There are two kinds of filmmakers in Hollywood. The directors who take job after job, churning out work like a fast food employee wrapping those plastic hamburgers. They cash a check, hide a little dignity, and try to create something out of a generic enterprise of commercialism.
Then there are guys like Joe Carnahan, who only works on a film if the need to create is deep inside his bones, like an itch that he can't resist. He may write something, think about doing something, or consider a project-but in the end, there has to be a hypnotic desire to create something to entertain people. It's never easy for these kind of renegades, but in speaking to him last month, he wouldn't have it any other way.
"It's better than moving furniture. I don't know how to do it halfway. If there was a more comfortable way to pick up a paycheck, I'd do it, but I just don't see it," Carnahan said on the phone from Los Angeles, where he is working on a variety of films, both in the pre-production, post-production and marketing stage.
Chief among them at the moment is "El Chicano", the new action-adventure from Benjamin Bray, a stunt man/coordinator and longtime friend of Carnahan's. He was the second unit director for on the 2012 Carnahan film "The Grey", which was an underrated gem. "El Chicano" was trademark Carnahan magic and the epitome of a film being more than work, becoming a personal journey.
The film started out as one friend helping another through tragedy. "When I was working on 'Bad Boys 3', Ben and his wife lost their baby daughter at birth, Bella. I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy. The only ball I was able to provide to try and heal this gaping, psychic wound was to tell him we should throw ourselves into 'El Chicano'," Carnahan recounted. "It's all I know how to do. I'm not a therapist. I love my friend and I wanted to help him, and that was the way I thought I could do it."
While Carnahan had a greenlit script with "Bad Boys 3", there were some issues behind the scenes. "The movie star shuffle began. I get it. They get to do this. They want to impose their will on the material, and that process, like it was with 'Mission Impossible 3', became arduous," Carnahan said.
He would eventually bail on "Bad Boys 3", and go off to make a film with his best friend. Here was a guy giving up a potential blockbuster that his heart would only be halfway in, instead choosing a homegrown independent film that needed to be told. If that doesn't tell someone all they need to know about Carnahan, nothing ever will.
"At this time, Ben had been talking about 'El Chicano' for ten years. His brother, Craig, had succumbed to gang violence. He got out of prison and couldn't shake loose. Something Raul (Castillo, the star) says in the film, about his brother being born with the thug gene, came from Ben's experience with his own brother."
Bray had written a 183-page, memoir-type script, but there was one big problem: Hollywood didn't want it. Here is a Latino-powered take on the superhero genre, a film that starts out, as Carnahan puts it, as a police procedural and becomes a superhero origin story. Something raw and original, and the big suits said no. Latinos make up 25% of North America ticket sales, but Hollywood wasn't ready to have them headline a studio film.
"We shopped it around. Nobody wanted to make it. I remember one guy saying, 'If you had a Caucasian influence...' literally. So I said 'OK, let's go make this ourselves.' I know how to make something look great for not a lot of money. There's a ton of stuff I'm terrible at. It's not this," Carnahan said.
That's when Carnahan and company found some friends in Canada who were interested in getting the film made. It started with John Altobelli, a friend in Edmonton, who connected Carnahan with Art Robinson in Calgary. "Thus began this odyssey of making dear friends up north. We never wavered. It turned into a fantastic movie. We had to cut 10 minutes here, 14 minutes there. It's a studio movie after all. The difference is, we had to pay for it," Carnahan said.
When they went back to the big studios to sell the finished film, Hollywood balked and refused to distribute it. It was no surprise to Carnahan, who knows the business all too well. "It's a risk-averse business. Their job is to not do stuff like this. They want to protect their job."
According to Joe, when studios are too afraid to run with something, the filmmakers and stars have to take all the risk. "They aren't riverboat gamblers. Frank (Grillo), Ben, and I have to be the riverboat gamblers. We have to lean into this stuff."
Case In Point: Carnahan's next film, this summer's "Boss Level", starring his longtime friend and collaborator, Grillo. Here is a movie that he shot in 27 days, which is the same amount of time The Russo Brothers probably spent cutting together a third of the climactic battle scene in "Avengers: Endgame".
"You never want to have go through that, but then you see what we did with 27 days, and it's groundbreaking. Find two guys who can do what we did in that amount of time, and I'd like to meet them," Carnahan said.
According to the director, it was well worth it in the end. "Just wait until you see 'Boss Level'. It's a game-changing moment for Frank, myself, and WarParty. The stuff we had to go through in order to get this made and to come out on the other end with what we have is a testament to twenty plus years of grinding it out," Carnahan noted.
