No./ 7
How I learned to stop worrying
and become an action hero
WithEXTRACTION, Chris
Hemsworth finds a tough-
guy role that’s right for him
(with the help of fellow
Marvel alumni)
CHRIS HEMSWORTH DIDN’T want to do
another action film, after an intense few years
playing Thor in near back-to-back blockbusters.
When he first read the script forExtraction
(written by Joe Russo, one half of theAvengers-
directing Russo brothers), he initially said
no. But on a re-read, he realised that this one
felt different. “There’s a beautiful heart to the
movie, a tragedy I guess,” he says. “This bond
that’s formed, two people who find something
they’re both missing. An odd couple. A lot of the
quieter moments in this have gone to places
I hadn’t really explored before.”
Russo’s script follows an Aussie ex-special
forces soldier turned jaded mercenary with
the none-more-action-hero name Tyler Rake(Hemsworth, naturally), hired by a wealthy man
to rescue his kidnapped son (Rudhraksh
Jaiswal’s Ovi). Given Rake’s seriously self-
destructive tendencies, a growing attachment
to the boy and some serious opposition, it won’t
be easy.
Russo also showed the script to Sam Hargrave,
a veteran Marvel stunt coordinator and the man
behind that extraordinary stairwell battle in
Atomic Blonde. Hargrave wanted to direct, and
had some ideas for the script. The story was
originally set in South America and called ‘La
Ciudad’, and he suggested the change to a less
filmed part of the world — Dhaka, Bangladesh
— and a few altered roles. Ovi was originally
a girl, while Golshifteh Farahani’s Nick, Rake’s
more emotionally grounded friend, was
originally a man. “I thought we needed a strong
female role in the movie,” explains Hargrave.
“It’s all grounded in the real world. We’re trying
to be diff erent by being more intimate, staying
with what the character is experiencing. It’s not
always about action for the sake of action. It’s
about action for the sake of driving the story
forward, or action for the sake of character.”
Insurance almost immediately shut down
the idea of fi lming in Bangladesh, so IndiaClockwise from
top: Tyler
Rake’s (Chris
Hemsworth)
shopping trip
goes awry when
he meets pursuer
Sarju (Randeep
Hooda); Director
Sam Hargrave on
set; Rake gets
a hold on
kidnapped teen
Ovi (Rudhraksh
Jaiswal).PREVIEW