I’ve always admired Sean Astin as an actor, whether it was as a kid in Goonies, his performance as a World War II army officer in Memphis Belle, his starring role in the classic college football drama Rudy, or his indelible performance as the beloved Hobbit Samwise Gamgee in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Astin has done a lot of good work since his days in Middle-earth including a stint as the paranoid Lynn McGill on 24, a lot of voiceover work in animated series as well as roles in smaller independent movies such as Luke Moran’s powerful new film The Boys of Abu Ghraib. The film follows soldier Jack Farmer (Moran) who leaves his family and hometown girlfriend (Sara Paxton) behind only to find himself working in Iraq’s most infamous prison, Abu Ghraib, where he’s responsible for guarding some of the highest priority detainees. Pressured by his superior (Astin) into using harsh techniques on a seemingly innocent detainee (Omid Abtahi), the seductive allure of war threatens to break the young soldier. The film is inspired by the true events that shocked the world in 2004.
I spoke to the thoughtful and politically astute Astin by phone and was delighted to find out about his excellent online bi-partisan political talk show called Vox Populi which is about to begin its second season. I’ll be listening.
Danny Miller: I was happy to see you pop up in this film. What goes into your decision-making process these days about what movie projects to take on?
Sean Astin: At this point, it’s really about what the environment of the film is, who the filmmaker is and what he or she is trying to do. It just gets down to basics — do I like the screenplay? Do I trust the filmmaker? Is the character something that interests me and something I feel I can do? The second The Boys of Abu Ghraib came to me, I instinctively knew that it would be a story that disapproved of bad behavior. It was an issue that struck me hard at the time. Playing a character who is so coarse and who is not connected to a morality that makes sense to me was very intriguing. You know what? Scratch everything I said — it’s all about the ideas that are present in a film!
There are parts of this movie that are painful to watch. What did you do to prepare for making such a film?
I was the Civilian Aide to the Secretary of the Army for 10 years — from 1995 to 2005. I’ve spent a lot of time with soldiers and their families. I’m also an actor who’s done movies that are critical of the military, as well as ones that present a very positive view. In this case, I didn’t seek out veterans who were specifically involved in the experiences in those prisons. What I did was immerse myself in extensive research with books, video footage and interviews with the soldiers who were there. I have to tell you, I’ve never had night terrors before in my life but my research for this film caused me to have night terrors for weeks afterwards. I’d wake up screaming and sweating — that’s never happened to me before and it was very disturbing.
Wow. I gather you followed the events of the Abu Ghraib scandal as they were coming out?
I was campaigning for Senator Kerry at the time. I remember listening to him giving a speech about education and then going with his wife and the Secret Service back to the hotel. When I got there someone told me about what was happening and my first thought was, “I hope this doesn’t get out there” because I thought if it got out people were going to start killing Americans. My second thought was “Oh my God, why did they do that?” and my third thought was “Where do we go from here?” It felt very personal to me because I felt I was doing things that were in support of shaping American policy about such things. It was a weird feeling — that something happening so far away was somehow happening to me, too. Maybe that’s just the conceit of being an actor or some kind of narcissist but I found myself deeply internalizing what went on over there. Preparing for this film made realize that I was still working through these issues and my frustration and anger about it. I take it all very seriously. And I was interested in this young filmmaker who’s developing his craft and writing about this topic and was glad that I could support him in his vision.
I thought Luke Moran was a good actor in the film and it was only after I saw the movie that I realized he also wrote and directed it. That surprised me, I admit, because he seems so young! You’ve worked with so many great filmmakers — does working with first-time directors ever give you pause?
Not at all, I never hesitate to work with first-time directors. Filmmaking is storytelling. What I find is that a lot of times it’s more about how a first-time director is being supported — what kind of infrastructure is there to back them up when they’re trying to make a film look and sound the way they want it to and to make sure the story they set out to make is being told properly. Of course, individual personalities need to be taken into consideration when you’re deciding whether to do something, but I look more at the ideas of the story and whether I think someone has the ability to pull it off. Look, you could have done this story as a student film and the ideas would have been just as powerful for high school students to be wrestling with as it is for someone making an independent film or someone telling the story in a $60 million studio film. The ideas are what matter.
Did you find yourself offering Luke advice?
