Family business
Milo Gibson charts his own course in 'Manifest West'
Among Mel Gibson’s nine children, only Milo has carved out a career as an actor.
An eight-year screen veteran,
Milo, 32 next week, stars in Friday’s “Manifest West,” a contemporary family drama co-written and co-directed by his older brother Louie Gibson.
It begins as Dave Harris (Milo) is moving his wife Alice and their two young daughters to live “off the grid” on top of a mountain.
Needless to say those idyllic plans are quickly complicated by neighbors and law enforcement.
“This is a family in search of a better life —and they end up embroiled in a standoff with the U.S. government,” Milo, who sounds exactly like his dad, said in a phone interview.
Dave, he added, “tries to do what’s best for his family. His main motivation is to help his afflicted wife. He thinks he’s doing right but he’s so close to the situation he doesn’t realize he might be hurting, or at least not helping, his wife the way she’s got to be helped.”
Asked if “Manifest West” says to live “off the grid” is a pipe dream, “It touches on what that is really in this day of age,” Milo answered.
“But what I want people to take away from this film is that no matter where you go, what you do or how far away you decide to go, your home always follow you.”
Born in Australia, Milo’s home growing up was Malibu. Initially he apprenticed as an electrician before he switched to acting with his dad’s 2016 WWII epic “Hacksaw Ridge.”
“I grew up obviously in the family that I’m in and going to sets and seeing it all around me. It was never pushed upon me, ever. It was never like, ‘Hey! you should do this.’
“I just never really gave it a serious thought. But when I realized it was something that I was interested in, I didn’t want to grow up and be 60 years old and regret not trying something that I thought maybe I had a passion for.
“So I just leapt off the deep end, went for it and realized that it’s something that I do love. It’s something that I do have a passion about. That’s how I ended up doing it.”
After a string of war movies, he next costars opposite another second generation actor Francesca Eastwood (her mother is Frances Fisher, Clint Eastwood’s “Unforgiven” costar) in “Clawfoot.”
“It’s kind of a satire, thriller, horror movie that’s a new character, a new pair of shoes that I hadn’t stepped into. I was, ‘You know what? This this could be fun.’”