Animator Plympton Releases his latest Feature "Idiots and Angels"

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Interviews

Published on Friday, 08 October 2010 13:55

Written by Brad Balfour

If anyone should be considered the American dean of indie animators, it's the New York-based master artist Bill Plympton. When we first met years ago, he was Soho Weekly News' political cartoonist -- and counterpart to the Village Voice's Jules Feiffer. Once the News disappeared into the trash bin of history, Plympton applied his remarkable penciling skills to making wacky short films that, over the years, have accrued him various critical accolades, awards, nominations and the headache of being a defiantly independent spirit.

The Portland, Oregon native found his way to the big City in the late 60s, as a transfer student at the School of Visual Arts.

Plympton's illustrations and cartoons have been published in The New York Times and The Village Voice as well as in magazines such as Vogue, Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair and National Lampoon. His political cartoon strip Plympton, which began in 1975 in the Soho Weekly News, went into syndication and appeared in more than 20 newspapers. 

Not liking his time spent as a wage slave, Plympton has chosen to go strictly on his own, only working with others on his own terms. And with that in mind, he has been supremely successful, garnering two short animation Oscar noms (for Your Face and Guard Dog), numerous awards, a successful self-distribution business and an enviable office in Chelsea. When Disney came to him with an offer to work on some of their productions, he realized they would sew up the rights to his ideas, and turned them down.

Now Plympton is releasing his latest feature film, the wordless Idiots and Angels, with a run at the IFC Theater here in NYC, then in Los Angeles, in order to stimulate Oscar consideration after a year's long passage through the festival circuit. It will then have national distribution and be viewable in tandem with a coffee table book of his work to come out later this year.

Q: With Idiots and Angels you’ve chosen not to apply computer animation or to slicken it up. Do you think it’s retro? Why do you continue to work with this pencil style, with this rawness? Your artwork consistently harkens back to a certain era; there’s a certain elegance to it.

BP: This is a style that I’ve been doing all my life, quite frankly. Ever since I was five years old I was always doing pencil-on-paper, and I like the cross-hatching, I like the smudging, I like the building up of the dark surfaces. So it’s really nothing revolutionary or even retro; it’s just a style that’s sort of been synonymous with Billy Plympton for a long time.

If you look at my illustrations, in that book that we’re doing you can see my illustrations in college and high school and you’ll see a lot of the similarities. It’s just a continuum of my drawing style. The pencil-on-paper I feel very comfortable with. If I was to do computer animation I would not feel comfortable. It just feels right for me, it just feels natural, and I like the way it looks. It’s different, it’s fresh, it’s evocative -- I can really draw the characters out like that, and it just seems like if I tried to do another style it wouldn’t be very good.

Q: It’s almost absurd to ask what you’re trying to get across in Idiots… because it’s open-ended. Things upend each other and then there are violent reactions to that. How do you see your work evolving in both storytelling and message. What’s the continuity, and where have you gone in different directions?

BP: I think that this film in particular, Idiots and Angels, is a real departure. Most of my films are sex and violence and gags, and this film has a lot more sensitivity. It’s more psychological, it’s a lot more character driven, it’s a lot more plot driven, and there are some serious moments in there.

There are some very magical, spiritual moments, and my mother, who saw the film, who doesn’t generally like my films, was moved by it. She thought it was very religious. I’m not a religious guy but this film has some moments that are quite religious in terms of being born again and rising up to heaven and everything. Very Joseph Campbell kind of stuff.

Q: I would say you’re standing religion and philosophy on their head.

BP: I do, yeah. I try to put some humor in there. But I think that’s what’s going on. You asked about my progression – that’s what’s going on, is that I started out doing wacky gag stuff and feature films I feel are a lot more emotional and lot more personal, a lot more soulful. I think there’s a lot more depth to my films now, and that’s where I’m going. I’m starting another film right now that’s even more personality-driven and is deeper storytelling.

Q: Does it work against you to not have any dialog?

BP: No, I think it helps. For sales overseas I don’t have to do dubbing and subtitling. It’s quicker, I don’t have to do the lip sync, which is really time consuming. And also I just don’t think I’m a very good writer of dialog. I prefer to tell a story with visuals, with gestures and actions and responses and close-ups of the face. You can get a lot of information that way.

