When a 3D release of The Lion King was released in US cinemas a few weeks ago, even Disney only had muted expectations for it. It was seen as much as a promotion for the Blu-ray release as anything else. However it went on to make $30 million in its first weekend, and its continuing success has seen it return to the list of the 10 highest grossing movies ever in the US. It is a special film and audiences have loved seeing it back on the big screening.

With The Lion King returning to UK cinemas on Friday in its brand new 3D form, we got the chance to talk to the film’s directors, Rob Minkoff and Roger Allers. We’ve split the interview into two parts, with one coming now and the other just ahead of the Blu-ray release.

We asked them how involved they were in the 3D conversion, what it involved and how The Lion King came to be in the first place…

How surprised are you that you’re still doing interviews about The Lion King after all these years?
Rob Minkoff: It’s odd because so much time has passed and yet it feels like only a short while ago that we made the film.

Do you think 3D adds something to The Lion King or is it only ‘fashionable’ right now?
Roger Allers: Sure. I think it adds a more visceral experience to the film. It’s been fun to see how “3-Dimensionally” we’d been thinking when we originally made it in 2D.

Rob Minkoff: I must confess that I am a fan of 3D when it’s done properly. Avatar was amazing on screen. There have been a number of films released in 3D which haven’t really delivered on its potential. But I think The Lion King 3D does. It adds a dimension to the world of our characters that makes the experience of the film more immersive. And it doesn’t take anything away from the 2D version either. So The Lion King 3D was a worthwhile endeavour in my opinion.

How involved were you in the actual 3D transfer of The Lion King?
Rob Minkoff: Don Hahn, Roger and I came in to meet with Robert Neuman and his team to launch them on the conversion. We watched the picture in 2D and conveyed our thoughts on things we’d like to see (and not see) in our 3D version. And then we met regularly to check the work in progress.

Roger Allers: Rob Minkoff, myself and Don Hahn watched the 2D version to determine which scenes could be pushed in 3D to enhance the storytelling and emotional content. Throughout the process, we then reviewed each scene to offer input to Robert Neuman, the 3D stereographer and his crew. I also oversaw the colour correction of the final version.

What was the process you went through to determine which story elements would most benefit from the stereoscopic 3D enhancement?
Roger Allers: We screened the movie without sound, watching for the scenes of greatest potential, and called them out to someone who was furiously taking notes!

Which is your favourite 3D scene?
Rob Minkoff: I think for me, the Circle of Life works amazingly well. And is a great way to open the experience of watching the film. It always had a power and impact but now really jumps off the screen.

Roger Allers: I’d have to say in the Circle of Life sequence where Zazu is flying up to join Mufasa on the promontory of Pride Rock. Great sense of flying and space!

How surprised were you when you saw the US box office figures for The Lion King 3D opening weekend?
Rob Minkoff: I couldn’t believe it! I originally heard they were estimating something in the range of $12 million. When it topped $30 million I was shocked and amazed but also very pleased. It’s nice that audiences still love the movie!

Were you surprised that hand-drawn animation worked in 3D?
Rob Minkoff: I had seen some attempts at traditional animation rendered in 3D and saw great possibilities in it. But I think Robert Neuman and his team went beyond my expectations and delivered a really compelling presentation.

Many people have noted similarities to Hamlet in the story of The Lion King. Was that something you were conscious of when making the movie?
Rob Minkoff: Because The Lion King was considered an original story there was always the need to anchor it with something familiar. When we first pitched the revised outline of the movie to Michael Eisner, Jeffrey Katzenberg, Peter Schneider and Tom Schumacher, someone in the room announced that Hamlet was similar in its themes and relationships. Everyone responded favourably to the idea that we were doing something Shakespearean and so we continued to look for ways to model our film on that all time classic.

What was the idea that brought to life The Lion King in 1994?
Roger Allers: We wanted to do an animal picture based in a more natural setting. A story that dealt with the issue of taking on the responsibility of adulthood.

Rob Minkoff: Originally it was thought of as a Bambi in Africa. More true life adventure than mythical epic. But when Roger and I finally got together on it we imbued it with the more spiritual elements that are a hallmark of the film.

