filmmaking you’re talking about where you have a script but you find some of it on the shoot, is that something you want to do again? Or would you prefer to do something with more of a tight script?
GREEN: The ability and immediacy is brilliant. Being alive on your shoot, and saying, ‘Well actually, we had this plan, but the actor’s come up with a better idea today.’ Unless it means your visual effects sequence or something hugely complicated. Sometimes it’s just not possible due to technical process. But I think in the sense of being alive and being flexible when you can, if it doesn’t destroy your shoot, then yeah, absolutely. But this was a very unique, one-off opportunity. And I don’t know if I’ll ever make a film like this again. I’m sure Gareth’s process has changed. From making that film to Godzilla to Star Wars. You have to adapt to the type of film you’re making. That’s again a misconception of this film. It was made in the same budget range as Gareth’s. We had no more money, really. We had a tiny bit more, but not really. We faced the same challenges, and we just tried to make it look like it cost $20m. It cost nothing. Like zero-budget filmmaking. No one got financially rewarded for making this film. It’s really all about the collaboration and the commitment of the filmmakers and the actors.
There was a necessity to that. It was the spirit of it, going into a country that was amazingly warm and generous to us. But at the same time was very difficult and challenging. We had a couple of minibuses and one handheld camera. That’s the misconception here, that we were making some big action movie. We weren’t. I had more resources on my short films, at times. So that was why it was really embracing the kind of chaos in a little bit, and finding form, and improvising, and working with amazing actors, and local people. And trying to come up with this. It’s a kind of odyssey, the film. All the parts and experiences we had. I think that’s what’s exciting and unique about it. Perhaps what’s been misrepresented, the film’s not been contextualised in the right way. Certainly, perhaps, in some of its marketing. That’s really what the film stands for.
Do you know what you’re working on next? Have you got something lined up?
GREEN: Nothing to announce today. Some great stuff. I’ve been back and forth to America a little bit, and that’s exciting. I’m hopefully going to be able to announce something in the near future. Films sometimes happen when they happen. But it would be nice when I can announce something. Really exciting opportunities ahead. The film industry has been really, I think, impressed by what was achieved. Again, for the resource, and hopefully the ambition in the filmmaking.
It came out incredibly well. I was there for the premiere in London last year, and was just blown away by it all.
GREEN: It was a big screen, wasn’t it? Maybe I think some people were feeling a bit seasick. It was, like, the biggest screen I’ve ever seen in my life. The Empire there. Amazing. It was an amazing night. The film was made for a big cinema screen. But maybe it will be discovered for audiences on DVD, and seen in the right way.
I really hope so.
GREEN: I’m really pleased that you liked it, and that you see it in the right way, hopefully.
On a completely different topic, just before we wrap up, I was wondering if you could talk a little about Misfits. You directed Episodes 1, 2, and 4 on Season 1, and then 1, 2, and 3 on Season 2. Was there a reason you didn’t come back for Season 3?
GREEN: No major reason. It was an amazing time of my life and a show to make. It required innovation and constantly creating solutions and creative ideas for it to feel energetic and the show it was. I think I’d just done two years of it and I felt like I needed a different challenge. And I felt like the show needed probably a new spurt of energy to come up with a load more new ideas to keep it fresh and keep it going forward.
In some ways, I maybe wish I had done the third series, because I think it was hard to come across writing, it was that great. Once we’d established that show, it was such brilliant fun to make. But, you know, Robbie Sheehan was leaving, and the producer was leaving, and the cinematographer, who I’ve done everything with.
It just felt like the right time.
GREEN: There’s a moment in time, and it was time for it to be re-energised. That was all it was about, really. But it was a brilliant show to work on. Especially straight out of film school.
You did an amazing job on it.
GREEN: It will always be a special show to me. It was just such a fortunate confluence of things. We found this brilliant cast, and Howard’s scripts were really funny and well written. Channel 4 gave me all their support. And I was able to go for it, really, and create it. I took a lot of risks on the show, and was supported for doing so. I think it was quite a unique opportunity, Misfits. Always be special.
One last question. You’ve worked on quite a bit of TV at this point. Is there anything in particular you’re watching at the moment?
GREEN: I’ve been watching the second series of True Detective a bit, which is interesting. I need to catch up with some of my shows. But I think it’s a really exciting time for television. I think we’re seeing all the filmmakers going there in a way you wouldn’t have twenty years ago. It’s always been more of a writer’s medium, I think, TV. But I think, increasingly it’s a filmmaker-driven medium, as well. I think audiences are responding to that. It’s a really exciting time. I think the writing is amazing at the moment, and the way you can present your narrative over much longer forms, is really exciting to a storyteller. I would love to go back and do some.
Brilliant. I’ll be tuning in to whatever you’re doing.
GREEN: I appreciate your positivity. I hope the film that may have been a little misrepresented, can maybe find an audience on DVD. That would be great.
Yeah, I hope it finds the audience it deserves.
Monsters: Dark Continent is out on DVD and Blu-ray this Monday, August 31st. There’s also a double pack DVD including Gareth Edwards’ original film, and HMV has an exclusive Blu-ray steelbook. So you’ve got plenty of choices. I highly recommend seeking the film out when it hits digital and physical shelves on Monday.
The post Monsters: Dark Continent Interview – Director Tom Green Talks Shooting in Jordan, Continuing Gareth Edwards’ Legacy & Finding an Audience on DVD appeared first on Final Reel.