Simon Rumley, Noah Taylor and Amanda Fuller had a testing time making Red, White & Blue, they tell Edward Lawrenson
Waiting to talk to the Daily Tiger, Simon Rumley, director of the gripping thriller Red White & Blue, and his two leads, Noah Taylor and Amanda Fuller, are discussing the merits of Jim Thompson. The reference point is apt: violent, terse and psychologically complex, Rumley's movie shares some of the feverish and hard-boiled intensity of the crime novelist's best work.
Set in Austin, Texas, the movie portrays the relationship between Erica (Fuller), a sexually promiscuous, emotionally withdrawn young woman, and Nate, the oddball loner with whom she shares a guest house. When Erica loses her job, Nate finds her a position in the DIY store where he works, and an intimate (but chaste) kind of attachment develops between the couple, although Nate remains troubled by Erica's continuing sexual encounters with strangers.
An atmospheric, subtly observed character study of these two lost souls, the first third of Red White & Blue grew out of Rumley's desire to explore "the dark and destructive side of sex," with Fuller's commanding performance hinting at a nasty secret underlying her string of one-night stands. Alluding to a violent past, Nate – played with scraggy charisma, a wiry beard and a faultless Texan accent by Australian actor Noah Taylor – is also a figure with a mysterious back story.
This rich ambiguity drew both actors to the screenplay, but its dark subject matter provided pause for thought. The sexual and violent content, Fuller explains, called for a cautious approach, especially for an actress at the start of her career; but she was impressed by Rumley's previous feature, the horror film The Living and the Dead, and reassured by meeting the British director. So to commit to a project like this the director has to win your trust? "Definitely," Fuller says, “You've hit the nail on the head."
Taylor's concerns were as much about logistics: "I've done some low-budget films where key scenes simply weren't shot but I knew from The Living and the Dead that Simon could deliver." He also took heart from watching the making-of featurette included on the DVD of Rumley's last film: "It looked like a smooth shoot and the director of photography did a good job and seemed like a good guy to work with! So I was glad Milton [Kam] was working om this new film, too."
The production schedule – 18 days, Rumley says – was tight, not just because there were quite a large number of locations but also because the film shifts tone mid-way through. To reveal more would be to ruin the story's unfolding shocks but let's just say that its final stretch reveals the horror credentials of Rumley's last film. Rumley made sure there was time to discuss his approach to these later scenes with his lead cast prior to shooting; given the challenging material of the script this was especially useful because, Fuller says, "the shoot itself was such a maelstrom. I have barely any memory of it, because we were so busy!"
Taylor's strongest memory was of an incident towards the end of the shoot. “We were doing some shots in Big Bend National park for the end of the film, and we got lost.” The story is jokingly retold by Taylor and involves a Scooby Doo-style van, two flat tires, lack of food and terrain said to be populated by many snakes. It was a gruelling day's travel, and Taylor reflects that he did well to retain his composure. “Luckily, it was one of our last days of shooting,” adds Rumley.
Taylor can also be seen in another IFFR title, Richard Lowenstein's 1986 Dogs in Space, in which the Australian actor made his fleeting debut. Asked about this, Taylor promptly produces a DVD of the film, on which Lowenstein has scrawled an obscene greeting to his erstwhile actor. “In Australia that's a term of affection,” says Taylor, with conviction.
More on Red, White & Blue here.