Can you talk a bit about how you went about recruiting animators to come work on The Lion King? I’ve always heard that because Pocahontas was supposed to be this prestige project, so most of the Studio’s A-list animators gravitated to that production. That then made it kind of tough to initially recruit animators to come work on The Lion King. Is that story true?
Rob Minkoff: The Lion King was originally called ‘King of the Jungle’ and was not well regarded around the studio. So when Jeffery Katzenberg announced that the studio would be split in two to make two films simultaneously, many of the top animators wanted to work on Pocahontas instead of The Lion King. Jeffrey had deemed Pocahontas the “home run” and The Lion King the ‘risk.” That gave a lot of newer animators a chance to step up to leadership roles.

Roger Allers: But this was a chance to give some really deserving young animators their chance to lead a character. Tony Bancroft (Pumbaa), Mike Surrey (Timon), James Baxter (Rafiki) are all brilliant guys – we lucked out!

Now it seems inevitable The Lion King would become a classic, but how much of a risk did it seems when you were making it?
The Lion King was the step-child project when we started at the studio. Developing it was a hard but satisfying journey. You can never know in advance how something will turn out, and even if you like it whether it will be a success.

Were you ever tempted to do ‘a George Lucas’ and improve parts of The Lion King, before the new release?
Roger Allers: No, I think we knew to leave well enough alone. Did some colour correcting though on a few scenes that I was never happy with.

Was there any concern that the movie might be too scary or adult for children?
Rob Minkoff: We found ourselves constantly re-balancing the film to make sure there were enough comic elements to lighten the mood after the tragedy of Mufasa’s death. Timon and Pumbaa really came along at the right time to give the film a lift and make it a more satisfying whole.

What`s the key things in doing a ‘larger than life’ movie like The Lion King?
Roger Allers: Story-wise, it’s important to stay rooted in the main character’s experience and emotions; not to let the sweep of story plots take you away from experiencing what happens through the character’s point of view.

What do you prefer, classic 2D or computer animation?
Rob Minkoff: I think computer animation has vastly improved over the years and has achieved a similar quality to traditionally hand drawn animation. That said, nothing can replace the look and feel of human drawings. So I think there is room in the world for both, each with its own unique strengths and weaknesses.

How closely did you work with the voice cast, and how essential are the right voices to an animated film’s success?
Rob Minkoff: As directors we work very closely with the actors to create their performance. Typically there will only be one actor recording at a time. This can make it challenging for the actors who are working in a vacuum. Sometimes we have some reading lines with them. Other times I will read with the actor which I find is an excellent way of getting the performance you’re after.

What do you think is the future of animation?
Rob Minkoff: When I got started back in the early 80’s it seemed that animation was on its way out. But today there are more animated features, TV shows, commercials, and animated content of all kinds being produced. So I’m very bullish on animation. I think, eventually, more films will be made with more diverse content to reach audiences of all ages, and that animation finally achieves a level of respect that equals any other kind of filmmaking.

Roger Allers: I think the field will continue to open up in terms of technique and subject matter. The line between animated and live action has already become so blurred, the entire distinction may disappear.

What was the most unexpected way that The Lion King made its way into your life outside the animation industry?
Rob Minkoff: Hakuna Matata has become a phrase recognized around the world. And every time we get kidded on TV, including the recent Emmy Awards, it’s very gratifying. It’s nice to have a little shelf space in the pop culture universe.

The Fast & Furious franchise has been astonishingly popular. Despite not getting the attention of some other movies, the films have grossed over 1.5 billion dollars at the box office, with the latest, Fast & Furious 5, being the most popular so far, taking an incredible $606 million around the world. People just can’t get enough of the cars, girls and action! Ahead of the film’s Blu-ray and DVD release on 5th September, we’ve got this great exclusive interview with director Justin Lin, who’s helped keep the franchise revving ever since Tokyo Drift.

So is making a Fast & Furious movie just about blowing things up and racing cars fast, or is there more to it than that? Justin Lin tells us.

So, these movies are very successful, can you tell us what it is about the Fast & Furious franchise that people love?
Well, for me, what excites me is the fact that it grows, it evolves. I think that if you look at every film, they have all stylistically been very different. We’re part of something that we are always able to push it and grow with the characters and sensibilities. And also, thematically, for a big action genre movie, the heart of it has always been about this non-traditional sense of family; that’s the thing that I think is always present, and I think that is very universal.

