(L to R) Nicolas Cage and John Travolta in ‘Face/Off’. Photo: Paramount Pictures.
Preview:
Nicolas Cage will star in new crime epic ‘Gambino.’
He’ll work again with ‘Face/Off’ director John Woo.
George Gallo and Nick Vallelonga wrote the script.
Back in 1997, director John Woo delivered some slick, silly action fun via ‘Face/Off’ which saw John Travolta’s dedicated FBI agent Sean Archer using special face-swapping technology to assume the identity of crazed criminal Castor Troy (Nicolas Cage) in an attempt to foul his latest scheme. Troy, in turn gets ahold of Archer’s face and the rest is pure 1990s Woo goodness.
It has been nearly 30 years since Woo and Cage worked together, but they’re set to team back up for a new crime epic called ‘Gambino.’
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The new movie will find Cage playing a mob boss who rules with a quiet authority in New York. Will it feature lots of Woo’s action flourishes. No one can say exactly yet, but we’d bet good money doves will fly at some point.
NextG Films is aboard to finance and co-produce the movie alongside Latigo Films.
Written by ‘Bad Boys’ veteran scribe George Gallo and Oscar-winning ‘Green Book’ writer/producer Nick Vallelonga, ‘Gambino’ follows Cage’s Carlo Gambino, a butcher’s son from Sicily, who ruled New York’s underworld with quiet authority. But when his death sends shockwaves through the city, Pulitzer-winning journalist Jimmy Breslin follows the trail he left beface-pffhind to uncover the man beneath the legend.
You want an official synopsis? Here’s ya official synopsis: “Through the voices of those who loved him and those who feared him, Breslin peels back the composure that masked Gambino’s ruthlessness, revealing how this outsider rose to redefine power, loyalty, and the American dream.”
Is another ‘Face/Off’ movie in the, er, offing?
Nicolas Cage in ‘Face/Off’. Photo: Paramount Pictures.
Despite fan demands for a follow-up, things have been relative quiet on a potential direct sequel to the original Cage/Travolta action movie.
There has been chatter about a remake, but in 2021, ‘The Guest’ director Adam Wingard announced he was attached to a follow-up.
Perhaps a reunion of Cage and Woo could give them both the impetus to get to work on an official sequel?
When will ‘Gambino’ be in theaters?
The movie is still at the “rights for sale” stage of development and pre-production, with WME Independent launching promotion of the enticing package at this year’s American Film Market.
Director John Woo on the set of ‘The Killer’. Photo: Peacock.
(L to R) Ben Affleck and Uma Thurman in ‘Paycheck’. Photo: Paramount Pictures.
Michael Jennings (Ben Affleck) is a genius who’s hired – and paid handsomely – by high-tech firms to work on highly sensitive projects, after which his short-term memory is erased so he’s incapable of breaching security. But at the end of a three-year job, he’s told he isn’t getting a paycheck and instead receives a mysterious envelope. In it are clues he must piece together to find out why he wasn’t paid – and why he’s now in hot water.
1975’s ‘The Dragon Tamers’. Photo: Golden Harvest Company.
Carter Wong plays a young chinese martial arts student who travels to Korea to learn Taekwondo Soon he comes up against a vicious gang who want all the local martial arts schools to join their evil association. But before he can defeat the bad guys he has to learn to master his own strong desire to fight.
(L to R) Adam Beach and Nicolas Cage in ‘Windtalkers’. Photo: MGM.
Joe Enders (Nicolas Cage) is a gung-ho Marine assigned to protect a “windtalker” – one of several Navajo Indians who were used to relay messages during World War II because their spoken language was indecipherable to Japanese code breakers.
Joel Kinnaman as Godlock in ‘Silent Night’. Photo Credit: Carlos Latapi.
From legendary director John Woo and the producer of ‘John Wick‘ comes this gritty revenge tale of a tormented father (Joel Kinnaman) who witnesses his young son die when caught in a gang’s crossfire on Christmas Eve. While recovering from a wound that costs him his voice, he makes vengeance his life’s mission and embarks on a punishing training regimen in order to avenge his son’s death. Full of Woo’s signature style, ‘Silent Night’ redefines the action genre with visceral, thrill-a-minute storytelling.
1986’s ‘Heroes Shed No Tears’. Photo: Golden Harvest.
