To old to die young
WHAT DRIVES LA CRIME SHOW TOO OLD TO DIE YOUNG?
Nicolas Winding Refn and Miles Teller on their ultraviolent, ultrastylish noir, which is streaming now.
Starring Miles Teller as a good-hearted LA hitman whose hunt for scumbags leads him to a ring of sadistic pornographers, Nicolas Winding Refn’s 10-part series Too Old To Die Young is one of the streaming events of the year. Considering this is the Danish provocateur who directed the hyper-stylised likes of Drive and Only God Forgives, expect neon cityscapes, long silences and explosive violence…
Why do a streaming series rather than a movie?
Nicolas Winding Refn: I wanted to experiment with that medium. It just became the next natural step. This is a 13-hour movie that I happened to chop into pieces. That’s what streaming can do. You have an endless amount of time, a whole new canvas. Streaming is the future... it’s an energy source that runs 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Miles Teller: For me it was, “It’s an Amazon series? OK. And who’s directing? Nic? OK.” I want to work with directors I’m a fan of, and it did just feel like we were making a long movie.
The show has a sense of doom…
NWR: The climate we’re living in now, there’s a sense of doom in many countries. There’s the idea of forgotten men and women, of something coming to rise. It’s not just in America; it’s a global phenomenon. There’s an enormous amount of rage. I moved to LA to prepare the show. The election was still going on. I was like an alien stranded in the US. I started leaning into that – I channelled how
I was experiencing the evolution of America. You get a sense that there is this emerging apocalypse.
Why set it in LA?
NWR: I think it’s a very cinematic city. And it’s a kind of artificial world. It’s a little like an alien landscape. An unreal reality.
Miles, do you see LA – your hometown – the way Nic presents it?
MT: I live right down the street from where we filmed, and it does not look anything like that! But that’s credit to Nic, and to Darius and Diego [Khondji and García, Dops]. We’d be on set and do a couple of takes and they’d stop and say, “It’s not working.” Then they’d mosey around, find a shitty mural, and light it for 45 minutes. I’d come back and it would be the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.
Your character is so tightlipped. Was it hard being that internal?
MT: When I was at school, I always enjoyed the movement classes, I always enjoyed expression without speaking. I always think somebody’s more interesting when they’re not speaking. This was an opportunity, and a challenge, absolutely. When you’re doing a 12-minute shot and you’re just staring… [smiles]. I tried to fill those moments with authentic, personal thoughts.
Did you see any similarities with Ryan Gosling’s characters in Drive and Only God Forgives? MT: No, not at all.
Do you like those movies? MT: I like all Nic’s movies. That’s why I wanted to work with him. Nic, your films are dark, yet you claim to be a happy person… NWR: We all have pleasure in watching depravity. We all have perversities within us, whether we like it or not. We have to let it wash through. Rather than hiding it, in art you can acknowledge it, get it out of your system, so you have more time to love and be happy and beautiful.
Jamie Graham
TOO OLD TO DIE YOUNG IS AVAILABLE NOW ON AMAZON PRIME VIDEO.