Jake Gyllenhaal’s powerful performance in The Guilty Fuqua after seeing the Danish-language original at Sundance in 2018, has won tremendous plaudits ever
safe ways to work during the pandemic. It’s also a big year for the Gyllenhaal clan generally, as Jake’s sister Maggie releases her feature directorial debut, The Lost Daughter.
Your sister, Maggie, has made a
I’m so close to it since I’ve been through the whole process of it. It’s almost like being in it, where I don’t have any perspective really. But to have been there with her in time it screened for an audience, it was like a huge relief followed by a huge celebration. It’s been amazing, and it isn’t surprising. Maggie is so smart, and she’s so brave to talk about complex feelings. I think it’s rare that feelings that complex get expressed, and it’s rare that they get the positive attention she has been getting for this movie, so I’m really excited about that. It gives me faith. She got so much support, and an incredible cast. She’s got all these nice little booster rockets.
a moment where everybody said, “Well, we can’t tell this story now.” I think it was an immediate reaction, with people not really looking at what was underneath; what this movie script to Antoine Fuqua, he said, “This is everything I want to be talking about right now, and it’s entertaining. People can listen again.” Both of us, Antoine and I, said, “Now is the time to tell this story.” And it wasn’t just about the relative ease of making it with the restrictions of the pandemic. It was because putting it into the American context was important. These are the times to tell stories like that.
When I look back at it now, it was very much an expression of that
moment for me. It’s an allegory. It’s very Greek, it’s very dramatic. I couldn’t go backwards when we shot, so we shot in order. It progressed into these kinds of big feelings that emerge toward the end of the movie. And there were many other big feelings under those big feelings. The Guilty
Both Maggie and I were raised to talk honestly about what’s inside us, and I want to continue to do that. I think I’m moving to a place where I just want to have more fun. And part to express those feelings myself; to create movies and tell stories on my own that communicate that, as my sister has done. And also, to be in movies as an
actor for hire that are just great fun to do. To enjoy the process. That’s not to say I haven’t had fun before, though I don’t know how much I was letting myself enjoy what was there. Some roles had been great fun over the years. Nightcrawler, even though people have a certain perspective on those characters, I found great fun to do. But the longer you’re lucky enough to get to do this, the more genres you explore, and if you can get stuck in there… I think I’m starting to get more interested in what an actual hero is, as an archetype and as an idea. And I’m interested in challenging that. I think most of the characters I played before have been more like antiheroes. Now, I’m sort of interested in what makes a real hero.
and it was
When you do it long enough, you start to work it out. Not to say those
Jake Gyllenhaal as Joe Bayler in The Guilty.
the start of the pandemic wanting to make the movie. Because it was contained, because it was centered on one character, it was a safe thing to do, and everyone was eager to be getting back in. Everyone jumped in. Then, George Floyd was killed. It’s hard for me, because I don’t want to give away too much of the story to people who may not have seen it, but let’s say that there was
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I do hope the movie inspires actual change, and I hope that perspectives like The Lost Daughter, which are already profound literary expressions, can be brought into the world more. I think there are many of them, and that was why I wanted to make The Guilty. You could see