Q: You’re the dean of  American independent animation.

BP: What’s interesting is that now you’re seeing a lot of people in the States looking at my films and saying, “I can do that too.” They’re inspired by my record. And so a lot of it, like Sita Sings the Blues, My Dog Tulip, Queer Duck, now these are people who are making their films on their own.

Q: Or even on a European level, like Les Triplettes de Belleville The Triplets of Belleville (from 2003, directed by Sylvain Chomet -- it was nominated for an Oscar for Best Animated Feature. And Persepolis (directed by Marjane Satrapi, was released in 2007 and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature at the 80th Academy Awards). I mean there are a lot of films now. So it’s not such a weird thought to be qualifying for an Oscar.

BP: No. Well last year The Secret of the Kells got nominated. So I figure if The Secret of the Kells can get in, maybe I have a shot.

Q: How many feature-length films have you made?

BP: I’ve made nine. Six animated and three live-action.

Q: What did you do that was live-action?

BP: I did J. Lyle, back in 1993, I believe. I did Guns on the Clackamas, which just came out on DVD, and that’s a really good film. That’s getting really good reviews. And then I did a documentary on Walt Curtis. So three live-action films. None of them did very well. I think the Walt Curtis film may break even. That’s about it.

Q: I guess it was the logical decision to go from paper to computer.

BP: Well no, it’s still on paper.

Q: But it’s all digitally projected...

BP: The big switch over was from Hair High, for which I did the drawings on paper. We Xeroxed the drawings onto cells, and then painted the cells. Now I do the drawings on paper, same old way I did it before; then we scan them and then we color them on computer rather than cells.

Q: Is it that much faster?

BP: It’s faster, more versatile, and cheaper. And it looks better too, it looks better than shooting it on Xeroxed copies. So I’m very happy with it. The cost of Hair High was about $400,000; the cost of this film was about $130,000.

Q: How many drawings do you actually make?

BP: Well around 30,000 for Idiots and Angels. It’s about a hundred drawings a day, which is not so bad.

Q: You don’t get carpel tunnel?

BP: Oh no it’s very relaxing. It’s therapeutic.

Q: Do you think you’re a little crazy?

BP: No I’m very normal actually. Boringly normal.

Q: And you're not a bit of a risqué -- at least with your work?

BP: No. Nope.

Q: You’ve almost become insufferably normal?

BP: The films manifest my weirdness. In my real life I’m pretty normal.

Q: Have you ever thought to collaborate with anyone?

BP: No. I’ve always had trouble with that because people don’t generally understand my kind of humor and my kind of storytelling. I think what I’m doing is kind of unique, and if I could find somebody who would do it, they would probably charge a lot of money for it, and I just don’t have money to pay people.

Q: I would love to see you with Jonathan Lethem or David Sedaris.

BP: Well they have agents, and their agents would want a big chunk of the finished film. Actually quite frankly, I’m very happy working the way I am. I like making the films on my own progress without a lot of pressure or a lot of people changing my ideas. Certainly they’re not big blockbusters -- they’re not Pixar films -- but for me it’s a wonderful exercise.

Q: Whom do you think of as your influences?

BP: First of all, let’s talk about Walt Disney. Windsor McCay, Tex Avery, Bob Clampett, Charles Adams, R. Crumb, Milton Glazer, Roland Topor, A.B. Frost, Peter de Seve, Tomi Ungerer -- I could go on and on.

Q: What about writers?

BP: Hunter Thompson, I guess. That’s about it. A lot of filmmakers; Frank Capra of course, Elia Kazan. It’s always befuddled me how a lot of people really hate Elia Kazan because of his political stance, but what he did was really courageous. I think that Communism is a bad thing, and I think if someone was a Communist it’s to their benefit to get out of being Communist. And for Elia Kazan to get all this heap of hatred because he exposed Communism; what’s so bad about that?

Q: That wasn’t exactly it.

BP: Communism in the ’30s and ‘40s, they knew what was going on; they knew that Stalin was killing masses of people and it was not a fair system. All this bullshit about equality and everything like that; it was bullshit and these people still were Communists. And I think Elia Kazan was very noble to stand up to these people.