Is it nice to have the different characters from the other films coming back in for the fifth movie?
I love it. I personally love stuff like that, so when they called and said, “What would it take for you to come and do another one?” I talked to Vin (Diesel) and it became very clear that that was one of the big reasons for me to come back, is to convince everybody else to come back. And again, it plays into the theme of family and at the same time, we get to introduce a new character with Dwayne Johnson, so that’s very exciting too.

So why did you choose Rio as the location for this one?
I’ve always wanted to get to Rio, and I felt like this franchise, as it has been traveling, and the sensibility of these characters, it felt like a perfect match. I think we have gone around all the places, and it felt like South America was where they would land on this one, for sure. Especially after the last movie.

You said that everything has grown, including the budget, so how is that reflected? In the cars? In animation or technology? CGI?
Everything. And also, hopefully, growth for me as a film-maker. I feel like every chance I get to make another movie, I feel like I’m better; I’m a better craftsman, I’m a better storyteller. Having that resource around, I want to be able to utilise that correctly.

Does this movie have any improved animation technology, or are the cars better?
We crash a lot more cars. You can talk to car people and they can argue that the older cars are better than the newer cars. I also think that as I’ve grown, I have been able to work with people that I feel I can work best with, so the more I do, I think the team gets stronger too, on the production side. Of course, technology is always growing, but I feel that part of the evolution and the maturity of this franchise is going ‘old school’. It is really respecting the car so that when it crashes, whenever it does, we are doing it practically. When I signed up for this, that’s the thing I’ve always tried to make sure happened, and any kind of visual effects are there to help environmentally.

Is this movie more focused on the character than the cars?
I know that Fast & Furious had certain considerations, but I know that we worked very hard to make sure that thematically the character journeys are important. And I think, referring back to your first question, that’s what makes the connection. I think that a lot of the time that people think of Fast & Furious, they think of cars and hot girls and stuff like that, but I think the reason why we’re here making a fifth one, and we still feel fresh and we still have that energy, is because I think we take a lot of care in all the characters.

There seems to be a great chemistry on set between the guys.
Yeah, it’s great. We have so many different personalities, people from all different backgrounds, different industries, so I feel like I’m working back at the YMCA with 15 kids, all different personalities.

Do you think it’s an advantage to have all different backgrounds and personalities?
Oh for sure. I love that. I love working around the world, I love working with people from different backgrounds. I think it helps me to become a better director because I have to communicate differently.

Do you get different influences from them?
Yeah, you get different points of view, and I think that’s always welcome. I feel like I like that, that discourse. So when I talk to Tego (Calderón) and Don Omar, it’s very different from Vin. Paul (Walker) is very different from Tyrese (Gibson). Sung (Kang) is very different from Gal (Gadot). So I love hearing what they have to say, and I love that journey of making sure I can communicate and convey that to them.

Can you talk a little about the creative process when it comes to action sequences? How do you manage to top previous action sequences, which were already very spectacular?
For me, it comes from character. I feel like there’s not a lot of real estate in these movies, so you have to utilise every second, and a lot of that comes from the action. And what I love about these characters – and I go back to sports for an analogy: I can sit here and tell you that I’m the best basketball player in the world, but when I get on the court, I am who I am. I think that’s the same thing with these characters: when they are driving, it conveys to the audience who they are, by the decisions that they make. So for me, it is very exciting when we lay it down. Action is usually secondary to me, I usually try to think about the theme, what the character arcs are, and once I figure that out, that helps me design the action.

Is it difficult to get all these big personalities together on the set, including the likes of Elsa Pataky?
Well, it’s not difficult in the sense that… well, nothing’s easy in film-making but I like that. I like the challenge, and I like the fact that I have to go and convey and convince people why they should be a part of this project. And it means a lot to me that someone like Dwayne Johnson, for him to say, “I want to be a part of this,” that means a lot to me, for me to go and speak to him. It means a lot to me that Tyrese, and everybody, are in a position in their career that they don’t have to do anything, so I like that; that, in a way, validates why we’re doing this.