The Thai government hires a group of Chinese mercenaries to capture a powerful drug lord from the Golden Triangle. The mercenaries manage to capture the drug lord, but soon find themselves pursued by his forces, and the forces of a bitter Thai officer. The Chinese mercenaries are vastly outnumbered, and as their numbers begin to dwindle, their desperation pulls them into a corner as their enemies close in on them.
The battle of Red Cliff continues and the alliance between Xu and East Wu is fracturing. With Cao Cao’s (Zhang Feng Yi) massive forces on their doorstep, will the kingdoms of Xu and East Wu survive?
In 208 A.D., in the final days of the Han Dynasty, shrewd Prime Minster Cao (Zhang Feng Yi) convinced the fickle Emperor Han the only way to unite all of China was to declare war on the kingdoms of Xu in the west and East Wu in the south. Thus began a military campaign of unprecedented scale. Left with no other hope for survival, the kingdoms of Xu and East Wu formed an unlikely alliance.
Jean-Claude Van Damme in ‘Hard Target’. Photo: Universal Pictures.
When a woman’s father goes missing, she (Yancy Butler) enlists a local (Jean-Claude Van Damme) to aid in her search. The pair soon discover that her father has died at the hands of a wealthy sportsman (Lance Henriksen) who hunts homeless men as a form of recreation.
1990’s ‘Bullet in the Head’. Photo: Golden Princess Film Production.
Three childhood friends from the slums of Hong Kong flee to war-time Saigon after accidentally murdering a gang leader, but their troubles only escalate.
Tom Cruise in ‘Mission: Impossible II’. Photo: Paramount Pictures.
With computer genius Luther Stickell (Ving Rhames) at his side and a beautiful thief (Thandiwe Newton) on his mind, agent Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) races across Australia and Spain to stop a former IMF agent (Dougray Scott) from unleashing a genetically engineered biological weapon called Chimera. This mission, should Hunt choose to accept it, plunges him into the center of an international crisis of terrifying magnitude.
(L to R) Omar Sy and Nathalie Emmanuel in ‘The Killer’, directed by John Woo. Photo: Peacock.
From the Oscar winning producer of ‘Oppenheimer‘, the kinetic action thriller stars Emmy nominee Nathalie Emmanuel as Zee, a mysterious and infamous assassin known, and feared, in the Parisian underworld as the Queen of the Dead.
(L to R) John Travolta and Christian Slater in ‘Broken Arrow’. Photo: 20th Century Fox.
When rogue stealth-fighter pilot Vic Deakins (John Travolta) deliberately drops off the radar while on maneuvers, the Air Force ends up with two stolen nuclear warheads — and Deakins’s co-pilot, Riley Hale (Christian Slater), is the military’s only hope for getting them back. Traversing the deserted canyons of Utah, Hale teams with park ranger Terry Carmichael (Samantha Mathis) to put Deakins back in his box.
(Right) Chow Yun-fat in 1989’s ‘The Killer’. Photo: Golden Princess Film Production.
Mob assassin Jeffrey (Chow Yun-fat) is no ordinary hired gun; the best in his business, he views his chosen profession as a calling rather than simply a job. So, when beautiful nightclub chanteuse Jennie (Sally Yeh) is blinded in the crossfire of his most recent hit, Jeffrey chooses to retire after one last job to pay for his unintended victim’s sight-restoring operation. But when Jeffrey is double-crossed, he reluctantly joins forces with a rogue policeman (Danny Lee Sau-Yin) to make things right.
Chow Yun-fat in ‘Hard Boiled’. Photo: Golden Princess Film Production.
A cop (Chow Yun-fat) who loses his partner in a shoot-out with gun smugglers goes on a mission to catch them. In order to get closer to the leaders of the ring he joins forces with an undercover cop (Tony Leung Chiu-wai) who’s working as a gangster hitman. They use all means of excessive force to find them.
(L to R) Nicolas Cage and John Travolta in ‘Face/Off’. Photo: Paramount Pictures.
In order to foil a terrorist plot, an FBI agent (John Travolta) undergoes facial transplant surgery and assumes the identity of a criminal mastermind (Nicolas Cage). The plan turns sour when the criminal wakes up prematurely and seeks revenge.
Premiering on Peacock August 23rd is ‘The Killer’, which is a remake of the classic 1989 action movie of the same name helmed by the original’s director, legendary filmmaker John Woo (‘Face/Off’ and ‘Silent Night’).
