In September, despite the fact that I had already bought Prince of Persia on DVD, I downloaded a copy to my iPad. I was away and thought it would be fun to watch. But the download took forever, and I never got around to it, preferring to watch it on our big-screen TV. Imagine my surprise when I casually clicked on it the other day and saw that there was a digital bonus: about 90 seconds of outtakes. I'm not technically adept enough to figure out how to rip it from iTunes. So I did the only thing I could. I recorded it with my camera. Hence the poor quality but (hopefully) still fun video below:
Apologies if you've already seen it in better quality. If you have, please link us!
I had wanted to do a PoP retrospective on Memorial Day. But I was recovering and unable to put anything together. Consider this a less comprehensive attempt. I've included some photos I haven't seen and/or posted before, as well as some favorites. I really love the way Jake looked in the movie and for all the promotion. I enjoyed so much of PoP: the funny promo interviews, the great red carpet shots, the scope and the richness of the film itself, especially seeing Jake in an epic. I really hope the perceived poor reception of the film doesn't prevent us from seeing Jake in big screen glory like that again.
One of my favorite interviews from the PoP junkets. Feel free to link or mention your own:
There you have it - a hodgepodge, but a beautiful one:
The weekend brought several new interviews with Jake Gyllenhaal, as the Prince of Persia promotion train rolls on. Two British articles were mentioned in the last post - you should check them both out if you haven't, especially the Times Online story.
The Irish Independent focuses on Jake's turning 30 - something that is many months away - in December, not October, Independent fact-checkers! But contemplating his thirties doesn't seem to bother Jake:
Gyllenhaal also appears to have resolved something within himself. Often said to be a somewhat reticent interviewee, today he is open and engaging, humorous and genuine. He talks repeatedly in his soft voice about how he no longer takes himself quite so seriously and how he has learned to embrace the various facets of his career and the life he leads around that.
...
Part of that realisation may come with age. He will be 30 in October and regards that event as a "crossroads".
"I feel honoured because I think life is precious and the more years you get you actually begin to learn. I feel that at 29 going into 30 I now have perspective behind me and in front of me. Whereas before I could only see in front of me. Now I'm like 'Oh, wow. Regret!'
"It feels like a big thing. They say in Ouarzazate [one of the Moroccan locations for Prince of Persia] it is the Gate of the Sahara. It feels a little bit like that in my life, like I'm entering a new gate."
So, as he approaches his fourth decade, does he feel he has achieved the things he thought he would achieve when he was 20? "I didn't ever think I was going to be 30 when I was 20."
What about 10 years from now? What are his aims for then? "I'm never going to be 40."
Excerpts from an Italian interview from Io Donna magazine were posted online. As is often the case, Jake seemed to open up more to these non-American reporters. He seems especially unable to resist Italian reporters :)
The entire interview was e-translated in a reply in the previous post. Some interesting tidbits:
1. Jake prefers himself with short hair and fewer muscles than Dastan.
2. He is not dating Isabel Lucas but does reveal that they "had dinner."
3. He's dedicating himself more to his family and old friends that he neglected when he was with Reese.
4. Now that he's single, he's eating junk food and drinking beer.
The Philippine Enquirer showcases Jake's determination not to take himself so seriously. The interview is peppered with much of the humor we've seen from Jake over the past weeks, with some new tongue-in-cheek "anecdotes" thrown in:
“I’d be talking to [cast mates] Toby Kebbell, Richard Coyle and Gemma Arterton in this horrible accent. There were a lot of flub ups and I asked them to tell me when something didn’t sound right or if I just sounded like I was pushing something and they would. I could see them cringe. Then slowly the confidence started to build. I remember the first day of this big rehearsal in Morocco. Mike was touring us around the set. I sat there with the actors in a tent and I was talking with the accent because I decided I would do that throughout the workday. They all started treating me differently. They were like more buddy-buddy. Toby and Richard invited me out for a beer that night which was really weird. Gemma was a little bit more flirtatious than normal. I thought, I’m nailing this accent now. They really think that I’m British.”
Jake also revealed a potential new project. Real news emerging from one of these interviews? The horror!
I’m also developing this film about Hans Christian Andersen. Not Danny Kaye’s ‘Hans Christian Andersen’ though that was one of my favorite movies as a kid. This is actually a musical and Stephen Schwartz is writing the music. It’s a dark, interesting tale of Hans, his stories and how he gets to meet his own characters. It’s all set to music. I really want to be in a musical but I want to reinvent the idea of what the musical is. There’s a way of doing it that can bring modernity to it as opposed to something we’ve already seen before.”
A fascinating, risky venture, to be sure.
