Netflix
If ever a film earned its title, it’sGareth Evans’Havoc.
The first comes inside and around a spacious two-story nightclub packed with partygoers.
Metal pipes, cleavers, champagne bottles, and Uzis are all in the mix.
Tom Hardy as Walker in ‘Havoc’.Credit:Netflix
The second notable action scene comes inside, outside, and underneath an isolated fishing shack.
In its most memorable moment, Walker dispatches a particularly vicious henchwoman with a harpoon to the neck.
(More on that later!)
Tom Hardy as Walker in ‘Havoc’.Netflix
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Tom Hardycompared working with youto working with Christopher Nolan.
How does it feel to hear a compliment like that from an actor of his caliber?
A bucket full of it, actually.
He’s a master, so yeah, being in the same breath is a huge, huge compliment.
Lets talk about the two big action set pieces, starting with the club scene.
How long did that take to shoot?
That was a while.
It took a while.
How do you begin to choreograph an action scene of this size?
Forest Whitaker as corrupt politician Lawrence Beaumont in ‘Havoc’.Netflix
It starts very early in the process.
It was even before Tom came on board.
In the script, I never get into details about the action.
Yeo Yann Yann’s Mother and her soon-to-be-harpooned henchwoman in ‘Havoc’.Netflix
Is it fast-paced, is it slow, is it fun, or is it scary?
And then a few, maybe one or two key moments that are important to plot and character.
How many pages was the nightclub scene in the script?
Tom Hardy’s Walker and Jessie Mei Li’s Ellie, this city’s only honest cop.Netflix
I think its almost like seven minutes long, six or seven minutes long.
That will take up three paragraphs, at most, or maybe four paragraphs on a page.
So the page a minute thing becomes obsolete with my scripts when it comes to action.
I never shoot wide masters as coverage.
I only ever shoot jigsaw pieces of action.
So every shot is specific to tell in that section of the action.
Do you have certain action movements or kill scenarios in mind before you shoot?
And I might have two or three gold ticket items that I want to put into the choreography.
Do you have a favorite kill in this movie?
I really love the harpoon at the end of the shack sequence.
Which scene took longer to shoot between the fishing shack and the nightclub scene?
The fishing shack was probably the one that took the longest.
They were both big sequences, and they’re both challenging in different ways.
When we did the fishing shack sequence in the cabin, the challenging thing was tracking all the weapons.
So every time a body would fall, we’d be like, Okay, what are they carrying?
It was a huge undertaking by the art department to get that done.
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Does Toms martial arts training come in handy?
We knew Tom did that, but our approach was like, Walker doesn’t [know Jiu-Jitsu].
That foundational work was paramount so that get him through the sequences that we were shooting.
It’s understanding the way Walker’s character is.
Have you thought about aHavocsequel?
It’s like, well, what happens once the credits roll?
Does he end up in the back of a cop car, or does he ride shotgun?
This interview has been edited for clarity and length.
