CineFOOLS: How'd you become involved with the film?

Ben Mendelsohn: I knew David, the director, for years and he had been developing this, I think this was like seven years ago...something like that. It was a long time ago , a really long time ago now. He had been working up this script and he gave it to me to have a look at. At that stage it wasn't... it didn't have quite the tight shape, in fact even from when we shot it to the final product it still got... there's things that were left out that we shot etc. etc.

CF: Was Pope your original character when he sent you the script?

BM: Yeah he always was keen for me to look at that.

James Frecheville: I found out about the open call through a teacher at high school one afternoon. I always wonder what would happen if I didn't go to class that day for some reason. So I did the open call and then had a bunch of call backs and found out I got the part on New Years Eve and went nuts.

BM: Wow! Was it New Years Eve? Cause when did we start shooting? Was it March?

JF: February 16th, what happened was I got a call around the 7th to the 17th and they said "it's down to you and one other boy we're just waiting on..."

BM: Oh that's the worst!

JF: ...and I was just like far out! They were like "expect an answer within the next week."

CF: So you spent Christmas with that?

JF: No this was just before Christmas and everyday I was waiting by the phone and it was painful. I would get phone calls at the end of the day and I could see the caller I.D. and I'd say "Hello?" and they'd say "Oh sorry James. No answers been made yet but we'll let you know once we have one." I literally had that phone call for like six or seven days straight. It got to the point where I was not enjoying it, I didn't care if I got it. I just wanted to know.

BM: It's like that though. You get down to that final thing and it's worse than being told "Oh, we've moved on." That's where it's punishing, you poor bastard.

JF: It was close to Christmas and I got call and they said "Hey, no decisions been made yet" they were waiting on an answer back from the States I think and they said "the Yankee industry shuts down till the 5th of Januaray so you'll know after then." I was just like "Thank f*cking Christ. I get my Christmas. I'll start stressing on the 4th." I was happy and then I completely put it out of my head and had a really great Christmas and New Years Eve I was in the process of moving out of this terrible house that this Real Estate agency got us and I got a call from Kirsty and I was like "Hey, how are you doing?" She says "James, it's Kirsty" I said "I know, caller I.D." She goes "Yeah good, um James...I'm about to change your life." I was like "Go on. I'm intrigued."

CF: Playing it cool.

JF: No I wasn't playing it cool I was just like "go on, I'm intrigued." She said "Well you've got the part, so we'll be in touch in the next couple of days. Congratulations." I just said "Thanks. OK see you Kirsty." I hung up the phone and screamed. On the phone I was so zen like and then I hung up and just went wild. Yeah that was about 3 o'clock in the afternoon and a whole bunch of our family friends were down so Mum was like "Don't tell anyone and we'll break it to them later. Have an excuse to crack out the champers."

CF: Out of curiosity how does it all come about after that? Did you then come in and meet the cast?

JF: I'd read the script and I had a copy of the script at that point so I read it maybe once or twice more and then I think there was a three to four week period of doing table work where I'd either sit down with David and various other actors and I, although I never did it with Ben, and we'd work out the beats of the scene. There's a guy called Greg Saunders, an actor, who's the drama tutor so he workshopped with me.

BM: Oh, Greg did it?

JF: A little bit. So we had some good character building stuff and then I got to work.

CF: How'd it go turning up with this cast?

JF: I knew it was going to be interesting but at the same time I didn't want to...actually I suppose I did it qute a lot but I didn't want to... I thought if I approach it on the same level, I'm there to work and thought it'd be better...

BM: He equiped himself really really well. He wasn't given an easy in by any chance. The reason that I didn't do anything with him was just to create space really. So that hopefully we might be able to have that sense of uneasiness. To get a bit of that. James handled imself beautifully and it was a very...it could get very fuelled. Basically we tried to set the template early between all of us brothers. We set something up and went with that and James has to come into that anyway. So you just try to do stuff that will help you out rather than hurt you.

JF: The title reflected the character, I felt. With no experience on a film set it's a baptism by fire and it was for me as an actor on a film set and the character with the cirumstance that he was put into.

CF: So it actually helped your character?

JF: Yeah.

BM: James is able to go with stuff really well too. He had all that, he's a natural. You just run across that sometimes.

BM: Yeah I drew inspiration from a lot of places. But f*ck all that. Cause where I found, how we did it, what we did. I mean David and I did our work together, we did enough work to get us to where we got and I understand why particularly with very strong kinds of characters it be interesting to know where they come from but who gives a f*ck? It's about what you feel when you're watching, I know what I did, he knows what he did (pointing to James) and I think there's a tendency to get into this creation olympics as though that's the point but it's not. I go to a restaurant I don't give a f*ck what the cook does all I want is a good meal and I think that this kind of stuff it's helped augment this kind of idea about what actors are and what they do but to tell you the truth most actors are pulling their f*cking c*ck about it. I know what actors do to get to work as well as anyone so I'm really glad that Pope's hit the screen in a way that people feel and they feel uncomfortable about it. I see them after the screenings and the various reactions and that's really good cause that's what he's supposed to do, he's supposed to take it and make it horrible for him, you guys have obviously seen it but we won't flag all of this but we're going there and there and there and that's where we're going to end up. Now you want to make sure that the end you can actually go "Ohhhh!" you want to get that, in order to get that you have to hit the stuff and the stuff that goes on is full on. There's no doubt about it. I've said this once in another thing...I don't think this is a film for young men, young males. I don't think it's a film for not mature males because of the intensity of the stuff, and you know what I'm talking about. Because it's the intense kind of violence and it's not about the explosiveness of the violence, it's about the horror of the violence and where is it going to come from and what's going to happen and what we've been through. So for that reason I think that there are people that are too young for this film and they should be approached with that. Whatever that's my rave.

