British actor Daniel Radcliffe needs little introduction – he did, after all, star as Harry Potter in all eight blockbuster movies based on J K Rowling’s best-selling series of books.
New York-born Paul Dano, meanwhile, is not quite so high profile, but has been quietly building an impressive career in a string of acclaimed movies, including his breakthrough role in Little Miss Sunshine in 2006, There Will Be Blood (2007), 12 Years a Slave (2013) and Love and Mercy (2014), in which he played The Beach Boys' Brian Wilson.
Together, they star in Daniel Scheinert and Daniel Kwan's surreal comedy Swiss Army Man, in which Radcliffe plays Manny, a corpse washed up on an island where Hank (Dano) is marooned. The unlikely pair become friends who together explore the nature of life, love and death as they try to find a way back to civilisation.
The film is bizarre, bawdy, and at times puerile, but Radcliffe says the prevalence of bodily-function-inspired comedy should not put anyone off what is, at heart, a very thoughtful, serious movie.
“You’re never quite sure exactly what you’re watching,” he says. “It just refuses to settle down and be one thing. It’s a really broad comedy, but also a really profound reflection on what it is to be human and alive – and a magical fantasy, too.”
Radcliffe says the script put him in mind of one of the literary greats.
“When I first read through it, I thought it read like something out of Samuel Beckett,” he says. “I’m sounding really pretentious now, but it was really existentialist. There was so much going on but it was so juvenile at the same time – It was just really me.
“There’s something about the absurdity of that ‘other world’ that can be really revealing about the human condition – while also doing childish gags.”
He uses an unexpected word to describe the film.
“It’s really sophisticated, which probably isn’t a word people would associate when they hear about the flatulence and stuff like that – but I think that’s why we can get away with some of that crazy stuff we do, because it’s all so well held together in a really imaginative, rigorously thought-through universe.
“This was an example of guys who’d come up with this incredible idea and managed to explore every possible idea of what it could mean and how that could affect the story. It just felt really complete.”
For Dano, the film threw up the unusual challenge of acting opposite a dead body.
“That was something that, going in, I was really nervous about,” he says. “I think we both had to allow ourselves to embarrass ourselves.
“It was incredibly challenging, not just physically – having to carry Daniel Radcliffe in the woods for five weeks – but also emotionally. The film kept revealing itself in new ways and I was constantly surprised by it. It’s two of us for a lot of the film and luckily I had a great scene partner, whether he was dead or alive.”
While preparing for the challenge, and trying to get a handle on his character, the directors provided Dano with some unusual reference material.
“They sent me a video of a kid on YouTube who thought he could smash a piece of wood with his head and he failed,” he says. “It was really funny and sad, and I watched it – and thought, I get this.”
Not everyone was so convinced about the film’s merits as its two stars. Though subsequent reviews have been generally positive, it did prompt walk outs during premiere screenings at the Sundance Festival in January.
“It’s a film-industry crowd where some of them are seeing eight or nine films a day,” says Radcliffe. “A lot of them are there specifically looking to buy stuff – and let’s face it, this film is not going to be for everybody.
“I’m sure a lot of people just realised this was not going to be bought by their studio and left to move on to the next thing. I don’t think people were actually offended.”
Dano, meanwhile, thinks that people just needed a little time to process what was on screen.
“I want people to feel first and then go, whoah, let’s unpack this,” he says. “I think there are a lot of layers in there, it’s really funny and surprisingly moving and sweet – there is a lot of love and spirit.”
artslife@thenational.ae