(L to R) Omar Sy and Nathalie Emmanuel star in ‘The Killer’, directed by John Woo.
Moviefone recently had the pleasure of speaking with actors Nathalie Emmanuel and Omar Sy about their work on ‘The Killer’, appearing in a remake directed by the original’s director, working with John Woo, the amazing action sequences, Zee’s motivations, and their characters’ complicated relationship with each other.
You can read the full interview below or click on the video player above to watch the interview.
(L to R) Nathalie Emmanuel, Omar Sy and director John Woo on the set of ‘The Killer’. Photo: Peacock.
Moviefone: To begin with, Nathalie, what is it like starring in a remake of a classic John Woo movie, that is directed by John Woo himself?
Nathalie Emmanuel: It’s great, it was what dreams are made of. That’s how I feel. I think when you have a remake of something that’s so iconic as ‘The Killer’, to have it be remade or reimagined, if you will, with the man himself, it’s the most exciting prospect for a re-imagining or a remake of something. I just felt incredibly excited. I just trusted John and his vision and what he wanted, and it gave me a lot of confidence to just step into it and it was just wonderful.
Director John Woo on the set of ‘The Killer’. Photo: Peacock.
MF: Omar, what was your first reaction to the screenplay and the opportunity to work with John Woo?
Omar Sy: The reaction is difficult to describe. It was like beyond a dream of something that you cannot dare to imagine, and it was happening. Just being in a John Woo movie but being in the classic ‘The Killer’ that I used to watch as a teenager so many times was amazing. The third thing was that it happens in Paris, my hometown. So that was just beyond everything. I had all my friend coming to set and saying, “You’re in a John Woo movie,” and then you can just witness that. It was amazing to do that, and then Paris was an amazing set, and the way John loves Paris was something interesting too. We had a lot of fun, but the reaction to today is just unbelievable what happened.
Nathalie Emmanuel in ‘The Killer’, directed by John Woo. Photo: Peacock.
MF: The action sequences are beautifully shot, and the choreography looks almost like a dance. Nathalie, can you talk about learning the stunt choreography and being directed by John Woo in the action sequences?
NE: I think you characterize it perfectly. It’s like doing a dance, not just within the choreography, but with the camera itself and the way that John shoots it. It’s almost like you’re waltzing with the camera at times, and it can be very specific and technical, but there’s also space for some spontaneity and playfulness as well. I feel like the process of learning choreography was so fulfilling and so wonderful, and the stunt team just really poured into me and really wanted to know how I felt about the way that Zee fights or how she kills or how she does her job. There were things that I brought to them, and they were really embracing of it, and John is also very involved in that too. Just having that pool of unbelievable talent and then the nurture involved, it was just wonderful. I honestly just felt proud of it and very proud of the things that I achieved, and it would just never have happened without that huge team of people.
Omar Sy as Sey in ‘The Killer’, directed by John Woo. Photo: Peacock.
MF: Omar, can you talk about the training and preparation you did for the action sequences?
OS: Same, that we had to be physically prepared to handle the whole shoot and the fight choreography, also the gun handling and all of that. So, we had few weeks before shooting and while we were shooting, we also had to do more training and to go into the precise choreography and all of that was very interesting. It was a lot of work, but very interesting because the process was different. This time, we had a lot of space to add something for our characters, that each move was a line, it’s a response to something with our characters. It was the first time for me to approach choreography and fight scenes like that. So, it was very interesting for me. It changed my way of seeing all those action moves.
(L to R) Nathalie Emmanuel and Diana Silvers in ‘The Killer’, directed by John Woo. Photo: Peacock.
MF: Natalie, can you talk about your character’s motivations, her unlikely alliance with Sey and why she decides to protect Jenn?
NE: Well, I think she’s got a very clear way of doing things, and she’s lived this life of solitude. She does her thing, she lives her life in a very particular, almost regimented way, but she’s somebody who is faced with this situation and her code and how she has a clear code of conduct. She will do the best thing to get the job done, and it becomes very clear that Sey is someone who she can collaborate with because he gets it. It’s that like recognizes like. At first, she’s like, “You are the enemy.” It becomes very clear that she’s like, “Oh, okay, I see something in you that I understand,” and I think the reason why she goes against Finn, played by Sam Worthington, and saves Jennifer or Jenn is because she believes in justice. She believes in the right thing. She’s like, “No civilians, innocent lives are not what I’m here to do,” but it throws up a lot of conflict for her. Therefore, it throws up a lot of questions about her whole life and the way she lives it, and that’s what happens for Zee throughout the movie.
