Harrison Ford: The K-19 Interview

September 1st, 2002
Film Festivals.com
by Lynn Barker

Actor Harrison Ford, the epitome of the American hero, as a gruff Russian sub commander during the Cold War? Ford considered his role, as Captain Alexei Vostrikov in K-19: The Widowmaker, a challenge since, for much of the picture, he's not considered a good guy. Based on a true 1961 incident, kept secret for many years, the film explores the action aboard a Russian nuclear sub when a reactor malfunction threatens a core meltdown in the North Atlantic, an incident that, if mishandled, would certainly have started World War III.

This is Ford's 36th film since his debut as a bellhop in 1966's Dead Heat on a Merry-Go-Round. Ford has wowed audiences in a long list of box-office triumphs with which we are all familiar. There have been a few duds but his performances are rarely panned. Ford has been honored with numerous awards but an Oscar, so far, has eluded him. When we spoke with the actor in Los Angeles, we found him to be extremely thoughtful, conscientious and self-effacing about his work in general and dedicated to this role in particular.

Q: How did you become interested in the project?

Ford: I got a script.

Q: I mean had you heard about what happened?

Ford: No. I don't think there's a lot of popular knowledge about this story. But Kathryn (Bigelow, the director) had worked for a number of years to develop the story to the point that it was brought to my attention.

Q: Why did you sign on as executive producer?

Ford: We all felt that there was a lot of work to be done. I was committing, as an actor, to a project that was not yet shaped to the point where I would normally commit so I wanted to have a hand in the work that was done. There's a name for that and apparently, sometimes, it's executive producer.

Q: This is your first submarine movie. What was it like to make?

Ford: It was my second "tube" movie. I did Air Force One, another tube movie. There are similar problems in filming and staging and keeping an environment alive and visually interesting. But the Air Force One (set) was at least twice as big as the submarine. I think it's really interesting that when you get on a set that is as confined as that, you develop behavior that, I think, is appropriate for those circumstances.

Q: This film is based on a true story. Did you talk to any of the original men who had been on the ship?

Ford: I did. I made several trips to Russia to do research. On two occasions I had a chance, once in Moscow and once in St. Petersburg, to meet with members of the crew, all in their 70's now. Because a submarine is so compartmentalized and because the information about what was going on was not necessarily shared by those in command, they all had much different stories about what happened. They didn't all agree and it was a little confusing to sort it out. Some guys thought the pipes came from the torpedoes, some thought the pipes came from the missiles and really, it was hard to figure out what really happened.

Q: How did you work it all out?

Ford: Finally, what we were looking for was a dramatic telling of the story of their sacrifice and devotion to duty. We were not so compelled to figure out which story was right but which story best helped tell the bigger story of the responsibilities of military command, the devotion to a political system, the devotion to your mates, your comrades and that was the story we wanted to tell. We were quite willing to take dramatic license to give that story a more compelling, cinematic expression.

Q: What most impressed you when you met the original crew members?

Ford: I was incredibly moved by their story of their struggle. This was the defining event of their lives and they lived without being able to tell the story for a long time. It was a military secret. They had a great devotion to each other even 30 years later, even though many of them hadn't seen each other for a long time.

Q: Was it difficult to get the Russian crew to trust the American filmmakers? We heard there was a controversy.

Ford: Why should they trust us? We were a bunch of Hollywood mockers and I don't think there was any reason for them to trust us. They had also obtained a script which was a very early version which didn't at all represent what I was hoping would be the final product. I think Kathryn, we all agreed there was a lot lacking in that version that they were acquainted with. We had all committed ourselves to doing a lot more work. Also, I think, they are submariners, not filmmakers. They're Russians and living a much different life. I think their immediate reaction is we should be telling their stories with their characters as they understood it. That's really not the purpose of a theatrical motion picture. We were absolutely committed to telling the story of their devotion to duty, their heroism and their selflessness.

Q: How is working with Liam Neeson?

Ford: Liam is great. He's a very capable, talented actor and he devotes himself to the work with a real discipline. He's got a good head on his shoulders and a good heart…just a great person to work with.

Q: Did you talk about how your characters would react to each other?

Ford: I don't think we talked a lot about it. When things were not in the final stages we would talk about the theory of a scene and what we wanted to accomplish. He had suggestions. I had suggestions but we're neither of us the kind of actors who like to sit around and talk about acting.

Q: You did a Russian accent. Was that difficult?

Ford: No. There was some question of whether or not we should be doing an accent and I thought that it would help remind us always that we were in a Russian context. One of the most important things to do in this film was to maintain a Russian point of view and not, for the purposes of commentary or temporary pleasure, adopt a kind of American point of view and a jingoistic attitude but to discipline ourselves. I think this helped us remind the audience that this was a Russian story. Besides which, I had an Irish co-star, real Russians on the crew, actors from England, actors from America and I think it helped unify the whole (dialogue) sound.

Q: Could you relate to your character pushing everyone to their limits?

Ford: I could relate to it and understand it intellectually and I hoped I could give it appropriate expression but this is one character of many in the story that go together to help shape each other in the context of their common experience.

Q: Do you think we look at the Cold War differently now?

Ford: I think it's always important to reflect on your history and the choices that you've made as a nation. It's important always to understand what shapes your national will and I think that, in the context of the Cold War, we had opened a Pandora's Box of nuclear potential. We were visiting a Pandora's Box that had been opened under Truman, a whole concept of balance of power obtained through mutually assured destruction is an idea that we should certainly think about and revisit often because it's not necessarily the best way of dealing with things.

Q: Was it hard not to take sides?

Ford: One of the things that was interesting to me was to not directly deal with or redress a situation where we demonize our enemies but to understand. It's like Pogo, one of my favorite political philosophers, [laughter] who says, 'I've seen the face of my enemy and he is us.' Men behave like Men regardless of the political system; the same tensions and the same issues are obtained in different kinds of government. What was interesting were the different theories of military leadership and the question of where moral responsibilities lies when you are charged with military leadership.

Q: The film presents your character as sort of a bad guy but at the end you see the reasoning of his decisions.

Ford: The balance between the character that Liam [Neeson] plays and the character that I play has to be obtained on paper and understood and manipulated. It certainly had to be understood that I was playing a character who would not be sympathetic at first. That was not difficult for me. I enjoyed the challenge of that and also I enjoyed the dramatic opportunity to demonstrate that these characters learn from each other and from their experience. The character that I play underwent a change that was caused by the circumstances that he found himself in.

Q: Were they any physical mishaps in the confined spaces?

Ford: People did frequently bump their heads. I did from time to time.

Q: Have you been practicing with your whip again for Indiana?

Ford: I'll wait until I get a script that I can commit to; then I'll pick up the whip again.

Q: You must have so much input into the Indiana Jones films.

Ford: It's not a question of my input. It's a question of what our collaborative capacity is. I'm working with George Lucas and Steven Spielberg. It's not a question of obtaining control over the situation but of all of us working together with our combined ambition to make a film that is as good as the ones we made before.

Q: What about doing a sequel to Bladerunner?

Ford: There have been no official attempts by the people who made the first movie to create a sequel to it.

Q: To what do you attribute your enduring qualities as a hero?

Ford: I don't play heroes. I play people that have particular dilemmas and if they are dramatized and it comes off as heroic then that's a cultural definition of the behavior. But, I don't play heroes. I play guys who behave well under difficult circumstances. I mean, occasionally, certainly you know that you're in a heroic context when you're playing the President in Air Force One but there is no simple formula to represent heroism. You just deal with the particular circumstances.

You keep dealing, Harrison. We'll keep watching.

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