I think it’s part of my job to understand and help a first-timer who may not know certain things about the process. If they tell you to go stand somewhere and you know it’s not the right place to be, you might say, “What do you think if I stand here?” and they’ll usually say, “Oh yeah, that’s better.” But if they say, “Please stand where I want you to stand, that’s the way I want it to look,” you know what? It’s their movie!
This film is pretty impressive for a first-time effort!
Luke was very confident. But this is the thing: My kids are now proficient on Final Cut Pro! These days, the expectation is less about the technical side and more about how young directors carry themselves. And this guy was very confident — it never felt like we were waiting for him to figure something out or to know what he wanted to do. It’s so important for directors to know what they want and to know if they have a reasonable chance of getting it! Luke knew exactly what he was going for and he was able to hear collaborative ideas without being thrown by them.
This is still a very polarizing topic. The events of the film don’t explicitly show the activities of the people involved in the Abu Ghraib scandal but you see the environment that led to that. Did you all talk a lot about what you’d show and what you wouldn’t?
Yeah, we definitely explored our emotions and our ideas about what it was we were doing. The movie doesn’t explicitly go into the specifics or the issues with the chain of command, but we certainly alluded to it. There’s that scene where Luke’s character says to my character, “Are we supposed to be doing this?” and I just look at him. You can take what you want from that look.
Did making this film change your perspective at all about the soldiers who committed those offenses at Abu Ghraib?
I identified with the people suffering the abuse, regardless of their guilt — just as a human being. I couldn’t help but wonder what it would feel like to get suffocated like that, to get shocked like that, or humiliated, and I was very troubled by it. At the same time, I identified with my character, too. Not in the sense that I agreed with the logic of what happened or the intention, but I could understand how that kind of coarseness develops. It was really shocking to me that after two hours of shoving these guys down on the ground and, as an actor, wanting to make it look as realistic as possible, how it started to feel so much easier to do. It was crazy going there emotionally, and that was just as an actor in a scene, I can’t imagine what it was like to actually be in that scenario with all the group-think that was happening and while mortars were being fired into the prison — and having do deal with people, many of whom would kill you if they had half a chance. I was very aware that we were doing this for other people to look at — maybe a lot of people who have never paid much attention to these issues but who just stumble across this movie. I think the film brings up issues that everyone should think about.
I’ve already seen some criticism about the film from wildly different camps — some people saying the story goes too easy on the soldiers who were at Abu Ghraib and others who say the film is anti-American for criticizing any part of the military. Are you bracing yourself for more polarized reactions to the film?
You know, I have a political radio show called Vox Populi, and the premise of the show is to bring in all sides, including the ones you just mentioned, but to use civil discourse. I feel somewhat inoculated from the extreme reactions to the film because my sense of purpose is clear and because I believe Luke is a decent person who was trying to tell a story honestly. People can agree or disagree about how far he went, but he did what he wanted to do. We can talk about it, we can agree or disagree with it, but that’s the power of filmmaking.
When it comes to people who have strongly held beliefs, I think it’s important to try to create a framework for understanding that allows for some kind of mutual appreciation of each other’s viewpoints regardless of your personal beliefs. When I have someone on my show who says that it’s anti-American to be critical of the military, I ask them a lot of questions and let them speak for a long time. I wait until they’ve gotten all their points out and then I ask the other person to share his or her point of view. I’ve hosted some pretty tough conversations but the goal is never to tell the other person that what they’re saying is wrong, but just to have everyone share what they think. It’s all about really listening to each other. Then you can begin to find any flaws in your argument and maybe see some value in someone else’s beliefs. You may not come away from it changing how you think about something, but hopefully you’ll feel like you can work with that person because you know how to listen to each other without being interrupted or attacked. I think there’s a time for standing on street corners and screaming at the top of your lungs about what you feel, and our Constitution certainly allows people to jump on the Internet and say whatever they want about a film like this. So I’m not bracing myself for anything because I understand that there will be different viewpoints.
I’m really looking forward to listening to your show.
We’re about to make an announcement about our second season. I’ve done 36 episodes on my own so far so on days when I’m not acting, the radio show takes up most of my time. But I hope you’ll do more than just listen — you should call in and send tweets and texts and emails. We try to make it as easy as possible for people to communicate with us.