(L to R) Omar Sy and Nathalie Emmanuel in ‘The Killer’, directed by John Woo. Photo: Peacock.
MF: Finally, Omar, can you talk about why Sey is fascinated by Zee and the cat and mouse game that they play throughout the movie?
OS: It was very interesting for me to play that because he’s a very instinctive guy and there is something that he recognizes that he feels about this assassin, Zee. She’s supposed to be the enemy, but because he recognized something, that same code and the same sense of fairness and justice, that’s how they will be on the same side very soon. He can recognize and feel that, and I like that it’s very sudden, it’s immediate, but it’s like a feeling, and the way to process takes the whole movie for him to understand why. But the feeling is magic, and then the fact that he can process and intellectualize that, it takes the whole movie almost. I like those that sometimes the heart goes before your brain, and I like that in the movie because it shows how romantic John is. It’s like the heart is always stronger than the brain, and I like that aspect of the movie.
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What is the plot of ‘The Killers’?
From the Oscar winning producer of ‘Oppenheimer‘, the kinetic action thriller stars Emmy-nominee Nathalie Emmanuel as Zee, a mysterious and infamous assassin known, and feared, in the Parisian underworld as the “Queen of the Dead”.
(L to R) Joel Kinnaman and director John Woo on the set of ‘Silent Night.’ Photo Credit: Carlos Latapi.
It’s been 20 years since John Woo made a movie for an American studio, and the action genre has missed this Hong Kong master during his absence. Woo does indeed bring a number of his trademark stylistic moves to ‘Silent Night,’ and is aided by a ferocious performance from Joel Kinnaman. But both are saddled with a derivative revenge story and a gimmick that quickly becomes contrived, making Woo’s return to Hollywood a mixed bag at best.
Story and Direction
(L to R) Director John Woo and Scott Mescudi on the set of ‘Silent Night.’ Photo Credit: Carlos Latapi.
Before there was ‘John Wick’ or ‘The Matrix’ or ‘Fast and Furious,’ there was John Woo. The Hong Kong master of action cinema rose to international prominence in the late 1980s and early ‘90s through such masterpieces of visceral action and violence as ‘The Killer’ and ‘Bullet in the Head,’ which combined double-fisted shootouts, almost gravity-defying action, and operatic, weirdly sentimental epics of male relationships and loyalties strained to the breaking point and beyond.
Woo eventually found his way to Hollywood, but after a string of hits and misses that included two legitimately terrific films – ‘Broken Arrow’ and ‘Face/Off’ – he returned to make movies in Hong Kong following 2003’s disappointing ‘Paycheck.’ But now he’s come back to these shores for his first Hollywood film in two decades, the revenge thriller ‘Silent Night.’
Joel Kinnaman stars as Brian Godlock (yes, that’s the name) who, when we first meet him, is wearing a bloodied ugly Christmas sweater and chasing two cars on foot as the inhabitants of the cars exchange wild gunfire through the streets. This first scene immediately makes us realize how much we’ve missed Mr. Woo: it’s intense, strangely symbolic (there’s a red balloon floating above that Godlock keeps his eye on), and absolutely bonkers, ending with Godlock doing a bit of parkour and several gangbangers impaled through their windshield.
Harold Torres as Playa in ‘Silent Night.’ Photo Credit: Carlos Latapi.
But not all of them: the leader, a truly menacing dude (Harold Torres) who we find out later is named Playa (yes, that’s the name), gets out of one of the cars, pulls out his gun, and puts one in Godlock’s throat, seemingly leaving him to bleed out. Over the course of the next few scenes, as Godlock recovers in the hospital from the brink of death, we find out the back story: Godlock and his wife Saya (Catalina Sandino Moreno) were playing in their front yard with their young son when the gang cars careened by, a stray bullet instantly ending the boy’s life.
From there, you can guess what happens, mainly because Robert Archer Lynn’s script is derivative, cliched, and predictable as hell: Godlock begins a single-minded quest to avenge his boy’s death, spending the next full year getting in top physical shape and training himself as an assassin as he zeroes in on Playa and his crew, even at the expense of his marriage and perhaps his sanity.