Q: I wouldn’t think of you as right wing. 

BP: Oh no, I’m not. I just have more important issues to deal with than reading up on politics all the time. In fact, all my friends who were in political cartoons or in illustration are dying. There’s no magazine work.

Q: Which filmmakers do you like?

BP: Well I like Terry Gilliam, I think Terry Gilliam’s great. Quentin Tarantino is wonderful.

Q: And you've met Terry Gilliam -- he is listed as presenting this film.

BP: Terry and I are old friends. I met him back in the mid-‘90s, and we sort of connected. He lives in England, so I don’t really run into him that much, but I recently ran into him at the Dubai Film Festival.

I happened to have my portfolio of drawings because I was showing them around, and he said, “Let me look at them.” So he started looking at them, and he flipped out. He freaked; he thought they were so great. And his agent was saying, “Terry, we have an interview with BBC. Come on, you’ve got go.” “Ah, fuck you! I want to look at Bill’s drawings.” And he stayed there for half an hour looking at every drawing, asking me about how I did this and everything. So I said, “Terry, you know you’re a really great guy, can you help me with my film?” He said, “Yeah. Anything you want.” So I said, “Well, would you like to present the film?” He said, “Yeah, I’ll put my name on it.” And he did a wonderful introduction for a documentary that Alexia’s making about me, called Adventures in Plymptoons, and Terry did a wonderful introduction for the film.

Q: Does it feel weird to have a doc made about you? You’re not dead. Did he know you?

BP: Yeah, it’s a woman who goes to a lot of the Comic-Cons, Alexia Anastasio. She’s been an acquaintance of mine for a long time. So two years ago she said, “I’d love to make a documentary about you.” She worked hard. Boy, she interviewed it must be a hundred people. She went to Oregon and interviewed my family and my college and my high school friends…(and to) Los Angeles to interview Matt Groening and people like that.

Q: Did she get a lot of the Soho Weekly News people?

BP: Ooh, I don’t think so.

Q: That is one of your defining periods.

BP: Well I don’t think so. I thought that was a path that went nowhere.

Q: Wasn’t that period the first time that you were really exposed as a personality?

BP: Yeah, but I should have been doing animation at that point. First of all, I wasn’t crazy about politics. It was hard work; I had to read up on all the magazines and newspapers

Q: Really? I thought that was when you jumped out in the world. That was where your first flag was planted.

BP: Yeah but you know I regret that because if I had a chance to do it again I would start doing animation right out of college.

Q: I also think that’s where you came into your own.

BP: Well I did develop a style.

Q: But we were also running around in the scene, part of an historical moment.

BP: Yeah, you’re right, you’re right.

Q: You’re part of a generation, and you reflect this generation. We were this transitional generation between the bohemian culture, the previous being the printed word, sort of the pre-digital age into the digital age.

BP: I suppose. I never thought of it, but you’re right.

Q: What do you think about running a business?

BP: I have to do it. I don’t like doing it; I don’t like doing the contracts, I don’t like doing the phone calls and the business meetings. I just want to draw, like most artists. But if I want to retain ownership of the film and I want to retain copyright I have to do that; that’s part of the deal.

Q: You’re sort of an accidental entrepreneur. I do think you should exploit it further.

BP: I could. People say I should do dolls, I should do calendars and all this bullshit. I just don’t have time to do it. Maybe at some point when I get enough money. I’m running a pretty tight ship here, the recession was not so easy, so sometimes I’ve had trouble making payroll. If I ever did get a big fat contract then I would bring in more marketing people, maybe David Sedaris, people like that. But I have no money now. But I like my own stories, that’s the thing. I really like my own stories, they’re fun to write.

Q: You look like some of your drawings...

BP: People say that.

Q: Have you done self-portraits?

BP: I do it constantly; I’m always doing drawings of myself.

Q: Do you feel you’re able to convey some of what you are?

BP: Well that’s what Idiots and Angels is all about. It’s me sort of talking about my feelings about being an asshole or being an angel. That’s what I think the film covers; control of your soul. I don’t mean to get heavy and I don’t want to be moralistic. Also I want to make people laugh and I feel that laughter is the essence of life.

