Justin Baldoni Interview Clouds

Justin Baldoni Interview: Clouds

We interview Clouds director Justin Baldoni about what inspired him to direct this film, working with the movie’s cast, and much more.

You Are Reading :[thien_display_title]

Clouds marks Justin Baldoni’s second feature film as a director, and this time he delves into the real-life story of Zach Sobiech. The seventeen year old inspired millions with his music while battling osteosarcoma, and the up-and-coming director poured his all into honoring his memory.

Baldoni spoke with Screen Rant about the journey of making Clouds, which premiered October 16 on Disney+, and how important it was for him to connect Zach’s reality with the onscreen performances.

This is your second film, the first being Five Feet Apart. What inspired you to direct this particular story?

Justin Baldoni: Honestly, Joseph was supposed to direct this movie first. I’ve been working on this movie for five years, and this all started when I made a documentary series called My Last Days with my friends at SoulPancake. I quit acting to pursue my passion as a director, and I had an idea to tell stories of amazing individuals who were living with a chronic or terminal illness, to try to help us all remember that we need to live while we’re alive.

And as the seventh story, I found Zach. It was the final episode of that season, which aired on YouTube. I fell in love with him; he became like a little brother to me, and his family became my family. And before he died, I made him a promise that I would do whatever was in my power to make sure that his story was amplified, his music was heard, and that his message inspired and was told all over the world.

I also made him a promise that I would do whatever I could to help him raise money for the fund he set up in his name, the Zach Sobiech Osteosarcoma Fund, which is really set up to to help fund cancer research for osteosarcoma, which is such an underfunded cancer. At the end of the day, Zach died so other kids could live. After his mom wrote her book, based on her experience as Zach’s mom and what happened with the documentary and his music and all of this, I asked her if I could option her book and turn it into a movie.

So, I was supposed to make this first. But I was shooting Jane The Virgin, and then I had the idea for Five Feet Apart based on another friend of mine. Five Feet Apart ended up happening first, and then this ended up happening second. Which I’m so grateful for, because I kind of think of Five Feet Apart as the younger sibling – even though it’s the older sibling, so to speak.

See also  10 Most Romantic Gestures In Christmas Movies That Make Us All Swoon

I heard that you had a lot of the real-life supporting cast on set. Can you talk to me about how that helped inform you as a director or the actors’ performances?

Justin Baldoni: Yeah, it’s a great question. When I set out to make the movie, I wanted to honor the family. The intention of this film was to give Zach and create a legacy for him and his family and amplify his story in a new way. I didn’t want to do the normal Hollywood thing, which is option a book and then turn it into a movie, and then you show them the movie when it’s over. I wanted them to be a part of it. This is their story, they’re just trusting me to tell it. I’m the vessel; I’m the guardian of the story.

And honestly, I’ve always thought of it as something that Zach was co-directing with me. So, from the very beginning, whether it was script notes – I would send them the script. I wasn’t supposed to, but I would send them the script, and I’d say, “Hey, tell me what you think about this.” They’d give me other ways they would say something or language that they would use or had used, stories that maybe we didn’t know about. When it came time to casting, I wanted Laura to help approve the cast, I wanted Sammy to help approve Sabrina; Amy to help approve Madison. I wanted them to be a part of it, because at the end of the day, these are real people and I want to capture the essence of who Zach was.

And then when it came time for filming, I wanted them to get to know each other. So, I flew the cast to meet the real people. I flew Fin and Madison to meet the family in Minnesota and spend time at the Sobiech house, in the basement that Zach used to be in. I wanted Fin to go into Zach’s room and get to know his stuff, and touch his stuff and read his journal. They all spent time together; they became friends. Robin, Laura, Neve and Tom; they got to know each other. And that was a huge part of it.

Because I didn’t want them to only rely on me or the documentary or memories that maybe they were coming up with in their own mind. I wanted them to learn from the real people. When it came time to filming, it was important to have them on set for a couple reasons. One, how freaking cool is it to get a chance to go to a Hollywood set and see your movie being made? How cool is that in your lifetime for a mom to be able to see, “Wow, there is a big Hollywood studio spending millions of dollars to tell my son’s story”. At the end of the day, she lost her son, and we are telling his story. So, she should be able to be there to see it.

See also  Game of Thrones Season 8 Premiere Sets New Ratings & Streaming Records

And all that does – you bring in everybody, you let them be a part of it – it just ups the stakes. It gives the actors an opportunity to reach into parts of themselves they didn’t know that they could reach into and do justice to them. And then the other thing that we did that was so important was, as I was making this movie, I took a director’s chair – and everywhere I went on the set, the chair followed me. And that chair had Zach’s name on it, because Zach was co-directing this movie with me. No one was allowed to sit in that chair except Zach. And there is not a doubt in my mind that Zach was on that set every single day.

That was the energy that I wanted to have in the movie, even down to as an example: you might not know this, but I had Fin wear Zach’s real clothes. As Chekhov in An Actor Prepares talks about putting on the clothes to inform the character, I believe that our clothing has energy; the things in our lives have energy. We shipped half of Zach’s room to our set in Montreal, so the props were real props. His room was his real room. He was sitting on his sheets, on his bed, on his pillow that that held Zacks energy. Wearing his shirts; the shirt that Zach wore, when he recorded “Clouds” for the first time that you can watch on YouTube is the shirt that Finn wore when he recorded “Clouds” for the first time in the movie.

I wanted it to be a convergence of life and art, so that we can touch people’s hearts in a way that maybe they haven’t been touched in a long time.

Link Source : https://screenrant.com/clouds-movie-justin-baldoni-interview/

Movies -