‘Need for Speed’ Interviews: Aaron Paul and his Gang on their Joyride

The challenge of adapting a video game without a clear storyline into a film certainly took some ingenuity from writer George Gatins who blended the high-speed chases from the interactive world with the American muscle car culture. Even with an enticing premise the hardest work would be in the hands of the one in the director’s chair, in this case legendary stuntman Scott Waugh seemed like the ideal choice. Regarding this lack of narrative in the original material the director thinks of it sort of like a blessing. “The greatest thing about turning that game into a film is that there wasn’t a narrative, because sometimes narratives in games work fantastically for the game but they don’t translate to the movie. We were very free about that, but they had a fantastic format which is you don’t race on tracks, you race on roads and your work your way to cars.”

Rejecting the use of CGI he wanted to go back to the practical methods used by his father and Lance Gilbert’s father, both of whom were stuntmen, the latter was in charge of the mechanics of the incredible feats performed with the cars. “We grew up watching, and being a part of with our fathers, of some of the greatest car movies that we felt started the genre which are “Bullet”, “Vanishing Point”, “The French connection, “Blues Brothers”, these are the films my father and his father worked on. We wanted to do an homage throwback to those great car movies, which was all real stunts, no CG, let me say that again, Zero CG, not even one percent. Everything practical for real, actors doing a lot of their own driving, things that Steve McQueen did, or Gene Hackman. I think this has become a lost art form in cinema. We are all now relying on computer generated effects to do things that we could do practically.”

The star of the film Aaron Paul, whose rise to fame came from the acclaimed AMC show “Breaking Bad”, had to undergo some serious training to be able to keep up with the fast-paced driving necessary to portray Tobey Marshall in what was a needed break from the extreme seriousness of the show. “I wanted to jump into something lighter and fun even if this does have some heavy elements to it. I was on the track at Wellsprings outside of L.A. It’s a blast. You can take a 3-day stunt course and learn how to do 360s,reversed 180s,etc. Learning how to drive around a track 80mph backwards. It’s just ridiculous. But you are learning how to get out of problematic situations, that’s really the main thing. Safety was their priority. I was shooting the final season of the show while I was trying for this” said Paul.

The physical demands of Aaron Paul’s role as Jesse contrast with what a big budget action flick like this required. “In the final season of the show you can see that Jesse stars getting a little bigger, I was so used to play a character that was so severely underweighted, if I was gonna do this film I needed to gain a bunch of weight. I gained about 30 to 35 lbs you see that though the course of the final season.”

Paul has had an incredibly productive year from the show to this huge film, and even finding the time to work on tiny films like “Hellion” which premiered at Sundance this year. “I started this film the day after I wrapped “Breaking Bad”, and then right after “Need for Speed” the director of “Hellion” came out to Georgia to meet with me for that project, which is a small passion project, $400, 000 project, 30-person crew, the death heat middle of the summer in Texas, we shot it over 3 weeks. I try to do this sort of films so I’m able to do the small passion projects that you simply don’t get paid for you just do it for the love of it” asserted the actor.

In charge of the lighter comedic side of the film were Paul’s sidekicks, a group of grease monkeys who work at Tobey Marshall’s garage. Rami Malek, Ramon Rodriguez, and Scott Mescudi played these funny guys with a great chemistry between that transcends the screen. Rami was especially fond of the opportunity to be literally exposed in front of the camera “I got naked [Laughs] not for all of it, when I could keep covered I did” Although his partners in crime were not as happy with that they do agree their rapport was authentic, so much that it was hard to let go. “Rami went into deep depression, Scott couldn’t write music anymore, and I decided to grow a beard” said Rodriguez.

Mescudi, a rapper turned actor who is better known for his musical background under the stage name Kid Cudi sees this facet separate to his successful records, although the film’s theme song “Hero” is of his authoring. “I’ve been going on auditions. It’s a separate craft for me. Music is one thing and acting is another. With every project I’m never thinking, “Ooh I can do something for the soundtrack!” I’m strictly thinking about the role and playing the character. Occasionally you’ll have the director asking what I think about the soundtrack and if I would be interested in doing something. Me and Scott started having those conversations within the first couple weeks of shooting, it was about creating an anthem for Tobey’s character.”

For Imogen Poots, who plays the heroine, the experience was something she wasn’t used to at all having worked mainly on period pieces and small independent films. She confessed her inadequacy in terms of the driving component of the film, which is something essential here “Driving a car was fun, I don’t drive in real life so driving a car full stop was kind of closer to being a grown up. The people who are gonna see this love cars, and I’m not gonna lie it is something that is slightly foreign to me, so I probably should have been more excited about driving the latest Mustang [Laughs].”

She attributed her decision to work on this project to her great relationship with leading man Aaron Paul “The dynamic was wonderful because we had just done a film in London together for a couple months, and it was actually Aaron who was like “Would you be interested in this sort of a film” the trepidation I felt about this sort of film was suddenly put at easy by the fact that we’d be in it together. I mean you are in a car, such a claustrophobic place, and it would be sort of awful not to like the person you are with, and I adore him so it was a good thing” said the British actress.
As Poots mentions this is a movie for car lovers, action film lovers, or those who are hungry for some good old dangerous thrills free of computer help.

“Need for Speed” opens nationwide on Friday March 14th.

“Framed for a crime he didn’t commit, muscle car mechanic and street racer Tobey (Aaron Paul) gets out of prison determined to settle the score with the man responsible for his false conviction. Tobey tears up the road in a gritty cross-country journey— one that begins as a mission for revenge, but proves to be one of redemption. DreamWorks Pictures’ “Need for Speed” is directed by Scott Waugh (“Act of Valor”), and also stars Dominic Cooper, Ramon Rodriguez, Rami Malek, Imogen Poots, Dakota Johnson and Scott Mescudi.”