And in this article, Jake reveals that he was literally born to be an actor:
What was the one movie that made you realize that you wanted to be an actor?
“The one movie? There wasn’t just one movie. I told you that when I came out at birth, I was already acting.” (Laughs some more). “I was born in the atrium of a film agency. The agents pulled me out — you know, ‘We got him, we got him!’” (And then he can’t stop laughing)
“I was to the movies born.” I've interspersed more new pics from Moscow among the interview snippets. There is also a Russian article that's worth running through the babelfish translator. Among other things, the manic waving is explained! Apparently, the PoP folks were told not to smile. This perpetuation of a Russian stereotype amused the assembled press, who assured the visitors that they could cut loose. So Jake did! Or as babelfish puts it:
it started to depict dashing happiness. It came out very convincingly! What a professional!
The article quotes a lot of the press conference, which was led by Jake's humor, including a bit where they ask Bruckheimer if he'll make Tetris into a movie. Much joking ensues and later, Jake talks about changing his form to play the part in Tetris. This exchange was also amusing:
The film will be undoubtedly be interesting to the male audience - but why so few women? Only one beauty? You should add a little more beautiful women - there can be wives, friends…
[Dzheyk]: (he nods always when asked the question, then is energetic) Da! Da! This is a very good idea, very. I'm all for it. [Dzhemma]: To you well, then I am insufficient? Men, always the same!
I don't think he really minded, Gemma!
There's also a whole section where Jake says that the dagger of time is real, and they actually can go back in time. Gemma chimes in, saying they already know the questions they'll be asked (you don't need a dagger of time for that, ed.). Then Jake announces that there had been people with them they didn't like, but they went back in time and removed them.
I hope this video comes online at some point - I'd love to hear the actual English answers. If you can stand more Russian, Trailer Addict has some B-roll from Moscow, as well as from all the other premieres.
In this clip, you can hear Jake's short attempt to speak Russian. Apparently, all of the PoPers except Gemma tried to say something in the local language. To the delight of the audience, despite the not-quite-successful attempts.
This babelized caption manages to sum up this whole experience:
Update:The Times also has an interview with Jake, who has an emotional response to being asked about Heath Ledger. It's too long and really too poignant to quote here. He also discusses his family name, the English accentand the reaction to some of his movies.
... how did America’s Devil Dogs react to Gyllenhaal’s portrayal of a Gulf War antihero in Jarhead? “Definitely a mixed reaction,” he responds, with a quick smile. “Some people really loved it, and ... well, what I appreciate is the flat-out honesty I get from people who were in the service. They come up to me and say, ‘Hey, are you the guy from Jarhead?’ I go, ‘Yeah’. And they go, ‘I didn’t like that movie’.”
He bursts out laughing.
And what about Brokeback Mountain? What does the general public think of that? Thankfully, with the mood lightened, Gyllenhaal seems comfortable returning to the subject of the Oscar-winning movie with one of the most tragic postscripts in modern cinema history. “There was a beauty to that film,” he says, with feeling, “regardless of the jokes poked at it. There was a beauty to it that surpassed all that other stuff.”
JakeGyllenhaal just can't stop talking to the press! The Prince of Persia promotional flood continues. The Independent has a new article about Jake's evolution:
After years of acclaim and quiet, unshowy, altruistic performances which helped his co-stars glean attention (Heath Ledger, of course, in Brokeback Mountain and Tobey Maguire in last year's Jim Sheridan-directed drama Brothers), Gyllenhaal is finally on his way to the sort of routine-shattering global success a Jerry Bruckheimer-produced "tentpole" film like Prince of Persia can guarantee, and he is the latest torch-bearer for Hollywood's "smart-throb" club. There are some of it who are older than him (George Clooney, Robert Downey Jr, Matt Damon) but not too many surrounding him, turning 30 as he does in December.
Jake is unique!
For Gyllenhaal anyway, Prince of Persia is much more conventional. "This kid doesn't know who his family is. He does something because his heart is good, and that heart is seen by someone else. Being seen really deeply is what being part of a family is. When someone sees you and they really see you for who you are, you become family with them in whatever way that is."
Does Gyllenhaal believe in real-life happy endings? "'Happy' is a funny word. How am I supposed to know? But yes, I guess I do."
One more tidbit from the article:
More women flirted with me," laughs Jake Gyllenhaal, "when I shaved my head as a marine in Jarhead than when I got big muscles and had long hair in Prince of Persia."
Maybe that's because you always kept that long, beautiful hair hidden away, Jake!
Still more videos from the promo blitz. Thanks to IHJ, a couple of new TV spots and some interviews:
From InStyle UK, Jake and Gemma talk about Tamina and Dastan's relationship:
And from ScreenRush, Jake and Gemma talk about why they did the movie and each other. They talk about each other, that is - not why they did each other.
