British actor Jim Sturgess broke onto these shores with the one-two punch of starring in two high-profile studio movies, Julie Taymor’s Beatles musical Across the Universe and the Vegas blackjack thriller 21, the latter a huge breakout hit.
It might have been surprising to some when he chose to next tackle a much lower budgeted indie project, that being Canadian filmmaker Kari Skogland’s Irish thriller Fifty Dead Men Walking (watch exclusive Red Band trailer). In the real-life thriller, Sturgess plays Martin McGartland, a street hustler in Belfast who was recruited by British Intelligence to infiltrate the Irish Republican Army (IRA) in order to help prevent more deaths on both sides of the bloody war. Sir Ben Kingsley plays “Fergus,” the agent who brings Martin on as an informer, and the two actors offer a lot of high points to the movie whenever they’re on screen together.
ComingSoon.net sat down for this exclusive video interview with Sturgess where you can hear him talking about:
* Why he was interested in playing Martin McGartland
* What was involved in researching the role
* Why they had to keep the premise of the movie a secret from the locals and how they shot the movie without the people of Belfast knowing exactly what they were doing
* How they researched the movie despite not having access to Martin or “Fergus” (Sir Ben’s character)
* How it was going from the big studio movies to a lower budget indie film
* How he picks the roles that he takes
* Working with Sir Ben and what he took away from working with him… and Kevin Spacey… and Ed Harris
* He talks about his upcoming thriller Heartless, which premieres at FrightFest in the UK next week
* He talks about the experience working with Peter Weir on his next epic The Way Back as well as his voicework on Zack Snyder’s Guardians of Ga’Hoole
* And More!
Fifty Dead Men Walking opens in select cities on Friday, August 21. Watch the exclusive Red Band trailer here!
