Interview: Filmmaker Brothers John Erick & Drew Dowdle of ‘No Escape’

Printer-friendly versionE-mail page to friendPDF version

CHICAGO – Filmmakers brothers are ubiquitous, as siblings grow up with the love of the movies and turn it into a career when adults. Director John Erick Dowdle and his writing partner, brother Drew, has had a successful run with films like “Devil” and last year’s “As Above, So Below.” Their latest film, “No Escape,” explores geopolitics and the increasing potential for government breakdown.

Owen Wilson and Lake Bell are Jack and Annie, Americans traveling with two children who go to an unnamed Asian land for Jack’s work. He represents a corporation whose activities with the government cause an uprising, and the family suddenly finds themselves in the midst of a street war. Coming to their aid is a mysterious British expatriate, portrayed with a maniacal verve by Pierce Brosnan. The family must find a way to escape the country, as foreigners are being rounded up for execution.

The Brothers Dowdle: John Erick and Drew on the Set of ‘No Escape’
Photo credit: The Weinstein Company

The tense screenplay was written by “The Brothers Dowdle,” Drew and (also the director of the film) John Erick. John is the older of the two, and they grew up in Minnesota. John Erick’s first film was 1996’s “Full Moon Rising,” and he was joined by Drew (as producer) for his second film, “The Dry Spell.” They have since teamed up as storytellers for “The Poughkeepsie Tapes” (2007), “Quarantine” (2008), “As Above, So Below” (2014) and “No Escape.” Both brothers were in Chicago to promote the film, and talked with HollywoodChicago.com about the politics, action sequences and working with an ex-James Bond as part of the story.

HollywoodChicago.com: Which event or thought process inspired this idea? And what specific themes did you want to express throughout the screenplay?

John Erick Dowdle: My Dad and I went to Thailand to travel, and right before we go there, a coup happened. The generals had taken over and kicked out the Prime Minister. And we thought, ‘is it okay for us to be here?’ It turned out to be peaceful, but there was heightened security everywhere, armed guards and they searched our car for bombs. It definitely got me in the frame of mind, because we had no warning, and I thought ‘what if you had kids?’

Drew and I are the oldest of six kids in our family. In a previous trip to Thailand we had taken our two youngest sisters. So it was natural to think about what would happen if everything went off the rails.

Drew Dowdle: Thematically we also liked the idea of that primal parental instinct. You read stories about a mother who picks up a car when their child is trapped underneath, so it’s that kind of idea of a family in an extraordinary circumstance. The casting of Owen Wilson was in line with that – we wanted that to feel like someone like your friend or your brother doing something like that in such a situation. Somebody without particular survival skills, just going by the instinct of protecting his kids.

HollywoodChicago.com: As the family goes through their ordeal, there are many specific moments of psychological anguish. What did you study about human nature in this situation – especially the psychology of children – that you incorporated into the script?

John Erick: I think it was more of a gut instinct. We come from a huge family, and there were little kids around all the time when we were growing up. Our parents divorced when we were 14 and 12 years old, and just seeing how that played out informed a lot about how we approached this story.

Drew: We did study a lot of crisis situations, and I think human beings with a crisis – especially when it’s ongoing – kick into this extra gear which blocks out the psychological trauma. We liked the contrast of the scene where Owen blanks out for a second, because we’re interested in the idea of the primal instinct, doing something first and then dealing with the psychological elements later.

HollywoodChicago.com: This is so different than the previous subject matter of your films, and more highly charged politically. What was different, to you, about the fear in this film versus the fear in a typical horror film?

John Erick: It’s definitely more rooted in reality. This is something that can happen, and does happen. I think there is that, and for us the family is crisis, and the way to get closer as a family is to survive a crisis together. We wanted to explore that, those human dramatic themes, and then base it in something that felt real.

Drew: We’ve always focused on keeping our films grounded, even though they had a supernatural element. This one is more experiential – we wanted the audience to ask what they would do in certain situations, and then they can really place themselves in that scenario.

Owen Wilson and Lake Bell Protect Their Family in ‘No Escape’
Photo credit: The Weinstein Company

HollywoodChicago.com: This is a shot across the bow regarding corporate influence in today’s world. What hasn’t the typical American learned, in your opinions, about how a for-profit entity approached geopolitics, as opposed to governments?

John Erick: It’s a very blurry line between governments and for-profit entities in developing countries. There are many situations that corporations take care of that are shown to be helpful – building infrastructure to ‘help this poor country.’ When you look under the covers more, there is some other interest they are after.

For example, I’m a giant corporation that gives a country a big loan to hire my corporation. So they pay themselves, and put the debt load on the shaky economy of the country. Sometimes it’s done intentionally knowing that it will never be repaid. But it can be repaid with a couple of extra votes in the UN or maybe a military base presence. It becomes about creating a position where favors have to be met.

