A twisted story of friendship, loyalty and love, writer/director David Ayer's Harsh Times brings the rough streets of South Central Los Angeles alive on the screen in his latest gritty drama.
Christian Bale (The Prestige, Batman Begins) stars as an ex-Army Ranger named Jim Davis who's haunted by memories of his time spent in the military. Freddy Rodriguez co-stars as his best friend Mike, a loyal buddy who gets pulled back into his old life of crime when Jim returns to South Central Los Angeles.
What kind of research did you do?
“I had the best kind of research. First of all, Dave [Ayer] himself. This is inspired by his own stories. All I had to do was say to Dave, ‘Bring ‘em all on. Bring all your friends in. Bring the military guys in. Bring the gang member guys in. Bring everybody in. Let’s just sit.’ And I spent three weeks hanging out. We went on tour, policemen as well.
It was funny because one day we’d be hanging out with an ex-gang member. He’d be telling us all stories about what he did down that street there, and then we go get a drink in a bar somewhere and we’d be chatting. He’d be helping me out, talking about Chicano lifestyle, vernacular, lingo and everything. And the next day we’d be going on a drive-around with a policeman who was showing us the same streets and telling us stories about what he did down there. I could see both sides of the fence and how they actually intersect an awful lot.
On top of that, the military personnel people who were good enough [to spend time with us]. And I’m really appreciative to them for being good enough to come spend some time with me, for allowing me to pick their brains, for some who divulged - and this goes for some ex-gang members, people I spoke with, the policemen included, military - people who told me very personal stories, very tragic stories. The military war’s going on and there’s wars right in the streets of LA, as well. [They told] stories that I would not repeat to anybody, just because these are personal stories that they offered to me with the understanding that it was just between the two of us.
It was a fascinating thing. Many of the military personnel…even though we’re not trying to suggest that this is a generic experience of soldiers. Not everybody comes back and suffers from some kind of PTSD. Many do. It’s not a rare case, and almost everybody knows somebody who has been affected. With [my character] Jim, however, the problem is he won’t admit it. He is in denial about that. That’s what really sends him on his downward spiral because he believes himself to be invincible, to be self-sufficient, and so how could he ever need help from anybody else? He’s this unstoppable force.”
Have you gotten backlash from any soldiers who say the film portrays them like psychos?
“See, I don't believe it portrays them like that in the slightest. To me, it’s a very honorable thing. Dave would not be like that towards the military. He comes from the military himself. But like many military people, you know what? They ain’t brainless. They are allowed to question what is going on. Sure, you have to be there for the person right next to you. That is what everybody says. That’s why they fight. Because you stand back and look at the bigger picture. For God’s sake, if they don’t have the right to stand back and question what the hell is going on, who does? And so I don’t believe that anybody could look at this and say that we’re pointing fingers at anybody whatsoever.
It’s a complex movie. That’s what I saw in it. That’s what I enjoy about it. I hate to use the word ‘enjoy’ because I could say that for maybe the first half, excluding the very beginning of the movie. But it’s kind of a joyride of a couple of old buddies, basically one of whom who is with Mike’s character [played by Freddy Rodriguez], whose movie I believe it truly is. It’s kind of seen through his eyes. It’s kind of his story of having to let go of a friend who was not fitting into the puzzle of his life any longer. But somebody who has moved on, who is constructing a life, who has committed to a long term relationship with the character Sylvia played by Eva [Longoria].”
Bale continued, “Then you’ve got Jim returning, who basically has seen so much trauma that he truly can’t share with Mike. Mike is a brother to him, but he’s probably become closer to the people that he lost abroad. But he comes back and man, he is just looking for the days of their teenage years when they could just kick back, smoke out, drink, go driving, get into trouble and it was relatively harmless. They were allowed to do that. You get a pass to do that at a certain age. The problem is he’s past that age, but more importantly, he’s past that capability. He’s a killing machine now. He ain’t just somebody with a penchant for violence. He’s somebody with which it’s an art form. He is just not somebody to mess with in the slightest.”
Did you do any military or police training?
“Absolutely, we did all that. I was going down to the firing range with Army Rangers. We were opening up with M-16s, M4s. You have the kind of families down there shooting their pistols who were staring up and going, ‘Holy crap, what’s going on there?’ We were just tearing up the whole building. Yes, I got very handy with a lot of different weapons for it and kind of over-learned. I learned how to use many of the different weapons or pieces that I didn’t even need to end up using for the movie.
My original intention was actually to see if I could attend that Rangers school. That’s what I wanted to do. But it was about eight weeks, so I didn’t have the time for it. I have no idea if they would have even allowed me in or not. It just ended up being, ‘Look, there’s no time.’ But I really wanted to see, because there’s a high drop-out rate from that. I really kind of wanted to test and see all right, would I even be able to manage to get through that training.”
Page 2: Christian Bale on Training Day, the American Accent, and His Character's Intensity
