Boxoffice - August 2019

had to work out so many different levels
at the same time.
What are some of your best stories
from the set?
We would talk for ages about “How
are we going to get the dog to jump
through that window?” or “How are
we going to get the dog to pick up the
hat?” But time and time again, we were
gobsmacked that the dog would do what
was needed on the first take. So we got
through our schedules must faster than
we were expecting! [Laughs]
There’s a beautiful moment towards
the end of the film, where Milo says to
the dog, “You’re a good friend.” Quite
spontaneously, the dog responded by
just laying his head on Milo’s shoulder.
As a director watching that moment of
spontaneous acting? That shot is in the
final film.
How did you approach the source
material in this adaptation?
If I’m honest, the story first came
to my attention after having read the
screenplay that Patrick Dempsey had given
me. [Dempsey was originally attached
to star in the film several years ago.] I fell
in love with the story first through the
script by Mark Bomback, then began to
cherish Garth’s wonderful book.
The movie is pretty close [to the
book]. The voiceover is a huge part of
the success of the book, I believe. Enzo’s
voice is the secret sauce of both the book
and the film—his philosophical view of
the world, sometimes being so intuitive
and accurate, sometimes being so
wrong and so funny. Once we were lucky
enough to have Kevin Costner record the
voice of Enzo, we liked it even more, so
we added some lines.
What was the most challenging thing
about making this movie?
Making a film where a dog is in every
part, that’s challenging not only for me
but for the crew and for the actors. Milo
plays a character who’s very close to his
dog, but the dog also had to have a very
AT THE MOVIES
WITH SIMON CURTIS
MOVIEGOING MOMENT
The first thing that comes to
my mind is my dad taking
me to see Butch Cassidy and
the Sundance Kid. It was in
a small theater in South
London, and it was just a very
powerful experience. I hope
young people can feel the
same about cinema now as
I did then. That would have
been 1969, so I would have
been 9. I was really into it.
AT THE CONCESSIONS
STAND
I’m not a fan of popcorn.
I suppose my favorite
would be a hot dog. I don’t
like hearing people eating
popcorn when I’m watching.
close relationship with the trainer. So
balancing those two things was quite
tricky, because we didn’t want to undermine
the dog and his trainer, but it had
to seem like the dog’s primary attachment
was to Denny, played by Milo.
Also, doing a domestic family film
that also has a big racing element,
balancing those two things. Racing is
such a magnetic and, dare I say, machismo
world. I was very keen to make the
racing as exciting as possible, but not to
the detriment of the emotional heart of
the film.
Which films did you look to for
inspiration here—dog movies like
Marley and Me, racing movies, or
something else entirely?
It was a mixture of three things:
I watched every dog film I could. I
watched every racing film I could. But
the films that were of most influence to
me were the dramas I grew up loving
like Terms of Endearment, Kramer vs.
Kramer, and Ordinary People. They don’t
seem to make those films very much
anymore, about modern America and a
modern family. I was trying to fuse all of
those together.
Someone saw the film and said to
me, “That was the most exciting racing
scenes since Rush.” I was very proud of
that. Someone else said to me, “That was
the best dog performance I’ve ever seen.”
When we screened it, it’s the laughter
and the tears of the audience when seeing
the life of a family that most thrills me.
Why is it important for people to see
this on the big screen?
I watch a lot of things on streaming,
but everyone working on this film
thought of it as a big cinematic
experience, where the audience can
share the emotion and the ride. When
we had test screenings, hearing those
roars of laughter and hearing those
sniffles has been in support of that. I
do think of this as a cinema experience,
and I hope the audience comes, to keep
these films around.
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