Do you have to reflect different cultures in each movie? Because it seems as though in every movie there is a Latino, an Asian character.
No. Look, I grew up in a very multi-cultural community, and I like the sensibilities, and this is why I love this franchise too. I think a lot of the time, Hollywood films feel a little bit backwards, like when you go to the Orient, it’s just like Geishas. It’s very backward. So I think for us to even do the third one, to say, “No, it’s not like drifting around Buddha statues. Tokyo is very post-modern.” So for us to even have subtitles, in a big action movie, those are fights you have to fight and I am proud to say that we have that. I can have Tego and Don Omar speak Spanish because that’s what they do. People are bilingual, people are trilingual now, and I feel like I like to be a part of that movement. It’s a little bit more authentic to respect the different cultures and not to just exploit.

This franchise is so big all over the world. Does that influence the decisions you make?
Very much so, in a way. I think I would have answered this very differently if you had asked me after the last movie, but when we went to do press for the last movie, I actually got to really spend time, from country to country, city to city, with the fans and really got to talk to them, and the thing I realised was that it’s very much a working class franchise. And that’s my background, that’s where I came from and I really wanted to respect that, and hopefully I’ve worked very hard to entertain and connect with them.

Do you feel more pressure now that you really want to deliver for the fans?
I like pressure and I think that’s why you do this. If it was easy, I don’t think I’d want to do it. I think having four films that have been successful, and now doing a fifth one, where do you go? I think that’s very important to find the right answers. Everybody on here, on this set, could have said, “No,” so for us to be able to go and push and push and push on every ounce of every scene, that’s great. I like getting up with that challenge.

So did you get Elsa Pataky in to fill another ethnic role?
No. What I love about this movie is that when we had that role, we just cast it around the world. We looked at everybody from different backgrounds, but she was the best for the role. And I like that, when you talk about different ethnicities, I love the idea about going out and being colour-blind and just going and finding the best person for the job.

Thank you, Justin.

Since she first hit screens in the 1980s, Joan Cusack has received two Academy Award nominations, first for her role in Working Girl, and again for “In & Out, and has also been seen in films as diverse as Friends With Money, Raising Helen, Arlington Road, High Fidelity, Where the Heart Is, Grosse Pointe Blank, Nine Months, Broadcast News, Say Anything, Sixteen Candles and My Sister’s Keeper – as well as voicing Jessie in the second and third Toy Story movie. However Mars Needs Moms presented a special challenge, asking the actress to go motion capture to play a mother who gets kidnapped to the Red Planet. With the movie out on DVD on Monday August 15th, here’s what Joan had to say about the CG animated film.

What made you want to take part in “Mars Needs Moms”?
I love being Mom.  I have kids – I have a passion for being a mom.  So from the beginning, I thought this part was so awesome. I loved the script that Wendy [Wells] and Simon [Wells] wrote – they’re parents who clearly relate to the story – and I thought it was a great story. I love the idea that if you’re a parent, it’s not about being a friend. It’s not about being your child’s friend. It’s much more than that. It’s more selfless than that. And because of that, you have to do the hard things and say the hard things that are important for your child to develop the right way. This really shows her to be a universal Mom that cares. It’s all about building real character in children, which is really the role of a mom. 

Describe your character Mom in Mars Needs Moms and what happens in the beginning of the movie.
She looks a lot like me. The character is a universal Mom that cares. It’s a slice-of-life, very normal day. She has fun with her son, teasing him a little bit to get him to do the right thing. There’s a lot of joy with him and a fun playfulness to her. She has a sweet love for her husband.

But she’s the one who tells Milo that there are consequences for bad behavior. She tells him to eat his vegetables, clear the table and go to bed. And he says the same thing every single kid says to a mom who’s doing her job, which is basically “I hate you” or “I wish you weren’t in my life.” It’s very typical. It’s a hard job being a parent – and sometimes when you’re tired they know the right buttons to push.

Who portrays Milo? 
Seth Green plays Milo. He has exuberance. What’s so wonderful about him is he’s able to be a professional and translate a real vision that Simon and Wendy have created, and do it well with great commitment and energy and discipline.  It’s a lot of physical work and it’s a lot of imaginative work. He’s amazing. We did a scene that was very emotional and he was just incredibly present and awesome.