In fact, as Charlie Chaplin once said, “A day without laughter is a wasted day,” and I agree with that. There should be a Nobel Humor Prize. I think that humor, especially in a world like today with so much fucked up stuff going on, people have got to laugh, people have got to enjoy life, people have to laugh at life.

Q: Conveying humor through a drawing is one of the toughest things in the world, much tougher than doing stand-up.

BP: I don’t think it’s particularly though but I think it’s important. I think it’s very valuable; it’s very beneficial to society.

Q: Who are your favorites in single panel cartoons?

BP: Charles Schultz I suppose and “Calvin and Hobbes.” Gary Larson was a big influence, of course. I don’t look at political cartoonists anymore.

Q: Why didn’t you ever do comic books -- you did a graphic novel?

BP: Comic books are not as satisfying as film. You never get to hear people laugh when they see the comic book. It doesn’t movie, it doesn’t have sound.

Q: You don’t think it might have a different kind of reach?

BP: Well comic books are really kind of a dead end anyway. They don’t sell that well unless you’re doing Batman or Robin or something like that.

Q: Do you think of your work as laugh-out-loud, or snicker?

BP: Well I hope it’s laugh-out-loud. I appreciate laugh-out-loud, but the cow film doesn’t get a lot of big laughs, yet still people love it a lot. So I think there’s a little more substance in there, a little more heart than my usual stuff. But I think eventually I’ll go back and still do those crazy sex and violence kind of films. I always love that stuff.

Q: How do people respond to your work, say, at a forum like Comic-Con?

BP: The thing is they saw it when they were kids on MTV or the Tournee of Animation, or Spike & Mike, and that’s where most people have seen it. They have fond memories of it. Some of them it twisted their minds a little bit, but they have positive attitudes.

Q: The number of awards you received is amazing. How did it happen that you got these Oscar nominations?

BP: The first film I think was sent in by the distributor. So they knew if they got an Oscar nomination it would help their chances. This was Your Face, which was 1987. And then the second one was Guard Dog, which we sent it to the Academy.

You have to answer certain qualifications, such as you have to play in LA for a week or you have to win a certain award. We sent it in to (a cinema) and it played for a week there and that qualified it. So also we’re doing Idiots and Angels and The Cow Who Wanted to be a Hamburger.

We do have a distributor for Idiots and Angels. Passion River, they’re out of New Jersey and they’re lining up all these art houses and college universities. We’ll get good distribution; we’ll get like a hundred cinemas, maybe more. Especially if New York and LA do well we’ll get a lot of distribution.

Q: From your early Portland days to now, do you step back and say, “Jesus, how did I get here? I guess I’m doing pretty good for myself.”?

BP: No I do. I look back and say, “Yeah; I turned out okay.” Things are going well, I get invited everywhere around the world and I have to turn them all down because I’m just so busy. I feel like I’m in a nice position.

Classic Rocker Tommy James Celebrates his Life

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Interviews

Published on Monday, 19 July 2010 16:42

Written by Bruce Alexander

Classic pop-rock star Tommy James writes his own music, has a great voice, stills sells records and tours regularly. Lots of musicians have covered his songs from such stars as Joan Jett to Billy Idol. I love all his songs from his early classic “Hanky Panky” to the great “Mony Mony.”

Now 63 years-old, this Dayton, Ohio-born singer/songwriter recently wrote his autobiography with Martin Fitzpatrick, Me, the Mob, and the Music (2010). Accommodating to his fans, he makes sure he meets and greets everyone and enjoy signing for the fans.

When he came to NYC for a book signing at Barnes & Noble, I had a chance to interview him for a few minutes. He’s a real pro, answered everything I asked and gave me great information about his past.

BA: What made you write this book?

TJ: Basically this book was in the works for almost 10 years. Martin Fitzpatrick and I started out writing an autobiography that was to be about music, which we were going to call it “Crimson & Clover,” but we soon realized that we weren’t telling the whole story.

