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Your new movie Lock
& Load - in a few words, what is it about?
Essentially Lock & Load
is an 80's/90's buddy movie homage. The film is actually a
sequel to one of our previous called Holiday Monday. The idea being that
the films are set on a bank holiday where our heroes (two mercenaries/guns
for hire/private security personell) are trying to relax and become
embroiled in some kind of chaos. This time their secret service friend
Agent Stokes goes missing during a sting operation to trap international
arms dealer Miles Steiger and our duo have to go out and find him and
fight their way through the bad guys to get to the end of a progressively
bloody bank holiday.
What
were your sources of inspiration when writing Lock
& Load? I
think typically it would be films like Lethal Weapon, which seems like an
obvious reference. Probably some martial arts movies as well because
there's a lot of MA in this film including MMA, lots of different styles.
The hook is also inspired by Die Hard with a Vengeance in its concept of
everything taking place in the one day. Obviously on a lower budget! But
we've taken from a few 80's/90's action movies and tried to keep
technology out of the action certainly, but the plot is a nod to 3-D
printing as the arms dealer is 3-D printing the weapons that he sells,
which is a bit of a modern day quirk! Lock
& Load features its fair share of fight and action scenes - so
what can you tell us about those, and how were they achieved? One
of the main things in the film are the number of 'boss fights' or 'hero
fights' as some people call them. We've got 3 heroes and 4 main villains
so it felt right to cap the film off with multiple 1 on 1 fights after the
obligatory big shootout at the end. I also like a 'teaser fight' where the
hero comes up against one of the bad guys and gets his ass kicked, so the
audience know it's going to be a struggle for them to overcome the villain
in the final showdown. I suppose Van Damme did a lot off those, for
example with Bolo Yeung in Double
Impact. Lots of rehearsal went into the
fights and I think we had 1 full day per final fight to shoot them, which
isn't a lot! For the time we had I think they turned out really well. We
also open these films with an 'A' 'B' opening, so we go to the heroes and
introduce them and give them a cold open action scene and then we switch
to introducing the villains in another thriller sequence before cutting to
the main titles. It's good for audience retention who want things to start
with a bang!
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There's
also plenty of humour in Lock
& Load - so do talk about your movie's brand of comedy for a
bit! The
comedy in this film can be quite absurd and ridiculous at times, it ranges
from a little dark to totally goofy. The main thing we want is for the
audience to laugh along with us. We don't take it too seriously and there
are lots of tongue-in-cheek moments and in-jokes and even references to
action movie tropes. It isn't a parody as such but we want the audience to
know we're in on the joke, and if it's ridiculous and implausible it's
meant to be! For example, you definitely cannot fire a mortar tube by
holding it like a rocket launcher. But, it's meant to be a bit unhinged in
places. A few words about your directorial approach to your
story at hand? I
think with these sorts of films as opposed to something entirely more
story-driven, the idea is to keep it moving, keep the pace, have an action
scene every 15 minutes, open with a bang, end with a bang and make sure to
have a pay-off, some great deaths, some ludicrous one-liners and a great
bad guy - an action movie is only as good as the bad guy. From a style
perspective we wanted to have lots of colours in this, lots of bright
popping colours, beams of light and really make the most of our locations.
It's a colourful film and we wanted to showcase the locations, throw in
some crazy shots and just have fun with it. The story is relatively
complex in this one, there are a few twists, turns, double crosses etc.
but I think it does work well, you still want the audience to engage in
the story as well as enjoy the action sequences. You also play one of the leads in Lock
& Load - so what can you tell us about your character, what
did you draw upon to bring him to life, and have you written Nick with
yourself in mind from the get-go?
