Just one action-hero role is enough for Penn
Sean Penn surfs, shoots, sprints, punches and fights for his life while playing a rogue ex-special forces officer in the geopolitical thriller “The Gunman.”
Since he’s now 54, one might assume that Penn is drifting into the territory Liam Neeson entered a few years back with a series of action-heavy box-office hits. And since “The Gunman” was directed by Pierre Morel — who launched the “Taken” franchise and Neeson’s renaissance — the comparison seems even more plausible.
But Penn says it couldn’t be further from the truth. “I think Liam Neeson is fantastic. I love Liam Neeson. But he’s a 6-foot4, melodically voiced, masculine figure who is a very good man — who’s only there to take care of the people he loves,” says Penn in an interview. “I am a 5-foot-9, highly conflicted man, who’s principally taking care of himself.”
Penn adds that he is a little baffled about the media focus on Nee- son right now. “Has nobody noticed Harrison Ford? There have been a lot of ‘geri-action’ heroes.”
Penn says he was drawn to his “Gunman” character, Jim Terrier, because Terrier reminds him of people he knows. Loosely based on Jean-Patrick Manchette’s novel “The Prone Gunman,” a 1981 French noir about a mercenary assassin, the story was reworked by Peter Travis and Don MacPherson to make it more contemporary. Penn also refined the script by adding some things he knows about NGOs and military tactics.
The screenplay takes Penn’s character to the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2006. A sniperfor-hire, Terrier draws the short straw and is ordered to assassi- nate a mining minister, which propels the country into a devastating civil war.
Eight years later, while digging wells for an NGO in the Congo, Terrier discovers that he, too, has been targeted for a hit, and he travels across Europe to find out why. Along the way, he suffers PTSD symptoms and encounters some of his ex-military colleagues (Mark Rylance and Javier Bardem).
Penn says though “The Gunman” has a few realworld parallels, “I don’t think there’s an enormous amount to be learned politically.” For him, the film is primarily about the consequences of violence.
Getting into fighting shape was part of his preparation for the role. “If you’re able to do the physical demands of the movie, it changes the way you handle the other scenes — and the way you move, the way you look,” says Penn. It’s a kind of no-brainer choice.”
Penn insists he won’t be joining any superhero film franchises, though. “I don’t see myself putting my underpants on the outside of my tights for a role any time soon,” he says. “I think that it’s a shame that we don’t have more faith in good stories that aren’t tied to such ... packaged, childlike things.
“I don’t mind the movies themselves, if they’re well made,” he continues. “Some of them are, but I mind the way that the business has become so desperate — not to make good movies, but to make $200 million or $300 million per picture at the box office.”
Penn’s next project, now in post-production, is “The Last Face,” a drama about civil unrest in Africa, starring Charlize Theron as an international aid worker and Javier Bardem as a doctor. Penn directed the film.