How do you feel about the rest of the Mars Needs Moms cast?
Dan Fogler is so sweet and soulful. He’s one of those actors who’s already an original – he’s a giving entertainer – some people are just born to entertain. Mindy Sterling just blows my doors off. She’s just awesome. She’s a mom and a professional and that’s not always easy.

What is your impression of director Simon Wells?
Simon [Wells] is incredibly thorough and thoughtful about the entire world.  He’s so great because his background in animation helps give all of his work purpose and thoughtfulness.

He’s an incredible director; he’s just so interesting and smart. He takes you right to the feeling, and comes up with different, fun ways of conveying that. This kind of filmmaking is such a great medium for him because he can be right there.  It’s much more like theater. You get to act with a sense of privacy, because the cameras are all far away and you’re just acting with the person that you’re acting with. Simon is not self-conscious about anything, and because he’s such a good, giving person, the actors don’t feel self-conscious having him there. We felt watched and supported; he gets it.

After our interviews with director Kevin MacDonald and star Jamie Bell, the last in out series of Q&As about The Eagle arrives. Channing Tatum and Jamie Bell star in The Eagle as a young Roman centurion and a slave who venture into the wilds of Caledonia (Scotland) in search of the legendary lost 9th Legion. The movie hits DVD and Blu-ray on July 25th, but before then Channing Tatum talks about the movie, learning to fight Roman-style and working with Jamie Bell.

So tell me all about your character.
I play Marcus. He’s a Roman soldier whose father was the leader of the 9th Legion, and essentially his father took his Legion, 17 years ago into the north of Britain – which is now Scotland – and they disappear. Cut back to 17 years after, and I’ve now been sent to Britain on my commission as a soldier trying to essentially win back my family’s honour. I can’t do it as a soldier, so I decide to go over Hadrian’s Wall and try to figure out what happened to my father and if I can, bring back the Eagle or face death. I take a tribesman, a Scottish slave essentially – even though it wasn’t Scotland back then – played by Jamie Bell, and we see things very differently.

It seems very historically accurate.
Yeah, Kevin (Macdonald – director) is obsessed with accuracy. He is a documentary maker. A lot of directors take a lot of creative license just for dramatic sake and it ends up looking phony. Audiences are smarter than you give them credit for sometimes and people don’t really get it. People know a lot about Rome because so many movies have been made about it, so many documentaries and we learn about them at school. If you just do a Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon-type version of it, people are going to be a little disenchanted. The Romans were some of the most advanced yet simple and driven people that you could ever, ever find in history.

How was it learning to fight like a Centurian?
It’s really eye-opening. The short sword is specifically made to be thrust in and up into your sternum. That’s what it was made for and that’s why they really excelled in hand-to-hand combat because back then, the Germanic tribes, even the Britons, they all had long swords and big long axes, so we could get in close and really be effective.

Can you talk about doing all of the stunts yourself, and did you sustain any injuries?
I didn’t sustain any injuries during the fighting, other than I thought I had broken my hand for a second but I just sprained it pretty bad. You just get bangs and bruises here and there. But I had a pretty bad burn injury in the river – that was pretty serious.

How did you get burnt?
They were pouring water down our wetsuits to keep us warm because we were in a hypothermic river all day for 13 hours, for about three or four days. We had been doing this for 13 hours and this poor guy was having to run up and down the hill, about every ten minutes with a huge bottle of water. We’d wrapped the day and I started to walk up and here he comes with the bottle of water to warm me up; he pours it down my wetsuit and it was boiling water. What had happened was that he hadn’t got all the way down to the river to dilute the boiling water with the cold water, so it was pretty painful.

So can you talk about the relationship between this Roman leader and his slave? It’s a very powerful relationship.
You know, at that time Rome was occupying a country and doing it without apologies. They were conquerors, that’s what they did. They did it in the name of Rome but with the idea that these people needed what Rome was. And that is a pretty warped mentality, when people are very happy with how they are, but for some reason, someone comes in and thinks they need the Roman way of life. It’s not so political and it’s not so humanitarian. They would kill as many people as you could possibly kill if that’s what it took, for Rome. I think that Marcus absolutely had this all-or-nothing mentality for Rome, because he felt he needed to essentially prove himself. His father was sort of a disgrace, so he had to be the perfect one and I think he was too committed in a way. He has to learn on the way, why and how he is seen through Esca’s eyes.