It had to be the Roulette Records story. The book was incomplete without that part of the story, but it was not in our best interests to tell the whole story at the time because most of the Roulette people were still alive. I was just uncomfortable about it.
A few years went by and the remaining Roulette regulars passed away in December 2005. We felt it was time that we finished the book and felt okay about doing it then.

So, we did it and told the whole story and got a deal immediately through Simon & Schuster which we were surprised about because they do more literary works and very few pop culture kinds of projects. We were very honored and flattered when they took the book. Now it’s going be a movie and a Broadway play. So, we are very happy, feeling lucky and also very blessed.

BA: I heard that director Martin Scorsese might be doing a movie based on it.

TJ: We are talking right now with three different directors and he is one of them. He actually contacted us first and we are going to make an announcement over the next few weeks on the film project.

BA: Martin Fitzpatrick is not only your co-writer of the book but also
your road manager.

TJ: He wears many hats for us, and also does merchandising for us.

BA: It must have been weird not getting paid for a lot of things back then.

TJ: Roulette was the best and the worst of all worlds. It was great from a creative standpoint because they left us alone and let us be whatever we could become, but getting paid was very difficult. I don’t have a lot of regrets and a lot of anger or bitterness because we were able to make a great deal of it back over the years. But it is true that getting paid was like taking a bone from a rottweiler

BA: A lot of people thought that you were born in Niles, Michigan when in
fact you were born in Ohio.

TJ: That’s true, I was born in Dayton, Ohio and moved to South Bend, Indiana and then to Niles, Michigan. My dad was in the hotel business so we moved around a lot.

BA: How did you find the transition when you moved to New York in the ’60s and that whole period coming here?

TJ: It was a culture shock because I was a kid from the Midwest, graduated from high school and all of a sudden within a year lived in the middle of New York. So, I consider myself the first year a spectator. I felt like I was in a movie in New York. I said in the book that I never felt so important and insignificant at the same time.

BA: What was it like playing music in and being part of the ’60s scene?
Was that a groovy time?

TJ: The 1960s were the best time ever to make it because all the ducks were in a row. All the planets were lined up. Radio and television and the record business were all on the same page and were not competing with each other much.

They were all looking to break the next big act. Of course, 60 million baby boomer kids with money in their pockets fueled everything and radio was so much bigger and covered so much more ground then than it does today.

The Average Top 20 hit from that period sold more records than 10 #1 records combined today. Really, the rules have changed. I consider that period of time the very best to have made it in because of then amazing numbers of people back then.

BA: Also, the music was very positive back then.

TJ – Absolutely, anything could happen that you could think of

BA: What was it like being away from your family and having this other 
life in New York?

TJ: You end up spreading yourself very thin when doing this business. One of my great regrets is that I wasn’t able to be more of a family man as so much of my life was was devoted to self promotion and making music. On one hand you get to stay a kid a long time but on the other hand you really do miss those important years with your family. But, you can be at only one place at a time.

BA: What it was like traveling on those package tours. Was it 
fun, tiring, or both?

TJ: I basically stopped the really serious touring back in 1968 .We had done the big one night tours with 40 dates back to back and I was so tired having to live like that it’s as if I became a zombie. I decided from that point on we would do one-nighters or two nights a week was all I wanted to do

In the end it worked out well because I was able to save my voice. I can’t imagine doing the touring that like Rod Stewart does. I don’t know how they do it; they would find me under a bridge or somewhere out in the field. I couldn’t live like that.

BA: What was it like working in a record store in that period?

TJ: I got a great education working in a little record store in Niles. Things that I use to this day I like learning to read the trade papers I learned back then. It was called the Spin-It Record shop.

BA: Anything about notorious record company owner Morris Levy that you want to add?

TJ: Morris ended up being the star of our book. He was one of the most dynamic people I have ever met. It was a real love/hate relationship, kind of like an abusive father I guess. I learned more being at Roulette than any place in the world.

BA: And any final thoughts?

TJ: I just want to say thank you to the fans for 44 years of fun and music. This is a business that maybe gives you two or three years if you are lucky, and we have had it for four decades. Thanks to the fans and the good Lord!