The twist here is that ‘Silent Night’ truly is silent: with the exception of a few whispered words from Saya, some police radio transmissions, and the odd radio broadcast, there is no dialogue in the film. Godlock has lost his voice, which somehow means that no one else can speak either. With film being, of course, a visual medium, the idea of a dialogue-free scenario is an intriguing one – if it makes sense in terms of the plot. It’s not very long before ‘Silent Night’ strains our belief and its own narrative with all sorts of contortions to avoid having people speak, down to Saya texting her husband from the kitchen as he sits brooding next door in the garage – in full sight of his wife.
Catalina Sandino as Saya in ‘Silent Night.’ Photo Credit: Courtesy of Lionsgate.
Speaking of poor Saya, she’s lost a child too but Godlock and the film don’t acknowledge that, and Moreno is quickly shuffled off stage left halfway through the picture. We don’t know how Scott ‘Kid Cudi’ Mescudi feels about his detective character, Dennis Vassel, also being reduced to a barely visible supporting player for most of the movie, only to emerge as a seemingly important character in the last 10 minutes. Like everyone else, he doesn’t speak, which makes his scenes even more irrelevant to the proceedings.
Most of the movie’s running time is devoted to Joel Kinnaman’s Godlock, and the good news is that the actor is fully committed to showing us his pain, grief, shock, and fury through his physicality. And he gets to indulge that physicality in several excellent action sequences, including that opening chase, a brutal fight between Kinnaman and a gang member he takes hostage in his kitchen, and another wild car chase featuring the striking image of first thick rivulets of blood, then a dead man’s face, slowly sliding down a windshield like melting crimson ice.
It’s what comes between all that that’s the problem. The revenge narrative is so well-worn that we can see right through it, and while we appreciate that it takes Godlock a year to get his act together, the training montage that eats up most of the second act goes on far too long. But Godlock himself is defined by just his rage and grief. There’s nothing else to him: we don’t even know how he supports himself, especially after Saya leaves him. John Woo’s best movies have almost always had two morally conflicted men reluctantly clashing with each other: here, in what is essentially your standard right-wing vigilante fantasy, there are no moral layers. There’s no sense of humor or the absurd either, something Woo also injected into his earlier films: ‘Silent Night’ takes itself dead seriously.
Scott Mescudi as Vassell in ‘Silent Night.’ Photo Credit: Courtesy of Lionsgate.
The gangbangers fare even worse, with the film playing up just about every racist stereotype about Mexicans that you can think of. It’s borderline indefensible. Equally lame is the film’s apocalyptic vision of a modern city (which is never named, although all the license plates are from Texas). Godlock is able to run a few hundred yards from his pleasant, tree-lined suburban block to a skid row on steroids, making us wonder why the hell he bought there in the first place.
Woo does execute some great action, with all the explosive mayhem and flying blood we’ve come to expect from him in the past, and Kinnaman is game for all of it. But we have to mention again how silly the lack of dialogue becomes — although a movie like this probably doesn’t miss it that much in the end – and how grave the whole thing is when it surely could have poked fun at itself.
Joel Kinnaman
Joel Kinnaman as Godlock in ‘Silent Night.’ Photo Credit: Courtesy of Lionsgate.
We have to hand it to Joel Kinnaman. The Swedish-American actor has been toiling in Hollywood since 2011, going from the highs of starring as Rick Flag in both ‘Suicide Squad’ movies and leading the acclaimed ‘For All Mankind’ series to the lows of replicating Alex Murphy in the ill-fated ‘RoboCop’ remake.
Real stardom has eluded Kinnaman to date, and while ‘Silent Night’ probably won’t change that equation, we have to give the actor credit for a painfully intense performance. Brian Godlock isn’t exactly a multi-dimensional character, but Kinnaman goes all-in and convincingly portrays a man following a path of revenge and self-destruction fueled by deep grief – all without saying a single word.
That’s tough to do, and Kinnaman pulls it off even if he’s not the most charismatic actor around. He also credibly pulls off the action and gunplay, and while a deeper moral conflict and perhaps some humor would be welcome in his work here, that’s more the fault of the writer, and not this watchable actor.
Joel Kinnaman as Godlock in ‘Silent Night.’ Photo Credit: Carlos Latapi.
