Willem Dafoe: Inside role was a 'pleasure'
Willem Dafoe thought it was a "pleasure" rather than a "challenge" to play a largely silent role in 'Inside'.
Willem Dafoe thought it was a "pleasure" to play a largely silent role in 'Inside'.
The 67-year-old actor portrays art thief Nemo, who gets trapped inside a New York penthouse when a heist goes wrong, in the new film and he insisted it didn't seem like a "challenge" having to get across his character's emotions with his actions and body language rather than dialogue.
He told ComingSoon.net: "I didn’t see it as a problem or a challenge, that was the pleasure. That was the opportunity, to tell you the truth. Just a different way of doing things, not using words so much, not bouncing off other people, bouncing off of places, things, objects."
The movie was shot chronologically and Willem insisted the filmmaking process was an "actor's dream".
He said: "It was a very task-oriented performance. That’s where you start, by doing things, and then you’ll have an experience, and with each choice you make, with each action you make, there’s a consequence and then, story starts to emerge. So, it was a very organic way to work. We shot chronologically. So it was an actor’s dream, actually, to work this way."
The actor hopes the movie will raise important questions about people's relationships with technology and the darker aspects of material wealth.
He said: "This guy gets trapped in this place and he’s surrounded by all the things we value as objects, as material, priceless art, luxurious apartment. But it’s no use to him. What he needs are basic human things. And to see those things that we value in one context, become worthless in another context, always opens up all kinds of questions as to what their inherent value really is.
"It puts us in a questioning frame of mind about things that we take for granted, and brings us to things like questions, naturally, I think, like what is our relationship to technology? We know it helps us, but what is the shadow side of that? We know art can be beautiful. We know art can become an object of wealth, but what’s the shadow side of that?
"These sort of things crop up in the course of the movie, not in a didactic way or, not an explicit way, but those themes, I think, are kind of interwoven or, not even interwoven, they’re present just in the scenario, and I think the audience will bring what they will to it, and have a dialogue with themselves."
