Colin Farrell has looked back at his expansive decades-long acting career and revealed which movie scene was the most dangerous to film.
The 49-year-old Irish actor, whose new movie A Big Bold Beautiful Journey was released last week, was joined by his co-star Margot Robbie for a new interview with Collider.
The two were asked which movie sequence was the hardest to shoot. While Robbie named a one-shot scene from Damien Chazelle’s 2022 comedy-drama Babylon, Farrell said his was from the 2004 war-action Alexander.
“The hardest sequence I’ve ever been a part of was there was a battle scene shot for Alexander in the desert of Morocco way back when,” he recounted. “We were [there] four weeks doing the Battle of Gaugamela, and so it was four weeks coming in every day.”
Giving it a thought, he noted: “Actually, that was the most dangerous thing. Let’s go with the most dangerous thing I’ve ever been a part of.
“They would say action, and there was eight head of elephant, 200 head of horse, and 800 background, 800 foreground, 800 x, 800 Thai men who would move. Eight elephants, 200 horses and 800 men would go on action,” he recalled.
“One guy broke his leg on horseback. That was it. Nobody died. It was a miracle. They wouldn’t do it now.”
Directed by William Oliver Stone, Alexander starred the Oscar-nominated actor as Alexander the Great, chronicling his rise to power, the creation of a vast empire, and its ultimate downfall.
The epic also starred Angelina Jolie, Anthony Hopkins, Rosario Dawson, and Val Kilmer.
Though the film was a major critical and box office flop, Farrell praised the film’s director for his leadership at the 2005 Golden Globes.
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“Oliver is an amazing director and an incredible man. He is somebody who suffers from an affliction that is not that common in today’s society, especially in respect to people that are as fortunate, as wealthy and as successful as he is; he suffers from pure honesty and complete integrity,” the Penguin actor said.
“Making this film was very much a journey of discovery for everyone involved, including and maybe particularly for Oliver. There was no doubt that he was our leader, and Oliver led by example, like Alexander; he pushed the crew and the cast extremely hard, and he didn’t push anyone harder than me, except maybe for himself. So, in that respect, he is an incredible leader; he’s a director that demands that you give as much as he gives.”
Currently, Farrell leads A Big Bold Beautiful Journey opposite Robbie. In the movie, which sees him reunite with his After Yang director Kogonada, Farrell and Robbie play two strangers who embark on a memory-recall road trip led by a magical GPS system.