CF: Have you guys seen the final cut of the film?

BM: No I haven't, he has. (Pointing to James Frecheville)

CF: Do you have a favourite moment in the film.

JF: Yeah...Somebody asked me if I channeled anything in my performance and I didn't except for one scene. which was at the very start of the film when my character is watching deal or no deal on the television. All I was thinking about when I was doing that was the observation when I've been a babysitter is when little kid sits down in a room with the TV here and there's something, like a mother over here talking. The mothers talking and the kids jaw's dropped (Frecheville re-enacts the first scene of the film exactly like he looked) watching The Wiggles and so I kept looking back and kept slowly reeling it back every time. I mean that scene read really well, at least I liked how it turned out and I suppose there's a whole bunch of other stuff but I remember people coming up to me last night at the after party saying "It's so nice to see your teeth."

CF: How has all this, Animal Kingdom winning Sundance, how's this all effecting yourself?

JF: I hope it's not. It could easily get to my head but I've had people from the outset say "Don't buy into the bullsh*t. Don't believe the hype."

BM: Look James is a good bloke and he's got a bunch of good stuff. Look there's always a transformation period that a person goes through and that's inevitable, that always happens because there's a lot of attention on you, where you're used to just walking around and it's about something and the something that it's about is actually something that happened a year ago and you're on to other stuff in your life. So it's always a bit, there's always an adjustment period. But it doesn't happen in a way that you could... I think from the inside, and I've seen it happen to a lot of people, it's not so much this kind of big head thing that goes on. What it is is people just go "What the f*ck's going on?" and try and get away from it a little bit or try and figure it out and that's generally what goes on.

BM: It was good! It was fun, I've never been to Sundance, you've never been to Sundance (points to Frecheville) so we're on a par there and we were staying in the same place as Jackie (Weaver) and the rest of them were staying at this other place. We had a good time and it was really good to be with something that was so incredibly strong, no OK there's Australians that are going to get the references but the Americans they're not. They're coming at it from completely outside, they might have their own filmic references or cultural references but they don't have ours so to have them just go off was great and we've sold it everywhere, sold it everywhere. Every one wants a bit of it so it's pretty good.

CF: It is! It's got to make you pretty proud?

BM: Yeah...it's pretty good. It's pretty bloody brilliant.

CF: This year has been a pretty big year for Australian film, in terms of the stuff that's been released before it's been dark but it's almost like this year, actually probably The Square was the first film that hit me, they have been approached the way Hollywood would approach a film as opposed to the way the Australian film industry would approach a film and Animal Kingdom fits into that as well.

BM: Do you see as a kind of Michael Mann-esque type of movie? When you guys are doing your thing and saying this kind of fits in with that where do you see it?

CF: When I was reviewing, I'm not saying David (Michod) has come in and copied but it's more like there's parts of Clint Eastwood because he lets the actors take the scene...

BM: ...very interesting...

CF: ...It's very simple.

BM: Yeah, very simple, static sort of stately framed performances going on.

CF: Obviously there's that Coen-esque feel, I think the look of the film is very Coen-esque in the cinematography. I hate saying things are "esque."

BM: No, no, no guys. It's alright we're all allowed to be film nerds. That's why we're her because we're all in it. So it's all good.

CF: And I there was almost a Scorses like elemnt to the film as well...

BM: What do you attribute that to? Is that about movement or is that about a character thing or is that about music? What do you put the Scorsese thing down to?

CF: I think it's even though they were rough people, you still became attached to them.

BM: So that's what you're talking about, the ability to attach emotion to them. That's incredibly important with this, less rich palettes with have a difficult time with that. In other words your more popular media has a difficult time with understand what the purpose of that is and that's again why I think for younger males it's not necessarily the right for them, it's a bit too tough but having said that that's really good that you guys got all those templates.

CF: That's the thing, it's not necessarily a violent film, because there's not much physical, there's obviously some bits here and there, but it's not really like punch ups...

BM: It's not visceral. You are drowning in violence, that's an incredibly different thing and my point about this is real people that do real bad things they don't need to act tough. They do not need to pretend that they're tough that's the point, that's why they are the way they are. They do not need to pretend they can do it. Cause they're doing it. Gentlemen they're going to give us the wind up are there any last questions?

CF: You're a part of The Killer Elite can you tell us a bit about that?

BM: I can tell you very briefly about it essentially it's a Jason Statham film, wiht Clive Owen, Robert De Niro, Dominic Purcell, Aden Young, myself and a slew of other actors over here. It's a story set in the 80's and it's about someone trying to hunt down a group of really full on killers. Like I mean professional soldier types.

CF: Can you tell us whether you'll be on the professional or the killer side?

BM: (Pauses to consider)...well I can tell you this I'm practicing my Scottish accent is what I can tell you.

CF: When does that start shooting?

BM: Well we've started, I actually last ngiht when we were doing the Premiere I went and recorded a Scottish guy to try and get the better sound and stuff while that was going on and then came back to the after party, so we're getting real close. Got to keep working on it.

CF: And yourself James where to from here?

JF: I've got no idea! I've got nothing lined up, I've been auditioning a lot.

BM: He's got the Americans seriously like that (Mendelsohn makes a gesture of someone preparing to perform fellatio) so he's doing fine. Now guys I think that is it. Pleasure to meet you.

CF: Thank you so much.