Brazilian Babe Alice Braga Hunts Predators, Repo Men

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Interviews

Published on Monday, 12 July 2010 20:17

Written by Brad Balfour

Maybe it's because of her Brazilian genes that Alice Braga looks good even when sweaty after a jungle trek. Braga has become the go-to girl for sci-fi action thrillers, what with this year's Repo Men and the recently released Predators. This time, as the bust-ass female lead, IDF sniper Isabelle takes charge, with co-star Adrien Brody, of a pack of errant mercs, paramilitary types, rebels and hardcore criminals forced to band together in order to survive after they are mysteriously chute-dropped into an unknown tropical forest on a distant world.

Chosen because they can kill without conscience, these warriors, some trained, some not, battle a pack of 10-foot-tall Predators who are hunting them as prey. In this vast jungle, these human predators must learn whom, or what, they're up against, and test the limits of their abilities, knowledge and wits in a battle of kill or be killed.

Having appeared in several films, most notably as Angélica in 2002's acclaimed Cidade de Deus, Braga landed her first US blockbuster with 2007's I Am Legend. Who else has starred in two apocalyptic films about the world's end within a year -- that Will Smith film and Blindness (2008) -- and survived?

Coming from a cinematic family -- her aunt is the great Brazilian actress Sônia Braga -- 27-year-old Alice Braga Moraes got started at eight being in a yogurt commercial. Besides her native Portuguese, this daughter of São Paulo, Brazil also speaks English and Spanish, and shows a sort of pluck that propels her career.

Braga has learned to endure all kinds of abuse whether it's rolling around in slimy traps, or having a hand rammed into her gaping wounds. Maybe because she neither has the tough-as-nail glare of Angelina Jolie or the towering power of Uma Thurman, she suggests both intelligence and vulnerability. That's something so noticeable when we talked for a few minutes after the Repo Men interviews.

Q: You've done a lot of futuristic movies lately; do you have an affinity for them? Do you look for science-fiction scripts or do they happen to find you?

AB: It was a happy coincidence. It was something that my mom always loved, so I grew up watching those types of films, but it wasn't something that I focused on. These scripts came to me; I read them, had fun with them and liked them. I really had fun because this type of film really opens a door for your imagination. It was a happy coincidence.

Q: When did you finish Predators?

AB: We wrapped the second week of January [2010].

Q: How was that experience?

AB: It was great, really nice, a lot of running around, running for my life as fast as I can. A great cast and crew. The photographer, Gyula Pados, was amazing. It looks really nice and the Predators are dark, and really, really, scary.

I think the fans are really going to be happy with it, at least I hope so. The director, Nimród Antal, is a fan of the films, so it was like a fan directing us. He was like a kid on set, and having that energy was really special.

Q: It was R rated; was it ever going to be a PG-13?

AB: I don't think they could have because there are some [really] dark scenes in it, like any other of this type of film. So I think it’s going to be hard. We never know what's going to happen or what the studio’s going to do in the editing. But it looks really dark, and I had fun doing it.

Q: Meeting you here, it's hard to believe they cast you as a tough "guy."

AB: Everyone tells me, "You look so much taller in the movies."

Q: Will you get your own action figure for Predators?

AB: I hope so. We did the scanning. I don't know if it was for action scenes or post-production things, but I really hope I have an action figure. I would love that.

Q: Your character is Israeli military?

AB: She is a sniper. She’s a Special Forces lady.

Q: So are you chasing the Predators?

AB: I’m being chased.

Q: Was Predators a hard shoot?

AB: It was a fun shoot. It was hard because of the weather conditions -- really cold and working outdoors. But it was a blast, and I think it’s going to be interesting.

Q: What’s it like acting next to some guy in a suit?

AB: Awesome. Truly, I had so much fun because in I Am Legend they were wearing suits with dots, so it's like Teletubbies.

I remember I took a picture when I met the guys because one of the guys who played the Predator -- he also played Jason -- Derek Mears, so he's big, and I was next to him barefoot. He's great. So having someone that tall, that big, with me -- and I’m like 5'3" -- that kind of vibe was great because it gives you [a sense of] that desperation.

Q: What was it like working with such different people on Predators? It has such an interesting collection of actors, like Topher Grace and Adrien Brody.