"El Chicano" and "Boss Level" are the latest wave of entertainment from Carnahan and Grillo's production company, WarParty. They put recent gems like the Jeremy Rush Netflix film "Wheelman" and Grillo's worldwide fighting odyssey "Fightworld", a docu-series that broke new ground in the world of fighters and their philosophies. Rush's film was an alternative take on the getaway driver/heist genre, showing a new, lean way to tell that story.
One key ingredient in all of these projects: a loud, beating heart at the center. "The action doesn't mean anything if there isn't a human component attached to it. I always think about 'The Matrix'. The Wachowskis are wildly talented filmmakers. However, there was nothing in those subsequent sequels of The Matrix that was intense as Keanu Reeves running for a ringing phone. There was a human attachment, like he's not going to make it," Carnahan said.
In all of Carnahan's films — directed, written, or produced — there's a grounding element. In "The Grey", it was Liam Neeson's character starving off suicidal tendencies by caring for others. In the 2002 gem, "Narc", it was two morally ambiguous cops trying to make their own things right. In "Smokin Aces", Ryan Reynolds' FBI agent is trying to battle moral compromise amidst chaos. Rush's "Wheelman" had the same common thread, making Grillo's driver real and grounded, a father trying to protect his family.
Working with Grillo is a house built on a foundation of trust and appreciation, something that started with 2008's "Pride and Glory".
"Frank was one of the only guys who delivered the lines the way I wrote them. He got every part of that cold. We had been pals. Hung out together," Carnahan said.
"I remember after 'Warrior', I told him I wanted him badly for 'The Grey'. He told me that he wasn't going to let me pass him for the Diaz role. Frank kind of steals 'The Grey'. He's the second lead in that film. People talk about the Diaz death scene the most. It was expertly crafted by him, playing a guy who was content to sit and expire."
"Boss Level" does represent a full circle moment for the two. 11 years after their first collaboration, they are the star and writer/director of a summer tentpole film. Here is a trippy take on the time travel science fiction action drama that incorporates humor into the fray. Grillo stars as Roy Pulver, a Special Forces operative who must relive a day repeatedly in order to save his family. He goes up against the likes of Mel Gibson and Michelle Yeoh in the film, and shares scenes with his real-life son, Rio, for the first time.
One of the good things about paying for everything and putting your neck on the line is that at the end of the day, the film looks the way you intended. And you get to work with your friends, whom you trust more than the more marketable and studio-friendly names like Will Smith and Tom Cruise.
With Carnahan, it's a family-type operation with one intent: entertain, leave a dent, and have some fun. Maybe, just maybe, make some money.
"Look, we are all just to be here. I don't have much of an ego. The movies we make have tremendous egos and we have to feed those things. I am just all about the work, and making great movies. Making stuff that people want to see," Carnahan said.
It's not hard to see the influence of Tony Scott in Carnahan's work. After all, what he and Grillo have going on is reminiscent of Denzel Washington and Scott's collaborations back in the day.
"Tony Scott was and always will be my spirit animal. He was a humanist. I always felt Tony was wildly underrated," Carnahan said. "That was Tony's great gift. His common touch. That's why Denzel was so sensational with him. We're missing that right now. Frank and I are trying to fill that void. A very grounded thing."
WarParty has more juicy goods in the pipeline. Along with the recently released "El Chicano" and upcoming "Boss Level", which will be at Comic Con and have a trailer released this summer, Carnahan and Grillo are in the process of mixing together the upcoming Netflix film, "Point Blank". A remake of a French film, re-imagined by Adam G. Simon and co-starring Anthony Mackie (who sparred with Grillo in a couple Marvel movies), Carnahan is excited about it. "People are going to get a big kick out of 'Point Blank'. Frank and Mackie have a natural chemistry."
Like I said, there are two kinds of filmmakers in Hollywood: the ones who chase a paycheck and hope to have as many dignity poker chips as cash ones in the end. And then there are the riverboat gamblers who feel compelled to make a movie just like Frank Sinatra sang his tunes, with conviction. They don't play with house money, instead using their own coin and sweat.
Joe Carnahan does it his way, and truth be told, he always has. All of his films are underrated and easily re-watchable because they were made for a reason. If you ask me, I'll watch a movie that lived inside someone's bones for years instead of a generic stack of papers constructed to turn a profit.
What you get with Carnahan is blunt realism, all the time. Whether he's exchanging tweets, talking about his movies, or just living life. There's no half measure, just full-bodied steps ahead.
If you don't know about his work now, trust me, you will by the end of the year.
