Redford on a roll
‘I always want to try new things because it keeps me active and alive’
Variety is key for Robert Redford as he approaches his 80s.
For instance, the busy actor plays a desperate sailor alone at sea in All is Lost. He is the bad guy facing off with Captain America in the superhero sequel The Winter Soldier. And he trades quips in the wilderness comedy A Walk in the Woods.
For something completely different again, Redford co-stars in the remake of the 1977 Disney musical Pete’s Dragon. The new version is still a family film but it’s missing the songs and the lacklustre dragon animation from the original.
“It was diverse from anything I’ve done,” says the iconic actor/ director, who turns 80 on Aug. 18.
In the movie, Redford plays the mild-mannered father of a park ranger (Bryce Dallas Howard) who befriends Pete (Oakes Fegley), an orphan child raised by a massive yet loving forest dragon. When loggers finally discover the boy and the dragon, things get complicated with the townsfolk near the woods.
Only the father (Redford) and his ranger daughter (Howard) seem to empathize with Pete and his dragon, since the father’s been entertaining the local kids with dragon tales for years. And it’s that storytelling aspect of Pete’s Dragon that hooked Redford.
“I grew up in a very lower-, working-class neighbourhood where there was not much to do, and storytelling became something to keep me alive,” he says. “Also storytelling’s a way to see a world bigger than the one I was living in, and that had great appeal for me.”
The attraction was about his family, too.
“Since that was part of my upbringing, it became part of me, and I wanted to pass it on to my kids and my grandkids,” Redford says. “I thought, ‘Well, if I can ever do a project that really has magic in it, I should do it’ — and (Pete’s Dragon) was it.”
Typical of Redford, he immersed himself in his role. He decided his character should be a woodcarver, a practical joker and a favourite with the local children because of the yarns he spins.
“Being able to scare (the children) and then pull them together with a dragon story that no one really believes, but they like hearing anyway, is good,” he says.
“Then they find out, guess what? It’s true. I love that angle on it. I just thought it was fun.”
The cast and crew thought Redford was fun, too, during the shoot in New Zealand. Howard says “he’s the coolest.” And director David Lowery describes the Oscar winner as “easygoing and remarkably inclusive.”
The odd thing is that Redford, living in Paris in the 1960s, came close to pulling back from acting for a career as an artist. Eventually, the Oscar-honoured movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid came along and changed his mind.
Fans continue to be happy about his decision, especially those who champion the Sundance Film Festival, a simple Redford idea that has blossomed into a multi-faceted industry.
He met Pete’s Dragon director Lowery at Sundance when the filmmaker premiered his crime drama Ain’t Them Body Saints there. At the time, Lowery was also prepping Pete’s Dragon.
“I was kind of curious about the film,” Redford says. “One of the things that helped me was my part was narrower in the beginning and not totally fleshed out. It didn’t need to be, really, because the movie is about the dragon and the boy, but (Lowery) allowed me to have a say.”
The collaboration worked so well, in fact, that they are working together on another movie in the fall called Old Man with a Gun.
“It’s a real story about a guy who kept robbing banks and he kept getting caught,” says Redford, who will play said bank robber.
“The reason he did that was because what he really loved was escaping.”
He also has two productions he might direct next spring if things come together the way he wants.
Time will tell. But all things considered, Redford’s on a roll.
“I’ve been that way my whole life, always moving forward, trying new things,” he says.
“I always want to try new things because it’s exciting and it keeps me active and alive. I think that’s just the way it is.”
Pete’s Dragon is a callback to an earlier era in children’s cinema, one the older millennial set will instantly recognize. In live-action films like Jumanji, The Indian in the Cupboard and Hook, there was little razzle-dazzle from special effects, and yet the films’ magic was believable and the stories were compelling.
Indie director David Lowery (Ain’t Them Bodies Saints) faced a difficult job with the remake of Pete’s Dragon in creating a furry green creature that audiences could care about within a fictional world that is otherwise realistic.
The remake of the 1977 animated film accomplishes this by making Elliott essentially a dog in a dragon’s body: He’s curious, playful, loyal to a fault and romps around the forest like a puppy alongside his best friend Pete (Oakes Fegley). Some of Elliott’s physical characteristics are downright canine, including his triangular black nose, perky ears and soft fuzzy fur.
But he can also fly. And breathe fire.
Elliott’s a mix between Clifford the Dog and Falkor from The Never Ending Story, but the characteristic with the most uncanny resemblance is his voice. It has the same effect as Chewbacca’s from Star Wars — the Wookiee’s unmistakable emotional purring that seamlessly emotes love, anger, or sadness depending on the situation (and without ever having to utter a word). Elliott’s playfulness may not seem as cutesy to a generation saturated with Minions and Spongebob, but it’s a refreshing reminder that not all movies need to resort to such zaniness in order to entertain children.
Pete is a young boy who, after losing his parents in a car crash, befriends the dragon, whom he names Elliott, after the dog from his favourite children’s book. Several years later in the nearby town of Millhaven, the skeptical forest ranger Grace (Bryce Dallas Howard) warmheartedly mocks her dad (Robert Redford) about a dragon he claims to have seen many years ago.
Meanwhile, her fiancé Jack (Wes Bentley) and soon-to-be stepdaughter Natalie (Oona Laurence) have a serendipitous encounter with Pete. The now feral boy and Elliott are exposed to the savagery that is human civilization, with its scary, hunting jocks (represented by Jack’s brother Gavin, played by Karl Urban), fast-moving vehicles and Social Services.
Through it all, Pete must learn to trust his new companions so they can keep him and his dragon bestie safe.
The film rolls out in a fairly predictable way, although it never comes across as perfunctory or boring. It’s beautifully balanced between developing a slow-rising narrative that also takes its time to build characters, without ever veering into precious or sentimental territory. And as much as it is a tearjerker — animal lovers should bring tissues — the film is fun, peppered with moments where Pete and Elliott are perplexed by the strange ways of human life – one memorable scene involves Elliott’s discovery of a sprinkler system.
These elements balance out any potential anxiety or sadness one might feel about this extremely special friendship between a boy and his dragon.