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with David McCallum |
I
do like playing a part in my own films, it doesn't have to be the lead but
I try to play a bit of a variety of characters. I think Nick's probably
the closest to my actual personality. He's always quipping and joking, can
be a bit smutty and goofy at times as well and generally enjoys himself or
makes light of a bad situation. He's a little bit unhinged as well, which
Derek (my co-star Colin MacDougall) is in his own way too, and I think
that's what sort of brings them together - their dementedness that they
revel in. I always think the most interesting heroes are the ones that
aren't perfect, they have flaws but they are relatable and likeable and I
hope that people like Nick and are rooting for the two heroes in the film. You're also in a lot
of fight and chase scenes in Lock
& Load - so what can you tell us about your physical training
for the role?
I'm
usually in the gym 5 or 6 days a week so I try to stay in shape even
between films or for films that don't necessarily require it. I don't
think I'd ever do the gaining weight (by weight I mean fat, not muscle)
for a role or get ultra skinny. For health reasons! I like to feel good.
For this one I hadn't done some of the kicks for a while, probably since
the first movie in the series, so as well as my usual gym training I got a
freestanding punchbag and did lots of kicks and stretches every day for a
few months before the shoot. The fights are faster and more nimble in this
one and I had to keep up with Dave McCallum (Baiser) who I have two fights with.
He's very fast and darts around with ease. So I had to make sure I was in
good shape to do the fights.
with Colin MacDougall and Graeme MacPherson |
Do talk about the rest of Lock
& Load's cast, and why exactly these people? Colin
MacDougall, who plays Derek (my partner in crime) is a nice laid back kinda guy, I
think we've got great chemistry on screen and he's always on the ball with
his performance, so it's been great doing another film with him. Graeme
MacPherson who plays Stokes got a bit more to do in this one (he's just in the cold open
of the first film), and I thought it'd be fun to bring him back and have
him be a bit of a contrast to Nick and Derek. Tony Macdonald, the main villain
(Steiger) is great for bad guy roles because he's got such a deep gravelly
voice and an ice cold stare so he brought a nice gravitas to it. Laura
MacDougall (Chess Master) and Dave McCallum (Baiser) have great martial arts backgrounds so
they brought some real energy and skill to the fight scene,s and they both
play characters that sort of revel in the mayhem and killing, and Stephen
Kerr (Sam Logan) is a very natural actor and he's good at giving a performance
with layers and a bit of insanity thrown in! A
few words about the shoot as such, and the on-set atmosphere?
Quite a gruelling shoot, probably the most physical I've ever done in terms of
fighting and general endurance. The rain fight at the end (which was shot
over 2 nights) was particularly unpleasant. It was coming into winter at
the time and we don't have the budget for hot water rain machines, so it is
literally cold river water pumped through the machines. We wore wet
suits/dry suits under our clothes but I don't know how much they helped, I
was starting to cramp up! The atmosphere on set always remained fun
though, lots of joking and appreciation for what we were doing, and the
cast and crew are all very chill and happy to be there (I hope!).
The $64-question of course, where can Lock
& Load be seen? The
film came out in the UK on Monday 24th July
on streaming platforms (Amazon Prime, Sky Store, YouTube Movies) and it'll
be released in the US towards the end of the year! Anything you can tell us
about audience and critical reception of Lock
& Load? The right places, and I think the pay-offs in the action surprised people.
Early reception has been good from reviewers, I think they get the film
and they get what we're trying to do, and that for me is the number one
most important thing from a reviewer or critic because if they are
comparing it to 200 mil blockbusters or whatever, it's always going to end
badly. The ones that get it tend to be the ones that appreciate it. Any future projects you'd like to
share?
We're working on a crime thriller right now that's very dark - a real departure
for us in terms of tone, style and character. I'm looking forward to
finishing that one because I hope it's going to surprise people. And then
later on in the year we're shooting a gothic horror called The Baby in the
Basket, which has a really cool cast. Penned by the writer of When
Darkness Falls, our last movie!
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merely forgotten to ask? Thanks
for all the support, we really appreciate it and thanks for sharing our
movies with your audience! Thanks for the interview!
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