Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with my brief, but fun conversation with the beautiful Mila Kunis for THE BOOK OF ELI. I did the interview at Comic-Con and held it and the other Eli interviews so they wouldn’t get buried in the avalanche of Con interviews and news and now it is here.
And it’s not just the lovely Mila Kunis, either. There’s a special surprise appearance by one of her co-stars in the movie. You’ll see what I’m talking about.
I also want to preface this interview by saying I’m 99% sure Mila Kunis fell in love with me during this interview. Look at some of the pics and see if I’m lyin’ to you. Who knew Mila was attracted to ugly fat geeks?
Anyway, enjoy the chat!
Mila Kunis: Hi!
Quint: Hello.
Mila Kunis: Have we met before?
Quint: We sure did. San Francisco, I interviewed all you guys for Forgetting Sarah Marshall.
Mila Kunis: That’s what it was. You had for an hour or something.
Quint: It was a fun chat with all you guys. I remember Jack McBrayer had just done that music video and you forced them to show it to all of us during the interview.
Mila Kunis: His Mariah Carey video! I wish McBrayer was here today. He’s always fun.
Quint: I love the post-apocalyptic genre. A lot of the time in these types of movies there aren’t many female characters and if there are they’re underwritten. I imagine since you took the role that wasn’t the case with this movie.
Mila Kunis: No. Solara’s one of the greater, most well-written female characters you can have. Absolutely. And she’s given a lot to do. Most times, and I fight against this as much as I can, the female character is the damsel in distress, the woman that needs to be saved.
Quint: And you don’t want to be screaming and biting your fist.
Mila Kunis: Not my kind of… no. And that’s not to say that Solara doesn’t cause trouble, because she does, but she resurrects herself and fixes things.
Quint: Obviously we’re following Denzel’s character. So where do you come into play? He stumbles upon you at some point in his journey, I’d imagine.
Mila Kunis: Yeah, he comes through this town that’s run by Gary Oldman’s character. Gary plays my stepfather and he sends me to seduce Denzel’s character in order to get information as to where he came from and who he is. In return my character becomes inspired by him and fascinated by him and escapes and goes on the journey with him.
Quint: So you become his sidekick?
Mila Kunis: (laughs) I wouldn’t know if she’s necessarily his sidekick. She’s more his pupil.
Quint: Protégé!
Mila Kunis: Yeah, she’s more his protégé. She’s not quite sidekick level yet, but she might be at the very end.
Quint: The focus on the footage was Denzel’s action work. Do you get some cool action stuff yourself?
Mila Kunis: Denzel kicks some serious ass in this film. Let me say. It was really impressive. There’s no stunt doubles, no fighting doubles… he does it all himself and in one take!
Quint: The Hughes Bros said there weren’t any camera tricks, either.
Mila Kunis: No camera tricks, it was all one take and he is fantastic in it. I have to blow things up and drive cars frantically. I don’t have one on one physical action…
Quint: But blowing things up is cool, too.
Mila Kunis: It’s so cool! It’s super rad, but truly… watching Denzel is incredible. He’s super impressive.
Quint: Let’s talk a little bit about the chemistry between you and Denzel vs. you and Gary. Did you work closely with them or did those relationships just come from what was in the script?
Mila Kunis: I think it just kind of came with the script. It never needed to be forced, ever. I think the script was so well written and so well executed, timeline-wise, it never needed to be forced to show the audience, like, “Look at this! This is the relationship!”
The brilliant thing was we shot as much in order as we could, so everything was very cohesive. Like the first thing I shot was the first time my character meets Denzel’s character. It was all very much in order and the last day I shot the last scene of the film. So it all kind of progressed very naturally and very organically.
Quint: I’m sure it must be a big help for you and your performance shooting in a linear fashion.
Mila Kunis: It really does. You don’t have to force it. I meet Denzel and, you know, he’s Denzel Washington. It’s indescribable what his presence is like, so to shoot that first scene where I’m supposed to try to seduce him? Nerve-wracking! And it works amazingly well. All natural!
[Mila looks over to the next table where Denzel Washington is sitting doing an interview and sees Denzel looking her way.]
Mila Kunis: (tough) Why are you looking over here?
Denzel Washington: I don’t know.
Mila Kunis: I was just talking about you!
Denzel Washington: She (his interviewer) just said it must be awful to run from Gary Oldman. I said, “Yeah, but it’s not so bad when you got Mila.”
Mila Kunis: Aww!
Quint: She was just saying seducing you was nerve-wracking.
Denzel Washington: It never nerve-wracked me!
Quint: Especially by Mila.
Mila Kunis: Wait, being seduced or seducing?
Denzel Washington: Well, being seduced!
Mila Kunis: Being seduced is not nerve-wracked…
Denzel Washington: Except when it’s your friend’s mother!
Mila Kunis: (laughs) Where’s your head at?!? Yes, that would be uncomfortable, you are correct.
Denzel Washington: I’m doing a visual now and I don’t like it!
Mila Kunis: It’s a slightly disturbing thought. I got nothing.
Quint: What are you doing next?
Mila Kunis: Apparently I can’t talk about what I’m doing next until Monday (it was then that her involvement in Darren Aronofsky’s BLACK SWAN was announced).
Quint: Well, are you doing any more stuff with ROBOT CHICKEN?
Mila Kunis: Yeah. Robot Chicken. Did you see my really talented dog on the Robot Chicken website?
Quint: No, I have not.
Mila Kunis: Then you are missing out. There are those Robot Chicken skate parties that are coming to your town, right? Seth (Green) came over to my house at, if I’m not mistaken, midnight one day and was like “We have to shoot a viral video to promote this.” You have to go online and watch the viral video to promote the Robot Chicken skate party.
Quint: I will do that (and I did... here's the link!). Thank you for taking the time to talk to me. I really appreciate it.
Mila Kunis: Of course! Ain’t It Cool News. How that website became as popular as it is is insane to me.
Quint: Oh yeah?
Mila Kunis: I used to go on it when no one knew about it!
See, she’s looking at me in that picture. Sorry, Mac. I think I just stole your girl’s heart.
Anyway, there’s that one. I hope you guys enjoyed the chat. It was one of my funner Comic-Con conversations.
I actually get to finally see The Book of Eli tonight and I’m very much looking forward to it. The flick hits wide tomorrow!
-Quint
quint@aintitcool.com
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