Mister Neeson, since “96 Hours” became a huge box-office hit in 2008, you keep making similar action films – and you keep threatening to abandon such physically demanding roles soon. So what does a film like “The Ice Road” need to make you agree again?
It’s simply because of the script, I must be interested in that somehow. In this case, the director and writer Jonathan Hensleigh contacted me and reported that he was inspired by the 1953 French film “Wages of Fear” for “The Ice Road”. I like that very much, so I was immediately pricked up. William Friedkin had already shot a remake with Roy Scheider in the USA in 1977, under the title “Breathless before fear”. A good movie too! And Jonathan’s script really convinced me, precisely because he gave my character an interesting relationship with his brother, who suffers from aphasia, a language disorder.
Are you sometimes tired of the fact that such action roles have become your trademark in the meantime?
I don’t really feel like I’m stuck in any drawer. After all, I can make enough other wonderful films, a couple of times with Martin Scorsese, for example. Or “Ordinary Love”, a really great film that I was in front of the camera with Lesley Manville in my old home in Belfast a few years ago. But to be honest: I also enjoy being able to shoot action scenes in my old days. I was 55 years old when I was shooting “96 Hours” and Hollywood suddenly saw me in a whole new light. An exciting experience. Much of what was offered to me was pretty bad, so I always turned it down. And the offers are also decreasing, after all, I’ll be 70 next year! Nevertheless, I still think it’s really great to train fight scenes and choreographies with a group of stunt men.
Are you also someone who enjoys physical activity in your private life? Or do you prefer to sit on the sofa and read a book?
I like to do both. When I make films like “The Ice Road”, it’s somehow my duty to be in some shape. I take that seriously too. Of course, my aim is not to look like Arnold Schwarzenegger at 35. But I have my little fitness program and train for half an hour, sometimes 40 minutes, every day. After all, that’s good for me, because every film shoot is exhausting, even when there is no action at all. And I don’t even have to leave the house because I have my private gym in the bedroom with a stationary bike, dumbbells and the like.
You don’t seem nearly as taciturn and grumpy as many of the men you play. Is the impression deceptive or do you ultimately have little in common with these loners?
You might have to ask others. I really like to be alone, I can’t deny that. I don’t hang out in bars and pubs or at parties anyway because I don’t drink. Which, by the way, always irritates people, because the stupid cliché of Irish people always drink. But to make a long story short: I don’t have anything against other people’s company in principle. But it doesn’t always have to be – and from a group size of more than eight people it often becomes too much for me.
Frosty mood: Liam Neeson (right) in the action film “The Ice Road”
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Build: AP
Speaking of Ireland, does it still feel like your home?
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