The renowned Swiss-Austrian filmmaker was this year's recipient of the Evolution Vision Award at the Evolution Mallorca International Film Festival “All Quiet on the Western Front” director Edward Berger gave a brief update on “The Riders,” his upcoming A24 film starring Brad Pitt. Speaking at Evolution Mallorca, where he is the recipient of this year’s Evolution Vision Award, the filmmaker confirmed they have already shot the film, which he calls a “singular perspective story told through the eyes of Brad Pitt.” “It’s a story of a man who’s renovating a cottage in the ’80s, in Ireland, waiting for his daughter and wife to show up,” he said of the story, which is adapted from the eponymous novel by Tim Winton. Frequent Luca Guadagnino collaborator David Kajganich (“Bones and All,” “Suspiria”) penned the screenplay, and producers include Ridley Scott’s Scott Free, Berger’s Nine Hours, Pitt’s Plan B, and Kajganich.
Further cast includes Julianne Nicholson, Danny Huston, Camille Cottin, Michael Smiley, and Lara Pulver. The director also briefly mentioned “The Riders” when speaking about one of his earlier films, the Berlinale breakout “Jack.” Both films have seen Berger work with children, with “Jack” starring then 12-year-old Ivo Pietzcker and “The Riders” starring seven-year-old Coco Greenstone as Pitt’s on-screen daughter. We had an exemption from the city where we could shoot with him for six hours, and usually it’s five hours.
Every day I literally got the shot one minute before the six hours. It’s really stressful.” “And we just made a film with another kid,” he added of “The Riders.” “It was the same thing. It’s like every day you just get it just before they take them.” Elsewhere in the career-spanning conversation at the leading Mallorcan festival, Berger spoke about some of his most successful films, including the four-time-Oscar-winning war drama “All Quiet on the Western Front.” The director recalled being offered the project by a longtime producer friend and having an immediate negative reaction because he was at a point in his career where he “wanted to make an English-language film.” “‘Conclave’ was in the works already and was percolating,” he added.
It’s something that I am going to have to do.” The Austrian-Swiss helmer said he felt “we were at a time where, and it’s only gotten worse, where international institutions that had brought us peace for a long time were being questioned. Nationalism was on the rise.” “You know, a hundred years ago, life seemed glorious too,” he continued. Pakula, political conspiracy thrillers like ‘All the President’s Men,’ ‘Klute,’ ‘The Parallax View,’” he noted of his creative process.
They have great editing rhythm and framing [of] people within the architecture.” Berger felt that precise rhythm was “fitting” for a story that started from the image of several older men sitting in a room for long stretches of time. So how do I make that interesting, you know?” The director said he would make new cuts of the film every week and show it to his friends during the edit. You gotta go faster through this.’ I don’t want to get that after the premiere.
I try to get it as good as possible, and you just don’t know because you lose perspective.”
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