Tom Hanks is confident that <em>Greyhound </em>can serve as a lesson to viewers on how to behave in the face of adversity, even if it is a virus
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7 July 2020 9h56
Updated at 22h22
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Tom Hanks : Greyhound can serve as a lesson in dealing with the coronavirus
Andrew Marszal
Agence France-Presse
LOS ANGELES — Tom Hanks has “the broken heart” that his new film war do so not in the cinemas because of the pandemic, but he has good hope that it can serve as a lesson to viewers on how to behave in the face of adversity, even if it is a virus.
Greyhound, released on Apple TV+ from the 10th of July, was written by Tom Hanks, who plays the role of a captain escorting a convoy of allied ships in their crossing of the north Atlantic, scoured by the German submarines during the Second world War.
The film follows the novice component of the crew in this terrifying journey, faced with the double responsibility of watching over the convoy and their own comrades.
“These guys on the ship… all they can do is what is expected of them and hoped that a mixture of providence and chance permit them to pass through”, has summed up the actor during a virtual press conference.
“The COVID-19, does anyone know how long it will last, nobody knows who is going to die… no need to look very far to see the correlations and similarities with the war years”, he says.
Tom Hanks is paid to know this : last march, he became the first star in Hollywood to contract the novel coronavirus, while he was in Australia to begin shooting a film about Elvis Presley.
The star of’saving private Ryan can not help but be indignant by comparing the gestures simple enough to protect them from the virus — keep his distance and wear a mask — with the German torpedoes, and the icy ocean that have had to suffer the sailors of the time.
“If someone is not able to put into practice these basic things, he should be ashamed,” says Tom Hanks.
“Don’t be wimps. Go ahead, do your part of the job. It is very, very simple,” insists the actor of 63 years.
Tom Hanks plays the role of the commander Ernie Krause.
Apple TV +
“Lived through hell”
History buff Tom Hanks has found the inspiration for his screenplay on a novel by C. S. Forester, Shepherds of the sea (1955). It took seven years of work since the time when he discovered a copy of opportunity.
The original cover showed a man grey-haired, scruffy, uniform beaten by the wind, the commander Ernie Krause that he plays in Greyhound. Seeing this character, “I thought : this man is exhausted, this man has lived through hell,” remembers Tom Hanks.
For the filming of the feature-length film, director Aaron Schneider has been building a setting based on the vessel USS Kidd, the only u.s. destroyer of the Second world War still existing today in its original configuration. For more authenticity, some of the interior scenes were filmed aboard the ship of war, who survived an attack by suicide bombers in 1945 and is now moored in Louisiana, where it serves as a museum.
Unfortunately, spectators will not be able to take advantage of all of these details on the big screen because the movie will not come out in the cinema.
Because of the pandemic which continues, particularly in the United States, the producers have decided not to wait, as dozens of other big-budget blockbuster movies are in the starting blocks for this winter or next year. Sony has, therefore, preferred to sell Greyhound’s exclusive to Apple for its video-on-demand.
“We all have the broken heart that this film does so not in the room,” assured Tom Hanks, believing that he had to face the reality of the pandemic.
“Just as [the commander] Ernie Krause in the middle of the Atlantic ocean, who wonders how he will survive and do its work, if it is going to survive, we are all in the midst of the crisis of the COVID-19, which is five times larger than what we had anticipated,” he continued.
“And we do not know how, and if, we are going out, and who will be able to join us on the other side.”
