2023-05-20 05:03:45
If the two actors gave the reply from 1993 in “Secret wounds”, it took thirty years for the trio to work together in “Killers of the Flower Moon”, a film presented on Saturday on the Croisette.
Admittedly, there was The Audition. This short film*directed in 2015 by Martin Scorsese, with Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert de Niro (and Brad Pitt), making the promotion of two casinos in Macao and Manila, is officially the first film in which the director of Taxi Driver brings together its two favorite actors. Nevertheless, moviegoers around the world eagerly await Killers of the Flower Moonpresented on Saturday May 20 out of competition at the Cannes Film Festival.
“Marty’s” latest film marks his tenth collaboration with Robert De Niro and his sixth with Leonardo DiCaprio. This western, adapted from American author David Grann’s bestseller, focuses on case of murders among the Osage Native American people, who became wealthy following the discovery of oil reserves on their land, in Oklahoma in the 1920s.
If they are reunited for the first time in a feature film by the New York filmmaker, “Bob” and “Lo” have already given the reply. In a film that almost everyone has forgotten: Secret woundswhich depicts the relationship between a rebellious teenager and his violent stepfather in the 1950s. Directed by Michael Caton-Jones, released on French screens in 1994, it constitutes the real starting point of the cinematographic relationship of the trio.
When the two actors arrive on the set of Secret woundsone is a huge star, winner of two Oscars, when the other is just a young teenager who has gone through and is finishing the sitcom What’s up Doc ?. “Il was one of 400 boys to audition”says Michael Caton-Jones in Medium* in 2016. His essays impress. “When I showed the tape to De Niro he said, ‘Oh I like the blond boy in the middle, he gave me chills'”retraces the director.
“You should work with him”
Leonardo DiCaprio, however, has a contrasting memory of his first rehearsal once morest the sacred monster, during a scene where the two characters clash … regarding a pot of mustard. The youngster then wants to impress the star. “I thought I had to do something…memorable (…) De Niro was there asking me: ‘Is it empty, is it empty?’ I just got up and knocked over my chair, or something, and yelled at him, ‘No, it’s not empty’he detailed in 2016 in Deadline*.
“Bob had this smirk on his face, and started to slowly explode, laughing in my face. And then he looked at everyone, and the whole room started laughing.”
Leonardo DiCaprio, actorat Deadline
Leonardo DiCaprio thinks he missed his chance. It’s just the opposite. Bluffed by his playmate, Robert De Niro talks regarding it to his friend Martin Scorsese. “He said to me: ‘I work with this young boy. He is really good. You should work with him.’ It was the first time that I had heard him recommend someone to me”explains the director in an article published Tuesday by Deadline*.
At the same time, the talent of DiCaprio bluffs another legend of American cinema, this time without his knowledge. Marlon Brando then just saw the actor in Gilbert Grape, where he plays a disabled person alongside Johnny Depp, a role that earned him his first Oscar nomination. The Hollywood legend talks regarding it to Baz Luhrmann, who prepares Romeo+Juliet, with DiCaprio as the Shakespearean lover. However, for Brando, choosing “a young man who is not completely in control of his mental faculties” is not necessarily a good idea. Thus, by his performance, “Leonardo had managed to make him believe that he really wasn’t quite balanced”relates the Australian filmmaker in 2007 to the magazine SFGate*.
An “empty shell” to fill
For the filming of Secret woundsLeonardo DiCaprio launches into a catch-up session of the great American classics, before rubbing shoulders with the one he will describe later, in an interview with the Screen Actors Guild*, like his “favorite actor”. “I came to this set following seeing everything Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro had done.”he says in Deadline. A “film history lesson” that he inflicts on himself “obsessively” in his room. A way to fill the “empty shell” that he was at the time of filming Secret woundshe assured in 2010 in L’Express (article for subscribers).
Robert de Niro takes care of the rest of his education, making him “watch all the great movies that[il] back[t] see at [son] age”, he continues in the weekly. In contact with him, he also learns his trade. “On n’imagine not even what it should give. I don’t see how Robert De Niro’s Actor’s Studio method might not have influenced him”supports Marie-Pierre Huillet, specialist in American cinema at the University of Toulouse.
Leonardo DiCaprio remembers in particular the turbulent teenager he might be and the aura of his partner. “I had no idea how to conduct myself on set. I didn’t understand when to…shut up”he smiles in Deadline. He confesses that director Michael Caton-Jones had to calm him down when Robert De Niro was preparing his scenes.
“Everyone was constantly joking until De Niro came on set. I was like, ‘What’s going on here?’ I mightn’t understand why everyone was so serious.”
Leonardo DiCaprioin a 2014 Screen Actors Guild interview
After secret wounds, Leonardo DiCaprio’s rise continues with Romeo+Julietthen he becomes a star thanks to Titanic. Hollywood is at his feet, George Lucas offers him the role of Anakin Skywalker in the second trilogy of the saga Star Wars, which he refuses. He is oriented towards The beach by Danny Boyle, but the turning point came when he met Martin Scorsese for Gangs of New Yorkat the beginning of the year 2000. “Building a career is real work, he fumbled at the beginning, it’s normal, details Marie-Pierre Huillet. He was a bit of a prisoner of his good looks. He had the foresight to choosing movies that took him out of his comfort zone. He built his trajectory with a certain intelligence of choice.” The actor confided the rest in 2013 in Point (article for subscribers) that his father had advised him to try to shoot under the direction of Martin Scorsese, “now that[il pouvait] work with people who [l]interested[ai]ent”.
Between “Bob” and “Leo”, two missed opportunities
The Italian-American director has also tried for his historical film on the founding of New York to associate Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro. The latter had declined the proposal, underlines Martin Scorsese in Deadline. Another attempt failed a few years later, while the filmmaker was preparing Infiltrators. He finally succeeds at the age of 80. “He is one of those aging, ‘iconized’, sometimes fantasized directors. It’s a way for him to come full circle, observe Marie-Pierre Huillet. But it’s also an ihuge communication blow. It makes the film necessarily ‘bankable’ and attractive.”
Thirty years following the filming of Secret woundsLeonardo DiCaprio savors, also in Deadlinethe chance to be able to find his “cinematic heroes” : “Work with [Robert De Niro], watching his professionalism and the way he created his character was one of the most influential experiences in my life and career. It led me to do all these movies with Marty and now (…) we all get to work together and collaborate, it’s such an amazing and special experience for me.”
* Links followed by an asterisk refer to content in English.
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