MOVIE NEWS – Colin Farrell had such a rough day on the set of a Spielberg sci-fi classic that the same scene had to be filmed almost fifty times – and co-star Tom Cruise was plainly not amused.
It’s hardly controversial to call Colin Farrell a phenomenal actor. Not just for his turn as the Penguin in his spin-off and in The Batman, but also for the deeply human dramedy The Banshees of Inisherin, which really tugs at the heart. His performance in In Bruges earned multiple awards as well. But even greats have off days: on a modern Steven Spielberg sci-fi classic opposite Tom Cruise, he ran into one of his worst.
The film, of course, is Minority Report – adapted from Philip K. Dick’s short story – where Tom Cruise’s character must flee a unit that predicts and prevents crimes before they occur, the very unit he once served. In this acclaimed thriller, Farrell plays a Justice Department agent determined to scrutinize the system – and, by extension, Cruise’s character – which put the two in several shared scenes. One of those, it turns out, was anything but easy.
It wasn’t stunt work or some uniquely technical headache, but the simple fact that Farrell wasn’t in top shape after a heavy night. He told the story on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert a few days ago: “It was one of the worst days I’ve ever had on a set. It was my birthday, May 31st, and we were shooting. I begged the producers – who did I think I was? – on a $120 million movie to let me off that day.”
The Line He Just Couldn’t Get Right
They didn’t grant the request, and after that night out, he remembers being told on arrival, “You can’t show up on set like this.” Laughing, Farrell recalled grabbing a beer and a pack of Marlboros to cope. “It was terrible,” he admitted. “I’ll never forget the line I couldn’t get right: ‘I’m sure everyone has grasped the fundamental paradox of the PreCrime methodology.’ That was the opening line of the scene.” After 46 takes, Farrell says Cruise wasn’t thrilled. “Tom, whom I love, wasn’t very happy.” (via Fox News)
Though he can laugh about it now, he added that he soon checked into rehab. Today he’s clearly at the top of his game – even if his new Netflix film, Ballad of a Small Player (from the director of All Quiet on the Western Front and Conclave), hasn’t exactly set audiences or critics ablaze. He plays a man burning through his days and nights with gambling and drink until an unexpected offer arrives.
Minority Report remains essential viewing – one of the genre’s standouts that leaves you chewing over its moral and philosophical questions. As a sidenote, a thematically similar feature, Mercy, starring Chris Pratt and Rebecca Ferguson, arrives in a few months, with an AI developed by the officer himself putting a cop on trial.
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