Video:Jake Gyllenhaal Interview-Prince of Persia The Sands of Time
with Rebecca MurrayJake Gyllenhaal takes on one of his biggest action roles to date in Walt Disney Pictures' 'Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time.' At the 2010 WonderCon, Gyllenhaal talked about this adventure film based on a video game and directed by Mike Newell.
Transcript:Jake Gyllenhaal Interview-Prince of Persia The Sands of Time
Rebecca Murray from About.com Hollywood Movies at the 2010 WonderCon in San Francisco.
Jake Gyllenhaal – 'Prince Dastan' in Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
Not every video game movie works, so why is this going to?Jake Gyllenhaal: "Not every… I don't think any video game movie has worked so far."
What makes you think this one's going to?
Jake Gyllenhaal: "Well because we… I think movies that work are when the story works, you know? When the story works, I think the movie's working. I think we started, as filmmakers we started with the idea of making a story that was going to be fun and entertaining and not just saying, 'Oh, well what cool moves can somebody do?' Or, 'Is it going to look cool?' We wanted to tell a great story, and that was the primary focus and everything else sort of came out of that. Whereas I think in other games seems like they focused on making it look like the video game, this did both. It told a great story and I think it sticks true enough to the actual video game."
Well, does it? I've never played the game before, so does it really stick close in your opinion?
Jake Gyllenhaal: "Well, there's so many incarnations to the video game. I mean, there from the very early one on up, and the Sands of Time - which this is based on – yeah, I think it does. I think particularly, just speaking from my part, you know the prince has a sense of humor and always complaining a little bit about this and that in the game, and I think that's definitely translated over. In terms of action, yes. I mean, all the same moves, a lot of the same moves you would find in the video game are also so…"
When I saw it I noticed it was a lot of parkour style. How tough was that for you to do?
Jake Gyllenhaal: "Well, I'm going to stress this – I tried everything, but I didn't always succeed at everything. So what I didn't succeed at, someone else had to pull it off. But it was difficult, but also really fun. I mean when you get parkour down, or the essential idea of parkour, it really is an extraordinary sport because there's an ease to it and it ends up not feeling that hard."
Do you find yourself doing it off the set now? Like, "Oh, I could go here to there."
Jake Gyllenhaal: "Actually, I was on set the other day and there was this pole like hanging from these stairs, because we were shooting on a second story. And so I grabbed onto the pole, I jumped down the stairs and then I grabbed on the pole and then I swung over and I landed. And all the producers on set, they were like, 'What is he doing?!' And I was like, 'That's what I did every day on Prince of Persia.'"
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