How was it working with Jamie Bell?
Jamie is… I keep saying it, but him and Joseph Gordon-Levitt are maybe two of the best young actors that are in our age group. They are so incredibly smart, they can do everything and they are just so thoughtful and they care so much about it.

Thank you, Channing.

Channing Tatum and Jamie Bell star in The Eagle as a young Roman centurion and a slave who venture into the wilds of Caledonia (Scotland) in search of the legendary lost 9th Legion. It’s an interesting set-up and the movie hits DVD and Blu-ray on July 25th, but before then Jamie Bell talks about the movie and working with Channing Tatum.

And if you’re interested in finding out more, click here for our interview with the film’s director, Kevin MacDonald.

Tell me about your character.
Esca is his name, freedom is his game. He’s a guy who, when we first meet him in the film, has lost everything. He’s lost his family, he’s lost his values, he’s lost his tribe, he’s lost his freedom and he’s enslaved by the very people who took that all away from him. And in that first scene you can tell, he’s willing to die; he’s very prepared to die – it would be easier if he just died. He could rid himself of the shame of being captured. He is saved and his journey after that is that he lays down a debt of honour. After that moment for him, every step, every action is about becoming a free man again.

Can you talk about the relationship between the Roman master and his British slave?
For the journey that these two characters go on… as much as it is a physical journey into the unknown, into a world that was very dangerous and hostile, it really is a journey about these two guys who are enemies and who are chained together. They  have to go on this mission together, not knowing whether the other is going to turn around and put a knife into his back. It’s that suspense, that sense of mistrust and betrayal that is lingering in the air. It draws this story forward.

And why do you think they bond? Is it because they have both lost fathers?
Absolutely. I think they are absolutely very parallel people, with very parallel storylines. I think guilt and shame are big themes for both of these characters. I think their journey is a catharsis. The sentiment of your saving grace could also be your closest enemy is a really valuable message.

So how was it working with Channing Tatum?
Channing is a great guy. I think the world of him. We had such a good time on this. You know, it’s two guys riding on horses and playing with swords in the Highlands of Scotland, and Romans and armour and all that stuff. So we were like kids on set, we had a great time together. We were also very competitive which helped push you a lot harder. So yeah, we had a great time on this, a really good time.

The film feels very historically authentic. Did you learn something about the Romans that perhaps you didn’t know before?
More than anything I had a real appreciation for the tribes of Northern Scotland to be able to survive in that terrain and that landscape. I also really feel for the Romans who obviously came from certain parts of the Continent. They went up there in their tunics and their sandals going, “Where the Hell are we? Let’s get out of here. Let’s build a big wall and never go back there.” I did empathise with them.

How was it learning to fight and did your dance background help you with the fight choreography?
Sure, yeah, absolutely. I think if you have a history of any sort of physical movement, like dancing or anything like that, it’s always going to help when it comes to stuff like this because fight scenes are basically just choreography, they could be dance choreography. So both me and Channing do have that background and we applied all of that stuff. It kind of comes as second nature after a while.

Any injuries?
I managed to get off this one unscathed, so I was fine. Nothing to really report there.

Even on the horses?
Even on the horses. I had never ridden a horse before so I had to learn from scratch and really bank time in the saddle before we started the film, but the one thing I was never afraid of was falling off. I really trusted this horse. He was called “The Mountain Goat” because he was incredibly stable over rocky terrain, so I was very well taken care of.

Can you talk about shooting in Scotland? It’s so beautiful up there but cold.
Oh, incredibly cold. I mean, yes, it is beautiful and it is the backdrop of the film; I think it’s a very integral character in the movie and to the telling of that adventure. It does present its difficulties: we were in some very remote places; Kevin MacDonald (director) really wanted to push the envelope of experiencing the frontier, the unknown world. So it was difficult, technically difficult: some of tents blew into the sea, some vehicles overturned, the horses were slipping and sliding on the hills and stuff, so it was demanding but I think that kind of stuff informs the film and informs your performance.

