UNSAFE HANDS
GUNS AKIMBO I Daniel Radcliffe comes out fighting in a violent, stylised action-thriller…
Iwas like, ‘What’s something that hasn’t been done in an action movie?’” says writer/director Jason Lei Howden (Deathgasm), talking to Teasers at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival, where Guns Akimbo has just premiered.
“‘What if it’s an ’80s style action movie where the hero is a pacifist, and he doesn’t want to be an action hero, but he has to be?’” continues Howden. “And it dawned on me: ‘What if he actually had the guns bolted on his hands so he had to shoot, or run?’ I thought that was such a quirky visual thing, and it went from there.”
Guns Akimbo isn’t standard, highbrow festival fare. An adrenaline-charged blast of hyperactive action, it follows slobby videogame developer Miles (Daniel Radcliffe), who finds himself forced into a violent underground reality show/death-match called Skizm. Guns bolted to his hands, Miles becomes the target of Skizm’s star player, Nix (Ready Or Not’s Samara Weaving).
“There was so much action involved in the stunts,” Weaving tells Teasers. “You had to keep your energy really high – especially with my character. She’s on cocaine the entire time, so I had to have a lot of energy! There was a lot of caffeine drinking.”
Weaving’s heavily tattooed and even-more-heavily armed Nix aims to break the mould when it comes to the objectification of these types of characters. “She wasn’t sexualised at all; I look heinous,” she laughs.
Combining irreverent comedy with blazing violence, Guns Akimbo could be a controversial sell. “For me, Skizm was a bit of a metaphor for the media in general, and wanting to push violence down people’s throats for ratings in a stylised way,” says Howden. “And then there’s people that enjoy watching conflict and reality TV and violence. The movie is a little bit of a comment on itself,” he laughs. “I feel justified in the way we approached it. We’re not trying to make people imitate the violence of the film. We’re trying to reflect the violence in the real world.” MM