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Frank E Flowers on Casting Haven: “My actors were amazing. They literally jumped in headfirst and really trusted me. They were just really inspiring and somewhat inspired, I guess, by this story and by this experience. Every suggestion they made was always at the benefit of enhancing this movie or supporting me or saying, ‘You know what, Frankie? When you told me that thing about so and so, this is kind of what I felt about that.’ It was always reactionary and very, very collaborative. It was a beautiful process in that way. There wasn’t a lot of yes and no.”
Even though Haven was his first feature film, Flowers says signing up a lot of 'name' actors for his debut effort wasn’t that intimidating. “These specific guys - there was no movie star s**t on our set. There was no money to pay anyone. They were all working for scale. Bill Paxton had his shirt off, he was eating lunch with the crew. Orlando [Bloom] was kind of hanging out. It was very grassroots in a way and it was very guerilla, I guess in a lot of ways, too, so it helps. It helps bring the intimidation factor down. And being in a strange country... I think as Americans, when you leave the country, you’re a little bit vulnerable. And as actors, when you leave the country, you’re a little bit vulnerable so being there really helped me establish somewhat of a, ‘I’m the director even though I’ve never made a film before but you’re in my country.’ They still needed me to navigate those waters so that was really cool.”
The Decision to Direct Haven: Flowers admits he didn’t intend to direct Haven. “I went to school for writing and then eventually screenwriting,” said Flowers. “And then John Singleton was a teacher of mine and he sort of said, ‘Dude, you’re from the islands and stuff and you’re going to realize that a lot of the scripts that you’re going to write, characters that you’re going to write, you’re not going to get many directors who are going to have any perspective on that. It’s going to be tough so you should actually look into bringing those stories to life yourself.’ I took a couple of courses and made this short film and said, ‘Let me see if I’m good at directing, and if I like directing.’ I was on the set of my short film and I was like, ‘I love doing this. I could do this the rest of my life.’”
If Singleton hadn’t given him that piece of advice, Flowers likely wouldn’t have wound up directing Haven. “Yeah, it was a perspective… I kind of felt it in my film classes. I‘d write these stories about the West Indies and they’d be like, ‘Oh God, do we have to hear that s**t?’ You can tell 20 fart comedies and people are like, ‘Oh, bring it on. Give me some more.’ But you tell two stories in class or you write two or three scripts about the West Indies and people are like, ‘Are you going to write anything else? Can you do anything else?’ And I’m like, ‘Are you doing anything else besides American people and comedies?’ No one says that and I don’t think that. No one thinks that! ‘Why are you giving me a hard time?’ I kind of felt like it was going to have to go that way and that I was going to have to be more a champion for it than just a humble little writer sitting in the back: ‘Please, sir, read my screenplay.’”
The Long Road to a Theatrical Release: Haven finished post-production in 2004 and had its debut at the 2004 Toronto Film Festival. The film’s finally getting its theatrical release in September 2006. Asked what took so long for the movie to be released in theaters, Flowers responded, “To a certain extent, a lot of it - some of it - was a strategy thing. We had to do some work on the film and obviously when you’re an independent film you don’t have the money to expedite that. And then when we were going to come out, we didn’t want to be kind the third Orlando Bloom movie in a row. He loves the film, he wants to support the film, but he’s like, ‘Dude, I’ve been on the road forever,’ and it’s just like not even an option. It’s not like he doesn’t want to. So we were just like, ‘Let’s wait till after Pirates and I can use that machine to really get [going].’ He wants people to see it. He’s a producer on the film and it’s not even about him as an actor or his role, it’s about this little film that he jumped into and he supported and produced and starred in and sort of wants to push. The rest of the cast were equally supportive. It’s been really cool.”
