USA: Matt Damon turns out for the New York premiere of his latest film, "The Informant!"
Record ID:
219670
USA: Matt Damon turns out for the New York premiere of his latest film, "The Informant!"
- Title: USA: Matt Damon turns out for the New York premiere of his latest film, "The Informant!"
- Date: 17th September 2009
- Summary: NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK, UNITED STATES (SEPTEMBER 15, 2009) (REUTERS) PAN OF RED CARPET (*** FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY ***) ACTOR MATT DAMON POSING ON THE RED CARPET DIRECTOR STEVEN SODERBERGH TALKING TO REPORTERS MATT DAMON TALKING TO REPORTER CUTAWAY OF PHOTOGRAPHER ACTOR JOEL MCHALE POSING FOR PICTURES ACTOR SCOTT BAKULA TALKING TO REPORTER (SOUNDBITE) (English) ACTOR MATT DAMON, SAYING: "Well it wasn't that much weight really, I mean, 30 pounds for somebody my size, I weigh about, I think like, 185, 190, so 30 pounds isn't that much, you know, sixty pounds, like DeNiro did for 'Raging Bull,' that's a lot of weight, and that's more work. I talked to him about it before I did it, and he was saying, 'yeah, the first part's fun, and then you get the second part, it's really hard,' and I just did the first part, so I'd definitely do it again because it was fun." CLOSE OF SIGN FOR "THE INFORMANT!" POSTER WITH ZOOM OUT TO MATT DAMON TALKING TO REPORTER PHOTOGRAPHERS COVERING EVENT (SOUNDBITE) (English) ACTOR MATT DAMON, SAYING: "Well, because the tone, because it's funny, and I think, had Steven not made the decision to shift the tone and make it a comedy, I don't think people would be that interested in seeing it because, exactly as you said in the question, you, you know, we see it on the news all day, we read it in the newspaper all day every day, who wants to, on their weekend, go see a movie about all this stuff that we can just turn on the TV and see? So I think, hopefully, the sense of humor, and the lightness that the movie has will make people want to go and get away and laugh a little bit." (SOUNDBITE) (English) DIRECTOR STEVEN SODERBERGH, SAYING: "I never saw it as a commentary on corporate culture and greed and all that, the fact is, lying is everywhere, it's everywhere. You can see it, it's in a hospital, it can be in a halfway house, or whatever. People lie all the time to try and get things that they want, and so that's what the movie was about to me, it wasn't, I wasn't thinking 'I want to make a movie about corporate corruption,' I just thought this guy was a really fascinating character, and when you put him in that environment, it's like an accelerant, and things start to really explode, so that's what I was interested in, I didn't see it as some kind of polemic about corporations." (SOUNDBITE) (English) WRITER KURT EICHENWALD, SAYING: "What was so astonishing, beyond the fact that Matt is incredible in the role, when those of us who know Mark Whitacre look up on the screen, it is Mark Whitacre, he does, he nails it even though he doesn't know that he's nailing the guy, so it's an amazing performance." VARIOUS OF RED CARPET WIDE OF RED CARPET EXTERIOR SIGNAGE OF THE ZIEGFELD THEATER
- Embargoed: 2nd October 2009 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Usa
- Country: USA
- Reuters ID: LVAV3YRV4GB11GSEMWIMNQKBOYI
- Story Text: Actor Matt Damon took to the red carpet Tuesday (September 15) to promote his latest film, "The Informant!," a black comedy about an executive who acts as a whistleblower at the midwestern-U.S. corporation he works for. Damon recently returned from promoting the film at the Venice and Toronto Film Festivals, and joined his friend and Director Steven Soderbergh, in ushering "The Informant!" to its United States debut.
Most questions directed at Damon on the red carpet had to do with his weight gain for the role of Mark Whitacre, the real life executive portrayed in the film. Damon played down the weight gain, and cited friend and actor Robert DeNiro as someone who undertook a more severe change. Damon called the "Raging Bull" actor for advice after accepting the role.
"Well it wasn't that much weight really, I mean, 30 pounds for somebody my size, I weigh about, I think like, 185, 190, so 30 pounds isn't that much," says Damon. "You know, sixty pounds, like DeNiro did for 'Raging Bull,' that's a lot of weight, and that's more work."
He adds, "I talked to him about it before I did it, and he was saying, 'yeah, the first part's fun, and then you get the second part, it's really hard,' and I just did the first part, so I'd definitely do it again because it was fun."
In "The Informant!" Damon wears a mustache and looks unusually unglamorous as Whitacre, who turns from corporate golden boy at Archer Daniels Midland to FBI informant to uncover price-fixing practices in the industry.
Dreaming of becoming a national hero and move up the company ladder, Whitacre agrees to wear a wire and carry a hidden tape recorder to give the FBI the evidence it needs to incriminate his bosses.
But nothing is straightforward in the film, which takes a farcical twist as it quickly becomes clear that Whitacre is not as well-meaning and reliable as he may seem.
Although the release of the film is appropriately timed, with public outrage at corporation widely expressed across the world since the collapse of the banking industry last year, Oscar winner Soderbergh insists that he didn't mean for "The Informant!" to be a satirical take on the current fiscal crisis. Rather, he thought it was a riveting story about a universal human quality -- lying.
"I never saw it as a commentary on corporate culture and greed and all that, the fact is, lying is everywhere, it's everywhere," says Steven Soderbergh. "You can see it, it's in a hospital, it can be in a halfway house, or whatever. People lie all the time to try and get things that they want, and so that's what the movie was about to me, it wasn't, I wasn't thinking 'I want to make a movie about corporate corruption'."
Matt Damon added that the fact that Soderbergh re-worked the story of the film into a black comedy was the best thing he could have done because with such bad realities in the news, no one would ever want to sit through a similar story on their time off.
"you know, we see it on the news all day, we read it in the newspaper all day every day, who wants to, on their weekend, go see a movie about all this stuff that we can just turn on the TV and see?" says Damon.
The story of Mark Whitacre was first brought to life through reporting by Kurt Eichenwald, who wrote about it through a series of articles in the New York Times. His writings for the newspaper were the basis for his book, "The Informer," published in 2000, and later, the film, which Soderbergh has been working on since 2001. Soderbergh made a point to not meet the real life person Damon portrays in the film, because he didn't want the character to be an imitation. Eichenwald was shocked by Damon's performance, because though the actor too had not met Mark Whitacre, Eichenwald believes he played the role perfectly.
"What was so astonishing, beyond the fact that Matt is incredible in the role, when those of us who know Mark Whitacre look up on the screen, it is Mark Whitacre, he does, he nails it even though he doesn't know that he's nailing the guy, so it's an amazing performance," says Kurt Eichenwald, writer of the book "The Informer," the source material for the screenplay.
"The Informant!" also stars actors Joel McHale and Scott Bakula as the FBI agents who convince Damon's character to become a whistleblower. Both actors were also on hand at the premiere at the Ziegfeld Theater in Manhattan.
"The Informant!," opens in U.S. theaters on September 18th. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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