Interview with Willem Dafoe on Playing Caravaggio & Revenge (1996)

Описание: We take a look at the past to shape our future.

In 1996, Willem Dafoe sat down with Charlie Rose to discuss his role as Caravaggio in "The English Patient," the critically acclaimed adaptation of Michael Ondaatje's Booker Prize-winning novel. Dafoe explains what drew him to the complex character seeking revenge against the mysterious burned man.

On what the film is about, Dafoe reflects: "It's so many things. It's complex. From the perspective of my character, it's very much about forgiveness. It's about how what we do affects people in ways we can't even imagine."

Dafoe describes Caravaggio's arc: "He feels he's been destroyed in the war. He's physically been mutilated by his experiences, and he holds this man responsible. He's out to seek revenge. Very much in the process of the movie is what happens to that impulse to exact revenge."

On how he approached the role: "He realizes he's got no satisfaction to exact revenge in the end. Ultimately he doesn't find the English patient responsible for his misery. Out of that view comes compassion, comes generosity that I think is moving."

The conversation explores Dafoe's process of finding character through filming: "The movie is always for me finding out who the character is. It's not like the first day you go and deliver a performance. The movie is really a record of me grappling with the character."

He candidly discusses Hollywood's volatility: "The movie business makes you feel like such a punk sometimes. A director wants you but the studio says you can't use this guy because he's not big enough."

GUEST: Willem Dafoe, Actor

Interview from 1996

0:00 Introduction: "The English Patient"
0:48 Interviewing Michael Ondaatje
1:15 "Very cinematic and exotic"
1:45 How do you explain this film?
2:33 "It's about forgiveness"
3:02 Different textures of love
3:35 Who is Caravaggio?
4:06 Destroyed by the war
4:40 Seeking revenge
5:20 Impulse to forgiveness
5:44 "No satisfaction to exact revenge"
6:20 You don't know his agenda
6:47 How he got the role
7:56 Reading the script
8:34 "Finding the character is the movie"
9:05 Adventure of real life experience
10:06 Clip: Caravaggio and Hana
11:06 Clip: Caravaggio in the airplane
12:10 How do you prepare?
12:42 "Authority to do the pretending"
13:26 Hollywood "makes you feel like a punk"
14:04 Studios reject actors
14:22 Glass half full perspective

This interview captures one of cinema's most distinctive actors discussing a film that would go on to win nine Academy Awards. History offers the clearest roadmap for our future.

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