AB: It was great because I think they wanted to do something different. Having Adrien as the hero was not the obvious choice, but he did great. I thought it was a great choice just to play around with acting in an action film.

Q: Do you think it one-up the old movies?

AB: I don't know if it will one-up [the original]. I hope it adds up more than anything else. I don't know if it ones-up the other ones. I think to become successful as the others I think it needs to add up. You cannot try to make something different because then you lose the fans. The best thing is to make a film for the fans. That’s why we’re making it.

Q: Is there a possibility to get your own franchise out of the Predators movie?

AB: I don't know. I would love to, but I have no idea. I'm totally open for anything. People ask me, "What type of films do you want to make?" I want to make films. I have a blast when I’m on set. Seriously, I’m a kid, ask anyone that worked with me or saw me on set.

Actually, what [director] Fernando Meirelles used to do with me on Blindness is he would keep me for last so that he could keep me on set. He knew that I wouldn’t leave. So if it comes up, definitely I would love to do more action and more stuff. I’m open for any type of acting.

Q: Have you talked to Fernando recently? Do you have any idea what he’s going to do next? Are you going to work with him again?

AB: I heard that he was going to do something with a Janis Joplin story or something, but I’m not sure. I heard that at a party at midnight in São Paulo, so that’s not a trustful source.

He was doing a really wonderful TV series in Brazil about Shakespeare. He’s been writing, and I think he’s probably in pre-production or something. As I was shooting Predators I was away for the past few months so I’m not sure.

Q: If you could work on any action film franchise or remake, do you have that ideal role in your head where you could be another kick-ass character?

AB: I never thought about it. I’ve always been a small, short girl so I never thought about myself running around and kicking ass and punching and shooting. In Predators, I’m a sniper and truly, my gun was the heaviest gun on set. It’s 14 pounds and everyone is with a knife, a pistol, and I’m with a [huge] rifle.

I totally love the challenge to portray someone like that character. It would be great if something comes up as another action figure. It’s a nice challenge physically and emotionally.

Q: Your career seems to be moving not only in a sci-fi direction but in an action film mold. The world needs a really big Latina action star. They’re looking to cast Wonder Woman right now.

AB: That’s great! But Wonder Woman is not going to be Latin for sure. With my accent?

Q: Linda Carter is half Mexican.

AB: Oh yeah but she didn’t have an accent like I do. That would be great though; Wonder Woman Latina. But I did City of God and Lower City and independent projects, and then I did some dramas. It was nice to face a film like Repo Men that has some drama, is a character that has some hard background stories but at the same time is running and training and firing. It’s cool.

Q: When did you do Repo Men?

AB: Right after, actually. I was shooting Blindness in Toronto and went to LA to audition with Jude [Law, co-star of Repo Men with Forest Whitaker] on a Saturday and then went straight back to Toronto to finish Blindness. Then I ended up shooting Repo Men in Toronto again.

My mom always asking me, “When are you going to do a romantic-comedy without monsters?” and I’m like, “Okay, that’s coming one day. Let’s work for it.” But this is a happy coincidence.

Q: Do you think your character, Beth, in Repo Men was plagued by a love for the surgery? Do you think she was addicted to the surgery or she was just going along trying to fix things?

AB: Miguel [Rosenberg-Sapochnik, the director,] and I spoke a lot about her past, about what she’s been through, what happened in her life, what was her background, why was she in that situation when we first see her in the film, just because I love doing that and Miguel also was really involved in the story.

We wanted to understand what kind of emotional state she would show up in. It’s just life; we created a little background, like some disease, some problem, some lack of health, addictions maybe. As soon as she started getting new ones then it became an addiction I think, because it’s kind of hard to say she had all those problems. It was mainly an addiction, but it’s hard to say that it was only that.

There was a line that ended up not in the film but is really fun. I looked at him and was like, “Did you get upgraded? Come on!” And that kind of line shows that she was always trying to keep up. It’s like us; you guys don’t have tape anymore.

We’re always upgrading, always doing something new. Everyone has the iPhone; in a week everyone’s going to have the iPad. We’re always upgrading all the time, so I feel that’s what Beth did. And it’s nice. If someone’s boring talking to you, just turn it down.

