Filmschoolrejects.com spoke with ‘Okja’ director Bong Joon-ho, and actors Jake Gyllenhaal and Tilda Swinton, back in May following the film’s premiere at the Cannes Film Festival. Here is their conversation:
Tilda, what was it about your experience working on Snowpiercer that made you want to work with Bong Joon-ho again so soon?
Tilda Swinton: I’ll be with Bong ’till the end. He’s now one of my favorite playmates, and anything that he comes up with, I’ll rock and roll with him. I met him in Cannes a few years ago when I was here with We Need To Talk About Kevin and he was on a jury. We had breakfast in a hotel and we became friends. That was it.
How much of your character’s appearance came from you and how much of it came from Bong?
TS: That’s an interesting question because it’s almost impossible to answer. It makes it clear to me how collaboratively we work. We just dream it up together.
As he sat down to talk to a select group about his latest film ‘Okja’ in Cannes, Jake Gyllenhaal crossed his arms in front of his chest and gave the room an intense, yet wary look-over. In that moment I thought, “uh oh” imagining the actor would be as I’d seen him before during a masterclass in Dubai — revealing exactly what he was prepared to disclose and nothing more, nothing less. Which would mean that I’d never get my answers about the man beneath the public persona. And that’s always the most interesting, isn’t it, who someone is after the spotlights are turned off and the crowds have gone home.
