Mark Interviews 2000+

Mark Hamill

Let's go to the Cannes Film Festival.

The classic war film The Big Red One has been restored for a special screening at Cannes. This is named after... The Big Red One is the US first infantry division and the film tells the story of a sergeant and his platoon trying to survive the war.

One of the stars of the film, Mark Hamill, is in Cannes and we can speak to him now.

Good morning, Mark. Thanks very much for coming on the program.

Thank you, Jeremy.

Tell me, how is this film changed, because the original version was at Cannes in 1980 - 24 years ago.

Well, it's sort of a sad story [for] Sam. It was taken away from him by the studio and cut...

This is Sam Fuller, the director.

Sam Fuller. And the original film was an hour and fifty-three minutes. You know, because of the DVD and the fact that Warner Brothers acquired [Loramar's] film library, they've been able to restore it to two hours and forty minutes and really restore Sam Fuller's vision for the film.
You know, it was an incredible experience for me because it had such authenticity, [of course]. Lee Marvin in one of his finest performances and Samuel Fuller himself actually participated in the war and I think that's really important. A lot of the film makers today that are doing war films, they [search for inspiration] on other war movies. This is the real deal and it was just an incredible experience for me to be able to be a part of this living history.

Do you think the film is better now?

Absolutely. I mean, there's something about Sam Fuller being able to put in quirky and [...] moments that… as a whole, yes, you can truncate it and take it out and say, 'Well, it's not important to the storyline', but take it as a whole, as a mosaique of a wartime experience. It really now has the feeling of war in a certain tense action, and then there's lots and lots of just sitting around, waiting for the next thing to happen. It's a… It was an incredible experience to be a part of it and to see it finally restored. I mean, my only regret is that Sam Fuller wasn't here to see it himself. He wasn't a bitter person, he wasn't someone that was sort of, you know, pessimist in any way, but I know it made him very angry that a movie that was so highly personal to him was, you know, butchered basically.

Why did the studio do that?

You know, who knows. In 1980, I guess, World War II was something that they felt was not a subject matter that they could really make fly, that their best chance would be to make it an adventure film of some kind - making it, you know, a comment on, you know, the madness of war. And the tragedy of children left homeless and children abandoned - you've got to see it to really understand, you know. He put his blood, sweat and tears into this thing and he just didn't have the power at the time. I think his reputation has grown over the years and certainly he's more appreciated in Europe than he was in America. I think his authenticity and his ability to criticize and illuminate the American experience without… with all its flaws is something that's appreciated over here and he doesn't glorify war in a way that there's a tendency to do on the part of American film makers.

Mark, tell me something. How does the movie stand up next to modern ones, because don't forget this is something conceived and produced and shot in the late 70s. And since then we've had computer effects, massive technological changes in film making.

Right.

Does this look a bit of a museum piece?

Not to me, because I don't think Sam was interested in the spectacle of war. I mean, you can put in, you know, 1500 CGI panzers and to me it all looks like a video game. This is the real, earth-bound reality and I mean, he finds human moments in the midst of the chaos of war. I think it's timeless, it doesn't look like… it doesn't look dated to me because it's re-creating a period that was, you know, already anachronistic when we made it. So it's authentic in a way that a lot of the movies that are able to just paint things on the screen I don't think are. Maybe I have to retrain my eyes, but more and more, I think, the CGI to me looks like in a video game [...]

Mark, I've studiously refrained from mentioning the two words STAR WARS so far...

{laughs}

... or the two words Luke Skywalker, but tell me, when did you last go through an interview without someone mentioning that film or that role?

Oh gosh, you know… It's always lying there [...] In many ways, there's a lot of advantages to that, I mean, certainly it gives you a kind of reference point, but it's been so long since I've been a part of it and especially now that they have these new ones coming out I think it's proper to keep a distance and be respectful but not too clingy. But, you know, I admire your ability to refrain from that.

Well, in that case I'll ask you a few more questions about STAR WARS.

Oh yeah.

What do you think of the new ones, these Prequels?

Well, they're ornate and elaborate in a way that ours could never be, you see, largely because of the CGI, but there's a… I think they stand on their own in a completely different way. Our trilogy was a little bit more comedic and light-hearted - I mean, there certainly were dramatic moments, but… You know, George is not only the writer and the director but he's the studio now, so they're not approximations of what he wanted, they're exactly what he wanted and so, you know, I like to leave the comparisons to other people if I can.

Very tactful. Do you think yours are more authentic?

Oh, I don't know about that. I mean, obviously it's a great contrast to The Big Red One because I went from a fantasy war that was meant to be for children to something that was based on someone's real life and that's why I refer to this as a living history, because when I would question Sam and say, 'Why am I doing x, y or z?' he could tell you! You know, he didn't make things up, he took it from what really happened to him or to people that he knew, so the contrast couldn't have been greater. And like I say, the two directors had different life experiences. You can see how George grew up if you see American Grafitti and you know, Sam lives several lifetimes, being the youngest crime reporter on a big New York newspaper and his experiences in early Hollywood as a writer, director and producer, it's all like a great film school to me, I mean, I'm very lucky to have been able to work with such dynamic directors.

Mark, even though we spent a second talking about STAR WARS, we're also talking about a film that you made early on in your career. What has it been like for you as an actor to have been involved in these very big projects and in the STAR WARS pictures - massive, massive global hits that people still talk about and still buy on DVD and on video - so early on in your career?

Well, you know, I mean, I never brought any specific expectations to what do and could do, I mean, in the last year I've been a writer, an actor and a producer myself. I just finished the run in a Broadway show and I directed my first film, which was a mock-documentary that was largely improvised at the San Diego Comic Book Convention. It's called Comic Book: The Movie and we did it for just under a half million dollars and it was bought by Miramax, so…

Congratulations!

Thank you! I'm now preparing a film version of the comic book I wrote, The Black Pearl, which will be very much informed by what I learnt from Sam, because it's a very small movie about little people with big dreams and people that are at the lower edge of the social strata, if you will. I mean, I just watched Pick up on South Street which is about a pick-pocket and, you know, I couldn't have worked for a better director in terms of a crash course in film making. I see what happens when you do something that's larger than life like the STAR WARS films - you cross over in pop culture so that people… it's everyone's frame of reference where it's my job to forge a future for myself if I want to stay in the entertainment industry. And you know I feel the diversity I've been able to employ… you know, Broadway, off-Broadway, I've done hundreds and hundreds of cartoons, a lot of kids know me just as the voice of the Joker on the animated Batman, but then to movies, to directing animation. I also directed an animated film called Aero-Troopers...

Busy man!

You know what I love? I love the fact that I've learnt that I don't have to be in the center spotlight, that I can be behind the camera, or behind the microphone.

All right, Mark Hamill, that sounds like wisdom to me. Thank you very much and thanks for joining us this morning. And this new version of The Big Red One, this classic war movie, sounds to me terrific.

It's awesome, it's just awesome. I'm so proud of this - for Sam, not for myself, but for Sam, because he was so undervalued in America and I'm just lucky that he's much more revered in England and in Europe.

BBC Radio, May 30, 2004