With classic Hong Kong films like ‘A Better Tomorrow,’ ‘The Killer,’ and ‘Hard Boiled,’ John Woo achieved a balletic, intense, almost poetic approach to violence and gunplay that influenced directors around the world for decades since. His up-close-and-personal trademark imagery of two men shooting at each other with both hands in close quarters has been adopted since by the likes of franchises like the John Wick movies.
We’re glad to say it shows up here in ‘Silent Night,’ along with his other trademark, the slow-motion action scene, giving this movie some of Woo’s most distinctive touches. He also shoots shattering glass just about better than anyone, making it look like deadly, frozen, crystalline rain. ‘Silent Night’ has several standout sequences: its opening chase with Kinnaman on foot pursuing two gang vehicles, and that fight in a kitchen midway through the movie that is absolutely bone-crunching.
Some of the later action in the film is more generic in nature – how many times have we seen the hero fight his way up a long, winding staircase through endless hordes of henchmen – but Woo still shoots it in a more intense fashion than many of his stylistic successors. This may not be peak Woo, but it’s still a trip to see the master back in (no pun intended) action again.
Final Thoughts
Director John Woo on the set of ‘Silent Night.’ Photo Credit: Carlos Latapi.
As fans of John Woo’s early Hong Kong classics and several of his previous Hollywood pictures, like ‘Broken Arrow’ and the camp masterpiece ‘Face/Off,’ we were looking forward to seeing ‘Silent Night.’ We also appreciate the presence and commitment of Joel Kinnaman, a hard-working actor if not quite a movie star. But while we enjoyed some of Woo’s distinctive tricks and visceral approach to action and violence, the movie’s cliched storyline and the “no dialogue” novelty act wear out their welcome pretty quickly. The director and his star do the best they can, but both deserve better.
‘Silent Night’ receives 5 out of 10 stars.
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What is the plot of ‘Silent Night’?
After losing both his son and his voice as a result of gang violence on Christmas Eve, a grief-stricken, fury-fueled father (Joel Kinnaman) prepares to take his revenge on the people who shattered his life.
Moviefone recently had the pleasure of speaking with Joel Kinnaman in-person about his work on ‘Silent Night,’ the challenges of appearing in a movie with no dialogue, his character’s emotional state, why he seeks revenge, and what he learned about action movies from working with master filmmaker John Woo.
Joel Kinnaman as Godlock in ‘Silent Night.’ Photo Credit: Courtesy of Lionsgate.
You can read the full interview below or click on the video player above to watch our interviews with Kinnaman and director John Woo.
Moviefone: To begin with, the movie has no dialogue. As an actor, did you find that to be a freeing process or was it more demanding because every emotion must be seen through your physical actions?
Joel Kinnaman: You’ve put the nail on the head there. It was surprisingly demanding. I really did not expect how much more demanding it was. When you have dialogue and you’re telling the story also through your words, you can rely on that in a way. Here when the only modality I must tell the story is through my eyes and the little micro expressions that come in the face that basically are only expressed when your emotions are coming through or when your thoughts get a representation in your face. The only way that they do that is if I’m a hundred percent emotionally engaged and present in each scene. So, it demanded me to do more prep for each scene and for each take. It was much harder to just roll into it. Sometimes you could if the situation demanded, but because this character is in such a state in every scene in this film, it really demanded for me to be there.
Joel Kinnaman as Godlock in ‘Silent Night.’ Photo Credit: Carlos Latapi.
MF: Can you talk about what your character is going through emotionally at the beginning of the film, suffering the loss of his child and the revenge that ends up consuming him?
JK: So, this film on its face is a very high octane, fast moving, fast-paced action film. It has a very emotional setup where we dive deep into emotions and I had a fantastic partner in Catalina Moreno, so I was very proud of how deep we got in portraying that. So, it gives the film a big setup. But when it comes to the character and the character’s journey, it’s really a tragedy. It’s a man that loses his son and his son is the light of his life. It’s a love that he’s never felt before. This gets taken away from him and he just loses his connection with love. So, it makes him unable to reconnect with his wife and with his life. The only thing that he can connect to is this obsession of making the people who took this away from him pay. The tragedy is that if you go down that path, like he does, you ultimately lose your humanity.
(L to R) Joel Kinnaman and director John Woo on the set of ‘Silent Night.’ Photo Credit: Carlos Latapi.
MF: Finally, you’ve worked on a lot of action projects in the past, but what was it like for you working with director John Woo on this film and what did you learn from him about making action movies?
