Roger Donaldson

Born 15 November 1945 Ballarat, Victoria, Australia.

Donaldson headed to New Zealand at age 19 [to escape the Aussie draft] and eventually began a career as a photographer. Gradually moving into filmmaking with documentaries, he first earned notice helming "Winners and Losers", a series of seven short films for New Zealand television.

Roger made his first feature film in his early thirties with a NZ film called "Sleeping Dogs" [1977]. It was New Zealand's first produced film in almost fifteen years & the first to be shown in American cinemas. The success of the film prompted NZ to form a film commission to promote and solicit additional motion picture and TV projects.

Roger on advice he's been given:
"I made a movie that shall remain nameless. The reviews were less than favourable and the movie did really well. I was at a lunch with Sam Arkoff, the legend of Hollywood, and I was down in the dumps. He asked me, "Did you get paid for this movie?" I said "Yes". And he said "It was a good movie then." Sometimes you have to lick your wounds and just move on."

Roger on his appreciation for both big Hollywood movies & small arthouse films:
"I grew up in Australia, which is sort of half way between the two, so I was subjected. I grew up on both American and European movies. I enjoyed how big and ambitious American movies can be, but I also enjoyed the more subtle nuance that you tend to find in European cinema.''

Nick Roddick interview with Roger on how he got to make The Bounty:
'In the early 80s, Dino De Laurentiis [producer of King Kong, Serpico] invited Donaldson to Hollywood to make Conan the Barbarian II. One night, he was having dinner with De Laurentiis when the subject of the full-size replica of the 'Bounty' -- a film which had been becalmed ever since David Lean dropped out -- came up. The ship itself had been laid up in New Zealand, and Donaldson asked De Laurentiis what he was going to do with it. The veteran producer shot the young director a powerful look and Donaldson began to worry he might just have junked his career. Then, the next morning, at five am, his phone went and Dino's voice said, "Is a car outside." Donaldson got in, was driven to the producer's house and asked why he had asked about 'Bounty boat'. Before he could reply, Dino exclaimed: "Conan a piece of shit! You do Bounty!"'

Roger on remaking The Getaway:
"It wasn't regarded as one of Peckinpah's best movies although it was his most successful one. So I didn't feel I was going to remake a classic. I also knew that I could have a hell of a lot of fun with the picture and that I could do a good job with it. I had a good cast, some really interesting characters and the opportunity to do some good stunts and action. Also, when the first film was made the Steadicam didn't exist, and the Steadicam is very much part of my work. I thought I could give the picture a style that was very much my own. We used the Steadicam for 90 percent of the movie."

Roger on what attracted him to making The Recruit:
"Al Pacino. Al Pacino. He was connected to the movie and I just think he’s the greatest and I liked the script. It was a real page-turner and I love thrillers. I love watching thrillers and I enjoy making them and that’s what connected me to it.......I’ve made quite a few movies and to get a chance to work with someone with the talent of this guy, gives you a good reason to get up in the morning and go to work again."

Roger on Colin Farrell:
"Colin was also attached to the film when I came along. Defining the next generation of young actors is pretty tough because, out there is a lot of people, but what is going to make one guy sort of shine above the others? You’ve got to talk to Colin. I heard you guys laughing. He’s a pretty charismatic guy. He’s young and enthusiastic. He’s very talented and he works very hard and he likes to have fun as well. He manages….I don’t think I’ve ever been on a movie that quite worked as much as this one did where he pulled…he himself managed to cement everybody into sort of a group that just enjoyed each other’s company. He wouldn’t let anybody be a pain in the ass around him. If anybody did do that around him, he would just challenge them in public so, for your own self preservation, you would tow the line. That’s no mean feat and that’s what’s going to make him go a long way. I think people…I think if you spoke to any other crew or cast or directors that have worked with this guy, they’d talk like I do about him. He manages to transcend generations, ages, I mean my mother came to visit us on the set and, within no time, Colin had her completely charmed and eating out of her hand and she was convinced she was sixteen again."

Roger on a funny moment filming The Recruit:
"The funniest thing, I hope they put it in the DVD. It’s a little risqué. It was a scene where Colin, where he phones Bridget’s room before he goes to it and he’s on the phone and somebody comes in and he’s feeling bad about what he’s about to do and this scene had gone beautifully and there’s a real close up shot of Colin. I was right in there on his face and the plan is that he will stand up into the frame and get his coat and sort of walk out of the frame. I’m there and I get very intense, I get right into my playback monitor and I’m watching every nuance and it always seems to go in slow motion. I see every subtle detail and it’s gone perfect, this take and I’m probably smiling. He stands up and I remember it in slow motion, he stands up and I go “oh my God. His ass is bare’. He’s got no trousers on."

