‘Thirteen Lives’ Director Ron Howard and Star Viggo Mortensen on Why This Movie Matters – Virtual Screening Series

Director Ron Howard, star Viggo Mortensen and producer Karen Lunder caught up with me Thursday night at Deadline’s virtual screening series to talk about making their true-to-life Thai cave rescue drama Thirteen lives. It’s a story known around the world, an event about trying to rescue 13 boys trapped in a cave in Thailand with little hope of getting out except for the extraordinary heroes who from around the world banded together to save her from everyone. Opportunities.

Howard made many heroic true stories out of it Apollo 13 for his Oscar win a beautiful spirit but this presented new challenges, not least because so much was known about the event, including books and documentaries. But he knew there was more to tell.

“When I read it I thought I knew the story, but I didn’t. There were a lot of twists that I didn’t know and a lot of ways that characters were really tested that were powerful and emotional,” he said. “So there was this part. The other thing was that I felt like I actually had a lot of experiences, and that ticked two boxes at once. I had many film experiences that made me believe that I could live up to the potential of this story. I understood how to make it exciting, how to turn it into a real theatrical film and still deliver the themes, although there were some challenges and it was just as exciting, even if it was a little scary , which was the cultural aspect. I knew I had to get it right more than ever during this time, but simply because it’s only right. You know, it’s a Thai story. So I knew I was going to be in deep water and rely on building good partnerships and it was really exciting and fun to achieve that.

“I knew other versions were being considered. Or be made. I knew there would be documentaries and more and things. I honestly felt that this is such a great story that if we can get strong acting and I can apply the right kind of film to this story, we can tell a version that has that kind of bridge, that empathy, that creates this intimacy . to understand what it would have been like to be there,” he added. “And I just want people to understand that story. You know, the people who went through that did something really remarkable. I want people to realize that we didn’t invent this. It happened.”

Mortensen, who played lead savior Rick Stanton (with Colin Farrell and Joel Edgerton), felt the same way. He hopes Amazon will actually find a way to bring it back to theaters for the ultimate viewing experience, even though it’s been streaming on Prime Video for months. He thinks it is so important.

“A lot of people have seen this film and hopefully will continue to do so,” he said. “It’s a film that deserves to be seen. One of Ron’s best films. It’s a nice story. It’s exciting. It moves. This is a great adventure story. It’s beautifully made. I’ve been lucky enough to see it on the big screen a few times and nothing beats it. It only develops with experience and I hope people get a chance to see it.

As for Lunder, she knew there would be competition to come out first, but she also felt they had a responsibility to get it right. “There are multiple producers involved because it was such an incredibly meaningful and important story when it came out into the world. There were a lot of different people flying to Thailand to look for different rights, as Hollywood often does, and we kind of sat back and didn’t do it,” she said. “Bill Nicholson wrote a beautiful script that Ron and I read and we were so struck by how exciting it felt and how much like a movie it felt. But we also felt this great responsibility to not be a Hollywood hero’s journey, things that swell, an epic kind of story. We really wanted to tell the truth.”