Thursday, February 4, 1999
Getting his due
FILM: In a departure from his typical role as the quirky, yet
loveable, good guy,
Mel Gibson turns bad in ‘Payback’
By Lonnie Harris
Daily Bruin Staff
In "Payback," Mel Gibson appears downright dirty. It’s a look
not often seen on the native Australian superstar, who has made a
career of inhabiting bad yet lovable good guys. His characters –
though their personalities may deviate from the norm – tend to
remain within the realm of good, honest folk who may occasionally
bend the rules. But not Porter.
Porter begins "Payback" by explaining that the expression GSW in
hospitals means "Gun Shot Wound," and if you’ve got one, they have
to report it to the cops. And Porter wants nothing to do with the
cops. He’s looking for the $70,000 his "friend" and "girlfriend"
stole from him several weeks before. And he’ll do just about
anything to get his hands on it.
With that simple premise, "Payback" develops into a clever,
violent and unbelievably sinister film noir, with a rather
surprising turn from a celebrity many thought they knew.
"He’s so hard and just completely amoral," Gibson says. "You
never know for sure whether it’s going to work, but you do your
damnedest to allow some access, some chink in the armor, so the
audience can grab a hold and vicariously walk around for 90
minutes."
Porter’s underworld saga was originally told in the pulp novel
"The Hunter" by Richard Stark, which was also the basis for the
1967 Lee Marvin thriller "Point Blank." Although tonally, Gibson
and first-time director Brian Helgeland maintained the attitude and
feeling of the novel, several changes were made.
"It’s quite different," Gibson says. "We just took off on a
weird tangent and went our own way. Some of the book stuff is
really too hard. He puts this guy in a stakeout and the place he
has to watch him from has this secretary gal in it … So he ties
her up and puts a handkerchief in her mouth and tapes her all up,
and he thinks about raping her. He’s a really dark character."
Gibson, who also executive produced the film, had a great deal
of input as well into the look and feel of the film, which he felt
should be based on ’40s and ’50s style American film noir, replete
with all the necessary smoke, fog and dreary street corners.
"Many people say it reminds them of a Humphrey Bogart film,"
Gibson says. "It must be all the smoke, and that it almost looks
black and white. There’s no graduation in a different hue. It looks
cool. If you’re gonna drink bad whiskey, drink it out of a dirty
glass."
Although the dark appearance of Porter’s world appealed to both
Gibson and Helgeland (who wrote the screenplay for the Gibson
vehicle "Conspiracy Theory" and won an Oscar for his screenplay
"L.A. Confidential"), there were areas of contention between the
two. Finally, Helgeland left the project and Gibson took the reins
to redirect several key sequences in the film, including the
addition of actor Kris Kristofferson as the film’s main
antagonist.
"There were changes that the studio wanted, and I wanted that we
asked Brian to do," Gibson says. "He opted not to do them because
he felt it compromised his artistic integrity. These were changes I
saw as necessary so I made them. He was professional and all that
stuff through the whole thing. It’s mine by contract. It’s mine,
not his."
Among the changes made to the film’s final scenes were a torture
sequence and a final confrontation between Porter and the head of a
large crime syndicate. According to Gibson, these changes were
necessary to give the film momentum and purpose in its closing
half-hour.
"You got to put him in a position of jeopardy," Gibson says.
"There was no tension in the end of the film. You’ve got to give
him something to do. You’ve got to lock him in a trunk with a
straitjacket and drop him in the ice and see if he’ll get out of
it. It’s entertainment. Otherwise it’s … boring, and it was. No
excuse for boring people, and I’ve done it."
Despite rumors circulating Hollywood to the contrary, the
January issue of Premiere Magazine reports that Gibson indeed
merely encouraged Helgeland to step away from the project and allow
the more seasoned star and director to move "Payback" in a
different direction.
"Helgeland was never fired from this movie – he was never asked
to leave," Paramount publicity chief Blaise Noto told Premiere.
"Certain changes were requested, and Brian asked not to do them,
and he voluntarily stepped aside."
Regardless of whether or not Helgeland was fired, let go or
something else, the question still remains: will audiences who
adore Gibson as the noble, or sometimes zany, hero want to see him
steal from the homeless, shoot crime bosses at point blank range
and kidnap teenagers? The star chooses not to focus on that angle,
instead hoping the strength of the film itself will carry the
audience along. He did, however, excise one scene that made Porter
too tough to root for – a scene where he physically abuses his
ex-wife.
"It was too much," Gibson says. "She goes out to make him some
coffee and he starts asking questions and she won’t answer him, so
he beats … her. He just beats her up. We had to get rid of it. It
really just made him into such a monster that you can’t redeem him,
you can’t come back. No one will want to see the rest of the film –
they’ll walk out."
After "Payback" has come and gone, Gibson will no doubt return
to a more standard character who suits his public image a little
better. His planned remake of "Fahrenheit 451" has been scrapped,
but the actor-director has several notions for his next major
project.
Whatever it is, he liked the idea of challenging his audience,
and he doesn’t even reject coming back to revisit Porter in the
future.
"I like the idea of making something this hard and having it
work," Gibson says. "You don’t want people running out of the
theater screaming. You want them to stay in there and tell their
friends, ‘It’s kind of hard, but you should go see it.’"Photos
courtesy of Paramount
Academy Award-winner Mel Gibson stars as Porter in the upcoming
film, "Payback."
Maria Bello stars as Rosie alongside Mel Gibson (Porter) in the
Paramount Pictures presentation "Payback".
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