JK: When it came to the actual action, I think I learned a lot from a lot of people on set. I had a great stunt coordinator in Jim Churchman and an incredible fight coordinator in Jeremy Marinas, who is going to become one of the new big action directors, I’m sure. But with John, what I really learned was that there’s a lot of levels and I really got to watch a master at work. With this movie, because you remove the dialogue, he doesn’t have to come in and shoot coverage of a scene where you’re filming someone talking or filming someone listen. It freed him up so he could just design one beautiful cinematic shot that tells the story of that scene. So, to get to be part of that and just to see him in action and see how his mind processed what the scene was about, what we wanted to tell into one beautiful shot was really inspiring and I learned a lot about storytelling from him.
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What is the plot of ‘Silent Night?’
Brian Godluck (Joel Kinnaman) is a family man who goes into the underworld to avenge his young son’s death on Christmas Eve.
John Travolta is a true triple threat of a performer, as he can act, sing, and dance!
Travolta first gained attention in the late ’70s as Vinnie Barbarino on the TV series ‘Welcome Back, Kotter,’ but quickly became a movie star after roles in ‘Carrie,’ ‘Saturday Night Fever,’ and ‘Grease.’
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Armed men hijack a New York City subway train, holding the passengers hostage in return for a ransom, and turning an ordinary day’s work for dispatcher Walter Garber (Denzel Washington) into a face-off with the mastermind behind the crime.
Carrie White (Sissy Spacek), a shy and troubled teenage girl who is tormented by her high school peers and her fanatically religious mother, begins to use her powers of telekinesis to exact revenge upon them.
When rogue stealth-fighter pilot Vic Deakins (Travolta) deliberately drops off the radar while on maneuvers, the Air Force ends up with two stolen nuclear warheads — and Deakins’s co-pilot, Riley Hale (Christian Slater), is the military’s only hope for getting them back. Traversing the deserted canyons of Utah, Hale teams with park ranger Terry Carmichael to put Deakins back in his box.
A DEA agent (Travolta) investigates the disappearance of a legendary Army ranger drill sergeant (Samuel L. Jackson) and several of his cadets during a training exercise gone severely awry.
Jan Schlickmann (Travolta) is a cynical lawyer who goes out to ‘get rid of’ a case, only to find out it is potentially worth millions. The case becomes his obsession, to the extent that he is willing to give up everything—including his career and his clients’ goals—in order to continue the case against all odds.
In this adaptation of the best-selling roman à clef about Bill Clinton’s 1992 run for the White House, the young and gifted Henry Burton (Adrian Lester) is tapped to oversee the presidential campaign of Governor Jack Stanton (Travolta). Burton is pulled into the politician’s colorful world and looks on as Stanton — who has a wandering eye that could be his downfall — contends with his ambitious wife, Susan (Emma Thompson), and an outspoken adviser, Richard Jemmons (Billy Bob Thornton).
Chili Palmer (Travolta) is a Miami mobster who gets sent by his boss, the psychopathic “Bones” Barboni (Dennis Farina), to collect a bad debt from Harry Zimm (Gene Hackman), a Hollywood producer who specializes in cheesy horror films. When Chili meets Harry’s leading lady (Rene Russo), the romantic sparks fly. After pitching his own life story as a movie idea, Chili learns that being a mobster and being a Hollywood producer really aren’t all that different.
Australian good girl Sandy (Olivia Newton-John) and greaser Danny fell (John Travolta) in love over the summer. But when they unexpectedly discover they’re now in the same high school, will they be able to rekindle their romance despite their eccentric friends?
In order to foil a terrorist plot, an FBI agent (John Travolta) undergoes facial transplant surgery and assumes the identity of a criminal mastermind (Nicolas Cage), who murdered his only son. The plan turns sour when the criminal wakes up prematurely and seeks revenge.
Tony (Travolta) spends his Saturdays at a disco where his stylish moves raise his popularity among the patrons. But his life outside the disco is not easy and things change when he gets attracted to Stephanie (Karen Lynn Gorney).
A burger-loving hit man (Travolta), his philosophical partner (Samuel L. Jackson), a drug-addled gangster’s moll (Uma Thurman) and a washed-up boxer (Bruce Willis) converge in this sprawling, comedic crime caper. Their adventures unfurl in three stories that ingeniously trip back and forth in time.