Drew: The whole idea of these massive loans being done, with the realization that there is no intention it will be repaid, it’s an unsettling strategy. When countries who do this end up in default, that is when government objectives and private sector objectives fall into line.

HollywoodChicago.com: The use and performance of Pierce Brosnan was quite brilliant. How did best connect on his loose and natural performance, in the sense of how he got to what you were trying to do?

John Erick: First off, there is an actor who knows his guns. He showed up to the set, and started going through them, and everyone was in awe watching him do it.

HollywoodChicago.com: I guess in that case you would defer to James Bond.

John Erick: There is the crucial scene where he faces down a vehicle, and at first we were budgeted for a pickup truck. And we said, ‘no, if it’s coming after James Bond, it’s got to be a 12 wheel military grade vehicle.’ [laughs]

All kidding aside, we wanted something that felt really different from James Bond. We wanted the audience to be unsure about him – is he a good guy or bad guy? We wanted him on the edge. We gave him some pretty subversive dialogue at the top of the film, and some people were saying that the reaction would be hatred toward the character. We just said, ‘not with Pierce Brosnan playing him.’ He pretty much can say anything, you just love him more.

Drew: Yes, if it were in the hands of any other actor, it might not have worked

John Erick: Pierce had just seen a documentary, ‘Beware Ginger Baker’ [drummer for the band Cream] and he told me he thought that was Hammond. I told him it was perfect. He playfully did it up in that way when he approached the character. He was kind of unrecognizable, sort of just an alcoholic British guy.

HollywoodChicago.com: I’d like each of you – since you are writing partners and brothers – to characterize something in the script that only the other brother could make up, given his personality.

Drew: One of John’s scenes that is my favorite is when Lake Bell’s character is in the bathroom, before the coup starts. She is trying to suffer in silence, and Owen’s character comes in to comfort her, but what he really wants her to do is tell him it’s all okay. But she can’t do that. That is something John can do well.

John Erick: Is the water wheel too specific? [laughs] It’s a moment of real poetry, and one of the things that Drew is really good at. Here we are in Thailand, and he sees that water wheel figurine, and knows that it fits in the film. He bought it from a pizza place. The clicking on it was so hypnotic, and it was so metaphoric.

Pierce Brosnan Encounters Owen Wilson in ‘No Escape’
Photo credit: The Weinstein Company

HollywoodChicago.com: Besides the abject violence against innocent people in the war zone you created, did you feel that any of the message of the rebels were correct, such as slogans like ‘blood for water’?

John Erick: The goal of radicalized situations like this is to destroy tourism. If they do that, they can ‘get their country back.’ The western countries and companies are taking over their water, and are messing with their affairs. Terrorism as it was depicted is horrible, but that type of radicalism was our mentality in the film.

HollywoodChicago.com: We had examples of corporate infiltration in the last Iraq War adventure, and for the most part it was a failed association. What is the danger, in your opinions, of corporations having too much influence when confronted with war?

Drew: More and more the military is outsourcing duties, not just security. Prisons are an example, and some military personnel were prosecuted for Abu Ghraib, when many more of the private resources also were involved, but weren’t prosecuted. There is a lack of accountability in a lawless situation, and if it’s not our government or our military managing it, it can derail. They don’t play by the same rules.

John Erick: There are certain situations where I think the government is in a better position to look out for human well being than corporations do. With corporations, there is no sense of a person that feels that responsibility at the end of the day.

HollywoodChicago.com: There are seven examples on IMDB for the title, ‘No Escape.’ Knowing that, was there simply no other better descriptive for what you wanted folks to know or not know when coming into your film?

John Erick: When were were shooting it, it was called ‘The Coup.’ But it wasn’t really about that, and some people were reading it like ‘The Coop,’ as in a chicken coop. [laughs] Owen Wilson is in a chicken coop comedy? It was just so unclear that we had to make a change. Since Owen was doing a different genre than what we’re used to seeing him in, we had to hit the title a bit more forcefully.

Drew: We looked at all the ‘No Escape’ titles, and realized the only one of them was the Ray Liotta film from 1994. We probably spent several thousand hours trying to get the right tone for the title.

HollywoodChicago.com: Since you’ve broken out of the horror mode with this film, what other type of film genre would you both like to tackle if given the opportunity?

John Erick: We’re working on a couple of true stories now.

Drew: They are more dramatic, and in the thriller mode.

John Erick: We’ll always do stuff that is intense, or maybe a ‘non-romantic’ comedy. [laughs]

By PATRICK McDONALD Writer, Editorial Coordinator HollywoodChicago.com [email protected]