Jape appeared on GMTV today in the U.K. The interviewer described herself as "giddy" after the clip. She asks Jake about the kids in his life - his niece and his god-daughter. And Jake affirms that he would like to be a father someday.
I know we've seen dozens of videos from the London premiere, but this one shows a lot of Jake we haven't seen: handing his gum over to his publicist and talking to the presenter outside the arena who properly swoons after interviewing him. We also get to see the interaction with the boy who was dressed up as Dastan.
Another London interview but with some different banter:
And if you want to watch the London press conference, the folks at Geek Syndicate have put up the entire thing. Here's Part One on youtube. Just follow the links to the rest from there. Haven't watched it myself yet, but it should be fun. With my newly acquired Russian skills, I found out that Jake talked about his Russian heritage:
"I feel a certain connection with Russia and the people that I see here. In spirit, they remind me of my grandfather and my grandmother. I didn't know my great-grandfather and great-grandmother, but I can judge by their children."
Jake apparently did have time for a little walk around the city, telling the reporters that he likes to go to places tourists don't go. Jake acknowledged the storied Russian melancholy, even in himself, but said he prefers to be positive. And that he hadn't really noticed it in the people he'd met , but had seen their sense of humor. He apparently wanted to quote from Moby Dick but couldn't remember the line. Here's my reworking of the babelfish translation of the Russian interpretation of Jake's English: "If you have a big heart, it's necessary to protect it."
Seems like they asked him about Reese, but I'm not sure if Jake said anything other than that he's single. Oh, and if you ever need to know Jake's name in Russian, it's Джейк Джилленхол. I'll leave the pronunciation to you! Finally - some new questions! MTV asked Jake about the Vampire Weekend video:
with a relatively huge summer movie to promote (the swords-n-sandals epic "Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time"), you'd think he'd have better things to do with his time.
Turns out, nothing could be further from the truth.
"That was just amazing, because I love that band, and I love their first album, and I had recently just got their second album," Gyllenhaal told MTV News. "I got a call from the directors, who are friends of mine ... and they were like, 'We're doing this thing, and we heard you're a big fan of the band. We didn't know if you wanted to come down.' I was actually in San Francisco, and they were shooting it in Los Angeles, and they were like, 'We're shooting it this evening,' so I said, 'All right, I'm there.' So I drove down from San Francisco to this soundstage in downtown L.A., and I basically changed into a tennis outfit, and I got down."
In the clip, Gyllenhaal plays a hard-swinging, even harder-boozing tennis pro, a role that, surprisingly, wasn't that much of a stretch for the Oscar-nominated actor.
"Well, that's the only way anyone's going to beat me, if I'm that wasted," he joked. "They call me, like, the John McEnroe of action films."
Updated with some more pics from yesterday, from photocall to press conference to premiere to post-party:
Video footage here and here. Prince of Persia had a Moscow premiere Tuesday, with stars Jake Gyllenhaal and Gemma Arterton shining on the red carpet. And sharing a private joke.
Here's a very short video of Jake at the premiere. This was shot by a fan and is jumpy and VERY loud.
This short but funny interview also contained these photos, which I hadn't seen. Taken I assume, during the Mexico City portion of the rolling premiere.
Jake was joking throughout, as we can see with this exchange:
Seriously? This is how it’s going to go? What about the challenges of working in the desert? Fergie talked about how tough it was doing her dance number in the sand for Nine…
“Again, like I said in the beginning, it is so hard to be an actor. Day in and day out a pride swallowing siege that nobody will ever fully know about. (grins) No, I’ve made a lot of movies in sand. It’s so strange. Like I read the scripts and I’m like, ‘Yeah, I’ll do it’. And then I show up in the desert and ask myself, ‘How the hell did I not know we were shooting in the desert for 4 months?’ Yes, sand is in my DNA by now. If I have children one day they will be born made of sand. I would rather be the sand in Fergie’s scenes than in mine, personally, but that’s just me. It gets in everywhere. Like my mother used to say, I had a lot of sand in my schlitz. Prince of Persia: The Schlitz of Time.” (laughing)
I'm not going to embed these, because the last few posts have been video-heavy and I know it slows things down. But check out this series of PoP interviews from the virtual press junket. Jake's interview is pretty long and has some funny moments. Haven't watched the others yet.
In this clip, Jake compliments the interviewer on his name: Jake. The best part of this video is Ben Kingsley commenting that the camera "loves" Jake and revealing Jake's greatest talent.
"We do solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth: We are sick of each other."
