I chatted over the phone last week with director Doug Liman about his upcoming movie American Made, a true crime tale that reunites him with his Edge of Tomorrow star, Tom Cruise.
American Made tells the story of Barry Seal (Cruise), a commercial pilot and hustler in the 1980s who smuggled drugs for the Colombian cartels while also being recruited by the CIA to run one of the biggest covert operations in U.S. history. Seal played both sides against the other, a dangerous game involving some of the most powerful political and criminal figures of the 20th century.
Seal's story is an outrageous one and, as the film's first trailer (seen below) makes clear, Liman's film embraces that absurdity and cocaine cowboy quality.
Here are seven highlights of what Doug Liman had to tell me about American Made, which flies into North American theaters September 29th.
The casting of Tom Cruise as 1980s drug smuggling pilot Barry Seal was very much a subversive nod to Cruise's star-making turn as a Reagan era flying ace in Top Gun. As Liman explained:
Tom Cruise as "Maverick" in 1986's Top Gun.
"In the same way that, when I made Edge of Tomorrow, I'm gonna take the guy from Mission: Impossible and make him a total coward. You know, that's just the way I think, and so, I'm like, how could I not think, oh, you take Maverick from Top Gun, have him play a smuggler. I'm gonna have him fly high-performance prop planes that pale in comparison to Navy fighter jets, and try to make a movie that's more fun and more exciting. ... And [the film also shows] what a great comedian (Cruise) is."
Liman, who proclaimed himself "a rule-breaker" with "a certain anti-authority streak in me," explained how American Made was a reaction to his own 2010 film Fair Game, another fact-based, politicized tale involving Washington D.C. power players and subterfuge:
Director Doug Liman on the set of Fair Game.
"I made a film called Fair Game where the government abused its relationship with spy Valerie Plame. My films tend to – even though I don't necessarily realize this until afterwards, I tend to be drawn to the movies sometimes because of the movies that came before. So I think Mr. and Mrs. Smith followed – I was interested in that after Bourne Identity because it challenged some of the assumptions that I made in Bourne Identity, like that being a spy is something that films should celebrate, when maybe maintaining a successful marriage is a more impressive accomplishment than anything James Bond has ever done. And I'm not sure I would have had that realization if I hadn't come off of Bourne Identity, and I'm not sure I would have been quite as drawn to a movie about a guy who just sticks it to the CIA, sticks it to the DEA, sticks it to the White House, if I hadn't lived through a movie where the White House sets out to destroy Valerie Plame and Joe Wilson."
In his role as both a CIA operative and an international drug smuggler, Barry Seal crossed paths with some of the most notorious figures of the 1980s ... and those who would rise to power in later years. Liman likened Seal to one of Tom Hanks' most famous characters:
Barry Seal meets Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega.
"The thing about Barry Seal is, he was kind of like Forrest Gump. He touched a lot of important people and famous people, you know, including Reagan, George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, Manuel Noriega, Pablo Escobar, Ochoa, Carlos Lehder, Oliver North, yoknow. A lot of those people are still around. So, when Noriega died, I was like, okay, that's one less person that can sue us. But, you know, Barry Seal did use Noriega's airstrips for part of his operations. That's what's, you know – part of what I love about the world of American Made is, everybody is a scoundrel. From the president to Barry Seal to Pablo Escobar to Domhnall Gleeson who plays Barry Seal's handler in the CIA."
Speaking of Domnhall Gleeson's CIA handler, Liman explained why this character is a particularly nasty piece of work:
"I've done the CIA before, you know, with the Bourne franchise, and with Covert Affairs. And with Domhnall, I found a really exciting way into showing the CIA side, which is, you know, the most dangerous antagonist you could have within the CIA is a guy in a cubicle. He desperately wants to get to an office. And that's what Domhnall Gleeson plays. It's one of the most – I'm so excited by how original, and honest, that portrayal of the CIA is."
Given that Barry Seal's story touches on then-future Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush (the latter is portrayed in the film by Star Trek: Enterprise's Connor Trinneer), there's an inescapably political element to American Made. Not that Liman wants his film to be seen as a political statement. For Liman, his movie is a story about one wild guy's crazy adventure:
"Barry Seal is like a conspiracy theorist magnet. Because it doesn't matter which side of the spectrum you're on, he touches everybody. Because he was working for the federal government, which is the Republicans and Reagans and Bushes. But he was doing it out of Arkansas, which is where Bill Clinton reigned, because he was governor. But, you know, we're a fun movie. So we left the politics – you know, we leave that to other people, and journalists. But I wanted the characters to make cameos in the movie. They are – you could go explore this, we're not going to. We're just gonna touch on it. Because we can't ignore it. But it's not – it's not the reason we made the movie. We have no agenda. The agenda is, you know, to celebrate what Tom and I both saw as an extraordinary life, and an extraordinary adventure. You know, Tom and I are both pilots, we're drawn to adventure. ... And, maybe that's what really appealed to both of us about telling the story about Barry Seal, what an amazing adventure this guy had. Flying for the CIA and Pablo Escobar at the same time, unbeknownst to the other."
Barry Seal's piloting skills, as well as his lack of interest in the cargo he was delivering, made him the perfect operative for both the drug lords and the Central Intelligence Agency. As Liman explained:
"Barry Seal, he didn't care what was in the back of his airplane, he just cared how heavy it was. And he built an empire. If it absolutely had to be there overnight and it was illegal, Barry Seal was your guy. He could get it in and out of the country. He could get it in and out of Colombia, or Panama. There's no place he wouldn't fly to. And so, you know, he always delivered. He was completely reliable, it's a reason Escobar considered him his most trusted pilot. And the CIA considered him their most trusted pilot, because he always delivered. He just was, you know. He was playing both sides against each other and they didn't even know it."
"I don't think we're, in the same way Barry Seal wasn't really thinking what was in the back of his airplane, the movie doesn't focus on that. We don't really – it's not really about the cocaine business, it's not really about the CIA and whether it was a smart war or a dumb war that they were getting Barry involved in. It's about, you know, being free. And for someone like Tom and myself, both of us have really aspired to a life filled with risk and adventure, Barry Seal is a – I hate to use the word role model when we're talking about the largest drug smuggler in American history, but there are qualities to his fearlessness that I do think are worth aspiring to."
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