Roger on choosing to discuss Lasse Hallström's My Life as a Dog (1985) as an example of good filmmaking:
"It was just the first movie that came into my head. I could reel off 20 movies that I really like, but there is something about this one that has always stuck in my mind - I mean, stuck more in my heart. I can remember feeling just so devastated for that little kid. It's so well observed. There's one scene when he falls through the roof - he's been looking at this woman undressing, I think. And there's another where he's been told he's got to go away, but he knows his mum is sick, and is trying so hard to cheer her up. It makes me feel emotional just talking about it .....it's a pleasure talking about somebody else's work, because, when you do a job, you're always more critical. But with other people's work, you come with a perspective, so when it's good, you have an appreciation of the levels where it's good. My Life as a Dog was one of those movies where I forgot I was a movie director, where I just got sucked into the story, where I felt the emotion of the piece - it was moving to me. And it was moving to me not as a movie, but as a beautifully told story.''

Composer Trevor Jones [The Last Of The Mohicans] on working with Roger on Thirteen Days:
"I first discussed the music for Thirteen Days with Roger Donaldson on location in Los Angeles during shooting breaks. It was the first time we had worked together and I was extremely delighted to be working with him, and on such a prestigious project. The film sets out intensely and continues to build in tension right to the end - there are very few moments without music. Roger Donaldson's brief for the music was focused and clear, being at once extraordinarily supportive, he allowed me the freedom to put my perspective on the ideas we discussed and the vision he had so brilliantly realized on the screen."

Roger on Thirteen Days:
"This is probably the movie that's the closest to my own heart, in terms of what I want to say as a filmmaker. Obviously, I'd like my movies to be taken seriously, to affect how people think. And you're not going to get that out of a movie like Species. "There are lot of elements in Thirteen Days which reflect my own sort of feelings about the Vietnam War -- a lot of resonance in this movie for me, personally. You'd have to go back to Smash Palace to find another film that was as close to me personally as this one -- especially, given that it wasn't my movie, I didn't write the script and it wasn't my idea to make it!"

Roger on the Cuban missile crisis & making Thirteen Days:
"I was a student in Australia, and I kept a diary at the time. There is a place in the diary where I talk about the day that Kennedy made the speech. They broadcast it over the loudspeaker system in the school -- nothing like that had ever happened before. I remember at first thinking he'd declared war on Russia! I think one of the reasons I wanted to make it is because things haven't changed all that much. There is a perception that they have, but they haven't. There was a level then of antagonism between America and the Soviet Union: that doesn't exist any more. But the weapons still exist, and now they're in the hands of a lot more countries than had them back in the 60s. And some of those countries are a lot less stable than America and Russia were at the time. George W Bush screened the movie at the White House for the Kennedys. The subject matter of the movie seems to me to be appropriate for a President to see it at the beginning of his presidency. And I know the military has been complaining ever since that he has gone back on his word to give them the money he promised them. So maybe it did have an impact!"

Roger on what appeals to him about making movies about secret American institutions:
"Well I grew up in the 50’s and 60’s in Australia and American influences on Australia were profound. Culturally, it was completely dominated by American media and politically, completely dominated by American foreign policy. As it evolved out of the Second World War and America came to the aid of Australia when the Japanese were coming south and there were famous battles like the battle of the Coral Sea. Then Australia became a supporter of America during the Vietnam War. So growing up, my interest in movies, my mom had some highbrow tastes and she would get me to go to see the latest Bergman movie and art house stuff and my dad, who had more common tastes, we would go to the drive-in on Wednesday night and see the latest Audie Murphy movie. I grew up with these diverse cultural inputs and ultimately American culture seemed so dominant around the world that rather than struggle away trying to compete against this maybe it would be interesting to come here and be part of it and make my version of what it could be."

Roger on missing a Thirteen Days screening with Castro:
"I knew that we were going to get invited and it was Easter season. My kids live in New Zealand and I thought my kids are going to remember long after Castro’s been and gone so I went with my kids and didn’t go to Cuba for that but when Castro saw the movie he suggested that they have a 40th anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis and so about 12 weeks ago I went to Havana with a planeload of Americans; Robert McNarmara and Ted Sorenson and Ethel Kennedy and we went to Havana and we sat around a table with Castro and talked about the Cuban Missile Crisis."

Roger on his movies:
"As for my own career, Smash Palace is, to my mind, one of the best movies I've done, and yet I've done a lot since then. I'm always trying to do good stuff, but that one had an originality to it, and it was what got my career going."