Thank you, Jamie.

He won an Oscar for his documentary, One Day In September, and went on to much acclaim as a fiction film director with the likes of The Last King Of Scotland and State Of Play. Now his latest movie, the Roman tale The Eagle, is coming to DVD and Blu-ray on July 25th, and so he talks about what drew him to the movie, working with Channing Tatum and Jamie Bell, and shooting in Scotland.

Can we talk about the genesis of this film? It’s based on a very well-loved book, so did you read the book as a boy?
I first came across this book when I was about 13. I read it then and it made a huge impression on me, something to do with the fact that it was about Romans and Scotland and I grew up in Scotland. Then it was many years later, I hadn’t really thought about it for a long time – this was maybe six or seven years ago now – and I heard that Duncan Kenworthy, the producer, had the rights and so I went and pleaded with him, “Please let me do it.”

So what is it about the story that is so powerful?
I think there are a couple of different things about the nature of this kind of story that are really, really strong. Firstly is that it’s a quest narrative. It’s about somebody looking for something incredibly valuable, in this case the lost Golden Eagle that belonged to the 9th Legion; it’s gone missing in Scotland, it’s been taken by these wild Scottish tribes. And just the journey that he has to go on, through incredible landscapes, all sorts of adventures, fights, battles, whatever, the simplicity of that story is very, very good. But also it’s something about the idea of Romans in Scotland and of Romans passing Hadrian’s Wall, which is the end of the Empire and going into the unknown, which is very mysterious to them. What are they going to find? What’s up there? What’s in the terra incognita?

It feels very historically authentic. Was that important to you?
Yeah, one of the things we wanted to do differently to the mainstream ‘sword and sandals’ movies is that we wanted to try to make it feel as historically accurate and authentic as possible. Not just in the texture and the way it was filmed in a kind of realistic way, but also in the amount of research we did into exactly what armour they would wear, what insignia, what their swords would have looked like, what the weave of their cloth would have even been like on the kilts, so that the details hopefully would build up into making the film feel completely real.

And the battles feel quite visceral.
I think what we decided, was not to use any CGI in the film. I’m kind of fed up with all these CG films where anything is possible and you have sweeping aerial views from the point of view of an eagle and that kind of thing. I thought, “Let’s make a film where the fighting, the battles, are actually with real people.” We had 500 people in a field battering each other, so the action does feel very, very visceral. But also we were very careful to research the different fighting styles these different groups had; so the Romans fight in a particular way that Romans fought with their shields and with a stabbing, short sword and the Celts fight with these sweeping axes that they have with blades on the end of them. That’s all based on surviving texts and archaeology, as to how they used to fight.

Can you talk about the relationship between the Roman master and the British slave that he saves from death? And what did Channing Tatum and Jamie Bell bring to that relationship?
Well the heart of the film is really the relationship, the uneasy, fractious relationship between a Roman master and his British slave. The slave is from a tribe that had been completely wiped out by the Romans, so he is incredibly resentful and despises the Romans and despises Channing Tatum’s character, Marcus. But through the course of their journey, all sorts of things occur to them. They betray each other, then they become friends again, and at the end of it they really do become friends. They overcome their cultural differences and I suppose that is the message of the movie: it’s about friendship overcoming everything.

Can you talk about shooting in Scotland? It’s so majestic and beautiful, but what were the challenges of that?
One of the things I wanted to do was show Scotland as I remembered it, which is not the Scotland of beautiful watercolours and shortbread tins, it’s a Scotland that is very, very harsh and bleak but beautiful at the same time. In order to do that, we had to film in the winter because that’s when it’s at its best and the winter of course is terrible weather: rain all the time, practically every day. Also, a lot of the film is shot in a river. There is a big sword sequence at the end that’s all in a river, and that was freezing. Poor Channing and Jamie had to go through God knows what to actually survive that. They had wet suits on underneath their costumes and they were freezing. That’s one of the great advantages of having young actors, they will put up with quite a lot. They’re not too precious yet!

Thank you, Kevin.