Gravity: The Cuaróns, Bullock, and Heyman

Directors Alfonso and Jónas Cuarón, producer David Heyman, and star Sandra Bullock talk Gravity

You’ve probably heard about this movie, unless you’ve been living under a rock, or been in outer space. Sandra Bullock and George Clooney have been illuminating billboards for months now. In their astronaut attire, they’re in commercials, magazines and online. When a movie has this much hype around it, one gets skeptical. Is marketing overcompensating for a so-so movie? I can assure you, after seeing Gravity at thescreening in LA, it is actually that awesome.

Keeping the plot secret is key, so I won’t divulge. Alfonso Cuarón, known for Children of Men, co-directs this time with his son Jónas. Together, they’ve made a truly captivating, innovative film. Every moment has you on your toes and wishing you had a glass of wine or scotch on hand. At the press day at The Four Seasons Hotel in LA, Sandra Bullock, the Cuarons and producer David Heyman discuss their venture.

It’s an exciting new role for Bullock, who’s already garnered an Oscar. When asked what made her come on board to such a unique project, she’s passionate. “I had longed to do emotionally and physically what my male counterparts got to do.  Those kinds of roles weren’t available. They weren’t being written. In the last couple years things have shifted. Jónas and Alfonso wrote this specifically as a woman. It wasn’t an after thought. It’s revolutionary in the fact that a studio, on blind faith, would fund something as unknown as this. Every day I’m so grateful.”

Sandra discussed the intense physical training she went through. “You had to re-train your body from the neck down to react and move as though it’s in zero G without the benefit of zero G moving your body. Everything your body reacts to on the ground…is completely different in zero G.” On top of the rigorous training, she also had the challenge of connecting emotionally, both to the character and the surrounding technology. “It was such a collaborative experience.”

What’s also remarkable is the father-son filmmaking relationship. Alfonso, after reading some of his son’s work, he wanted to help him write something that was a “rollercoaster but at the same time is a deep, intense, emotional ride…with thematic elements told through visual metaphors. “

Jónas adds, “Working with [Alfonso] was a great experience.  The biggest challenge was to engage the audience on an emotional level and I think that never really came to happen until we started working with George and Sandra. It was really impressive how [Sandra] really manages to engage the audience for 90 minutes.”

Sandra first saw the film in Venice of this year. “An actor, when they see themselves for the first time, you spend all your time just watching yourself. There was no time to pick apart ones performance because you were inundated with the extreme beauty and emotion that [Alfonso] created visually. You can’t really speak after the film is over.”

Someone inquires about Cady Coleman, an astronaut Sandra spoke with for research purposes. They ask what about her job fascinated Sandra, a job perhaps even cooler than her own. Sandra jokingly snorts, “What?! Take that man’s microphone away!” It’s refreshing to see a movie star with a sense of humor and the crowd laughs. But she does emphasize learning about Cady and her co-workers “emotional point of view on life, why they want to go to space to see how it operates so we all benefit from it when we get back. “

Alfonso adds, “In our early draft we have scenes that, after talking with one astronaut, we realized were absolutely moronic. We wanted to make everything as plausible and accurate as we could. Talking with those people, you don’t care about your movie anymore. You want to hear what they’ve gone through, you want all the details. These people are so well trained. That’s something I admire in the space program, it’s a bunch of people that are so qualified.”

When asked if she learned something about herself after Gravity, Sandra responds, “the experience of meeting an artist that you’re in awe of and you hope to create with one day is usually disappointing. You put them up on a pedestal and then you’re like ‘Wow that’s not a nice person.’[Everyone laughs] But the exact opposite was true in the meeting of Alfonso. And then I met Jónas and there’s a sense of calm and understanding. And then you meet the producer  [Heyman] and you’re like ‘Aw here’s the person I’m going to hate,’ but all of our proprieties were the same. We were stepping into a completely unknown world.  There was a level of kindness and collaboration.”