STACK #194 Dec 2020

FILM FEATURE

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worked with several of the cast – who have military backgrounds – and they all supported her. Like with other actors I’ve brought to Africa, it’s a completely different experience and you come away slightly changed. So she was not at all what I expected – and everything I hoped for.” Featuring numerous CGI lions, you can’t help but ask if Bassett might have tapped mo-cap stars Andy Serkis or Toby Kebbell, both of whom she directed in Deathwatch and Wilderness , respectively. “I love them both but I couldn’t afford them anymore,” she laughs. Rogue marks a full circle moment for Bassett, a life-long animal lover whose teenage dreams were inspired by David Attenborough and David Bellamy; quitting school to train as a wildlife filmmaker. Following a brief foray as a TV children’s show presenter, she purchased a video camera and began exploring a secondary passion for “blowing up sh-t”, resulting in her debut film, the horror drama Deathwatch , starring Matthew Rhys and Jamie Bell. “Growing up in the ‘80s in England, there was no real culture of genre filmmaking, but I liked James Cameron and Steven Spielberg and big accessible horror movies by Wes Craven and John Carpenter,” says Bassett, who eventually launched a successful action film career, directing Solomon Kane and sequel Silent Hill: Revelation .

Megan Fox ditches her former sex symbol image to play a tough mercenary in the new action-thriller, Rogue . STACK got the lowdown from director MJ Bassett. Words Gill Pringle

As she built a repertoire of action and horror on both TV and film, her passion for wildlife was not forgotten, and she considers Rogue to be the first of a trilogy of similar action/ conservation themes, recently

D irector MJ Bassett had little interest in hiring a big star like Megan Fox for her low budget action-thriller, Rogue . “I like making small movies because they give me the freedom to do what I want to do which, in this case, was make an action film with an underlying eco-conservation message,” says Bassett, talking to STACK in Los Angeles. “When you add a big star to the mix, everything changes.” Set in South Africa, Rogue follows a group of tough mercenaries on a mission to rescue hostages from the remote outback. When the escape plan goes wrong, the team is stranded in an abandoned lion farm, forced to survive a long night against local rebels and even more deadly wildlife. “I hadn’t seen anything that showed Megan being tough and nothing she’s done demonstrated she’d even be interested. And frankly, it’s Megan Fox, so I wasn’t interested,” recalls Bassett, who was persuaded to meet Fox over coffee, the actress having expressed interest within 24 hours of reading Bassett’s script, co-written with daughter Isabel. “But Megan is absolutely nothing like you’d expect. She’s a very thoughtful, considerate, intelligent woman. She’s a mother of three kids and not a sexy little vixen in short shorts anymore. She’s very aware of the perception

returning from Kenya where she shot a second film. “ Rogue is ultimately supposed to be an

I’d love the audience to come

entertaining, fast-paced, scary, edge-of-your-seat action-thriller, with a kick-

away from this movie thoroughly entertained, but also educated

ass heroine and some good jokes in there too. But there’s also a strong conservation message throughout. With this movie I’m hoping to shine a light on the

about her and I think she saw how a film like Rogue could move the needle and allow her to be a different person.” If Fox launched her career on big budget flick Transformers , then she had little experience of actually leading a movie like Rogue . “She’d never really done any military stuff or handled weapons and I’ve done lots of that,” says Bassett, who put Fox to work with military advisors and a former marine sniper prior to the 21- day shoot outside Johannesburg. “So she came to Africa and got completely stuck in. I’ve previously

lion breeding industry in South Africa, where these magnificent animals are farmed in often terrible conditions for their skins and bones as well as being used for canned hunting. Tourists don’t realise that the adorable cubs they’re petting for their holiday photos and selfies often have a very bleak future indeed. I’d love the audience to come away from this movie thoroughly entertained, but also educated, and thoughtful about how humans impact and often destroy the natural world.”

• Rogue is out on Dec 2

32 DECEMBER 2020

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