Toronto—The first big American opening at the Toronto International Film Festival was for "Brave One," a thriller, directed by Neil Jordan, starring Jodie Foster and Terrence Howard.
While based on a familiar vigilante pattern, this film provides an insight into the thoughts, fears and rationale of the female radio host-turned killer Erika (Foster), who finds herself irreversibly changed after the violent death of her fiancé on the streets of New York City.
The leading actors of the "Brave One" spoke about their characters and the questions raised in the film during a press conference last week in Toronto.
Jodie Foster on doing the film:
"Well, I think, what's beautiful about the movie and what works so well is that it is a terribly sophisticated movie that lives in an unsophisticated genre. I love having a combination of those two things: a film that is on the one hand a commercial movie, to which people will connect in a general way, and yet it is a thinking one. I love this film, I really am so proud of this movie, I loved every moment of exploring this character, and part of what's extraordinary about her, and I think people are touched by, is that she is able to lay claim to a kind of humanity about herself that she did not even know she had, and that humanity is at once absolutely beautiful and absolutely monstrous."
Terrence Howard on the questions the film raises:
"In life there is this strange dichotomy that exists, it's between the law of nature and the law of man, and we try and walk this line of distinction, and there should not be a difference, there should just be one law. And this film asks all the right questions: What would I do in the situation her character was placed in? Would I sit back and wait for justice? Would I go to the police office twenty times hoping that someone would help me? Or would I go and buy a gun? These questions are about humanity – they make films interesting. We live in fearful times now. I hope this film will push people in the police department to help people feel a little bit more safe. That's what we need – we need people to feel safe. It's raising a lot of questions in my mind."
Jodie Foster on her character:
"She is thinking, she is intellectual, she has shame and she has the guiding moral principle. In post 9/11 New York, where there is Disney Land and Times Square and a cop on every corner, and why is it that I don't feel safe, and why is it that I feel fearful, every inch of me is caught in orange alert or red alert even though it should be the safest time of my life. And the main social commentary of this film is that violence corrupts absolutely: she thinks she loves him (Terrence Howard's character), and she is drawn to him, because he is the last good person. She wants him to be the one who takes her down, because she knows she is bad. And when you get to the end, you see that violence corrupts absolutely, and even the last good man becomes a bad man."
"The Brave One" will open in theatres in the United States and Canada on September 14.
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