Q: How do you find the right level of empathy for a character that has so much of her body turned over to science and is a drug addict and does all those deals? How far do you go to make that character empathetic, and where do you stop?

AB: Empathetic in what sense?

Q: You want people to feel sorry for her so that you worry about her, but where do you stop? Because you also want her to be tough.

AB: I don’t know if I want people to feel sorry for her. I never felt sorry for her. I always try to not judge the characters that I portray. I try to just understand, and get meaning and belief in the characters. But I always tried to make her as human as possible.

All of us endure pain, sadness, loss. Life is not only happiness. But on the other hand, you can find love or happiness, or you can find anything else, so that’s the change she goes through her life. She’s giving up on herself when he finds her and that’s why I punch him in the face and am like, “Why? Why did you do that? You’re not going to save me right now. You’re going to go away.”

Who knows, maybe 10 guys did with her, or her family did with her, we don’t know. I just tried to create a character that was human more than anything. I think feeling pity is a really strong thing to feel for someone.

Q: Apparently, in the book version, your character had cancer which  ravaged most of her body? Her husband at the time had been a doctor, so she got a discount, which is why she got so many body part upgrades -- he was just trying to keep her alive. By that time she was 74% artificial, and he couldn’t be with her anymore.

AB: [Miguel] didn’t say anything. No but I wish he did. The script was so different in a sense, so we tried to build the story and background. There were a lot of different versions of Beth and Remy’s love story in the beginning, and then it changed through the course of the film until we started shooting.

Q: Miguel said your character started out in a different relationship with Remy. What’s your reaction as an actress? You play a part a certain way, and then it’s edited and somehow it works in a completely other way that you hadn’t intended. What did you think when you see that?

AB: My mom’s an editor, so I totally understand editors, which is great -- It helps. I’m kidding. I grew up in this world. My father’s a journalist, but he directed a lot of TV shows in Brazil. I never think too much about what they’re going to do. I always try to grab the script and learn it by heart and focus on that, and whatever they want to do later they can do it. I don’t mind.

I’m passionate for the story and being part of something. That’s the most important thing. Funnily enough, in Repo Men, I prefer what I saw on the screen than what we shot. It works really nice. I don’t know how, because we had such a background in our minds – me and Jude, Beth and Remy – all the time that drove us through the journey towards the end of the film, and once we cut the part before they meet, where we meet them in the film, it could have gone wrong.

What is great is that it was done perfectly, and it was even better. I’m glad he took it off because the story is even sharper. I think more important than you as an actor is the storytelling. Of course as an actor you want to show your work, you want to be on screen, but being part of a nice story, it’s really special. So I do think as an actress you need to know how to understand and how to put yourself into it. Everything matters; don’t take anything for granted. Be present in the moment. That’s the best thing to do.

Q: At the end you’re still alive. Is there hope for a sequel that would include you?

AB: Maybe. I'll give you Universal’s number so you can ask them. Then I’ll give you mine, and you call me. I have no idea what they think of it. I don’t think so. I think the story’s done.

Q: Did you think of yourself as a female Terminator?

AB: The way Beth’s going, she probably can be a Terminator because the only thing’s real are the lips.

Q: One of those scenes near the end where he's taking the parts out of you is really sick but also sexy in its own way. It recalls the movie Crash. In filming that scene, how did you play it so that it was both passionate but kind of sick and crazy at the same time?

AB: When Miguel told me that he wanted to do that scene as a love scene I couldn't picture it. Once we started doing it I was just trying to figure out how to play it, not to be overly painful or only love and forget the pain. I tried to stay in the middle and to just bring truth.

It's interesting that both characters are so in love and they’re fighting for their lives, yet they’re so connected at that moment in the film. I think pain and love go together. If you're in love, you're going to feel pain and the passion increases the pain.

It's hard to explain with a logical answer, but mainly I do think that's what Miguel wanted, and I tried to put my heart into it and just bring it alive. It was fun to do it because it was so free to create anything. We are in sexual positions actually; it's like we're making love. It was a great idea.

For more by Brad Balfour: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brad-balfour