LUCIDMEDIA

Interview with Unthinkable Actor Gil Bellows

Written by Phil Brown Monday, 21 June 2010 10:12

Canadian character actor Gil Bellows has made over 60 film and television appearances in his career, popping up in everything from Don McKellar’s underrated comedy Childstar to the TV movie 24: Redemption. He’s a workman actor who tends to make the most out of limited screen time in interesting projects.

When asked what he looks for in a role, the actor joked, “A huge paycheck,” before clarifying “I just like to find a good script and try to honor and serve the piece. Hopefully if I hit my marks and do my job, I’ll maybe give it an extra dimension and context.”

It’s a mantra that has served the actor well over his 20-year career, leading to an appearance in the intriguing thriller Unthinkable, which presents an uncommonly morally complex examination of torture in addition to suspense-driven entertainment. The movie is one of the best the actor has made yet, but unfortunately it’s going to be damn hard for you to see it.

Unthinkable was shot 15 months ago in Vancouver with an impressive roster of talent. It was directed by the Australian auteur Gregor Jordon who once pulled Heath Ledger away from Aussie soap operas and made the similarly sadly dismissed war satire Buffalo Soldiers.

The cast features the likes of Samuel L. Jackson, Carrie-Anne Moss, and Michael Sheen and yet the movie never got a shot in theaters. The reason? It all comes down to the controversial subject matter. Unthinkable is about a terrorist who has been captured by the United States government, but has 3 bombs in major cities set to explode within 72 hours. Desperate to prevent the loss of American lives, interrogation specialist Samuel L. Jackson is brought in to brutally torture the captured man until the location of the bombs are revealed. Everyone working alongside Jackson is disgusted by his methods, but has no idea of how else to get results.

Admirably the filmmakers never fall on one side or the other and in the end the audience is left confused and disgusted by the use of torture, unsure whether the results obtained were worth the inhumane treatment or not.

The movie plays like a black-hearted antidote to all of the positives uses of torture appearing in action franchises such as 24 in recent years. For that reason alone it’s an important movie to hit screens. Gil Bellows was quick to acknowledge that this instantly attracted him to the project.

“I was excited by it,” says Bellows. “I thought the script pulled no punches and would give a context for great discussions after the movie. When I have the opportunity to do something that’s both entertaining and provocative, I run to it not from it and that’s why I was so disappointed that it didn’t get a theatrical run.”

Sadly, even though the movie is one of the more effective dissections of torture to hit screens since it invaded American culture in the wake of the Iraq war, it’s being unceremoniously dumped on DVD. Apparently audiences aren’t considered intelligent enough to handle this kind of movie anymore.

It’s not as if the people involved with the movie didn’t know what they were getting into.

“The script clearly delineated and identified for everybody involved—including the producers and the distributors—what we were making,” revealed Bellows. “Our job to just honor that and be as definitive about it as we could and I think we accomplished that.”

The movie certainly delivers on the premise, which is why it’s so disappointing that audiences haven’t gotten much of a chance to see it. The decision simply seems to have come because someone at the studio got cold feet at the last minute. Bellows laughed that he only discovered the impressive film would be release straight to DVD a mere ten days before the interview. While many actors might be dismayed that such an exciting project would never reach the number of viewers it deserves, Bellows wisely just shrugs it off.

“It’s the product of people above my pay grade making decisions that I can only wonder about,” sighed Bellows. “Those are the kind of decisions that if I really try to get involved in, I’ll go crazy.”

Sadly, this sort of thing is just part of the movie business these days. With an overcrowded theatrical market place where millions can be spent on advertising begging audiences for attention, sometimes it’s just best to put difficult films straight to DVD where the lucrative home video market can recuperate a budget without drawing much controversy.

It’s something that Bellows admits has happened to him many times before and can’t be taken too seriously. “I have a list of these movies,” said the actor. “It’s a difficult thing. The demands on people’s attention these days is incredible. I mean, right now you’ve got the Stanley Cup finals, the NBA finals, and the World Cup starting in a few days and that’s just sports. Getting people to give up a few hours of their time watch a difficult movie about torture is not easy. I think it’s one of those things where you just have keep your sense of humor about it and keep trying to be involved with interesting projects. You can’t predict what will happen.”

Unfortunately what Gil Bellows has to say is all too true. With so many films and television shows competing for attention from viewers at all times, it’s difficult to convince people to watch a challenging film like Unthinkable when disposable crap like Jersey Shore can offer instant escape without any complicated emotions.

Still, it’s nice to know that movies like Unthinkable are out there in some form to offer audiences entertainment with a little meat on its bones. When asked to describe the message of the film, says Bellows. “That there are no easy answers. I think the thing about life is that people like the comfort of slogans, but the real world is a little bit more complex than that.”

It’s a message that sums up both the film and the reasons for its limited release surprisingly well.