Why the action sequences of The Convert are more brutal than “Die Another Day,” explains the director

In The ConvertThomas Munro is a lay preacher who is sent to a British settlement in New Zealand in the 1830s. There he hopes to find peace and escape the demons of his past, but is thrown into the middle of a conflict between two Maori tribes and a settlement full of ignorant Britons who do not understand the way of life of the indigenous people living on the land they now inhabit. Munro’s faith and hope for redemption are tested as he attempts to end the war between the Maori tribes and opens himself to an understanding of their culture.

The Convert subverts what many would expect, with Guy Pearce bringing humanity, empathy and a certain secrecy to the character Munro. The brutality of the action sequences with the Maori is the perfect contrast to the Maori culture and curiosity of some of the tribe members. Lee Tamahori led the project not only as director but also as co-writer, bringing a completely different perspective to the story, especially in Munro’s journey.

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Screen Rant interviewed The Convert Director Lee Tamahori. He explained how he approached the plot in The Convert unlike James Bond. He also praised Pearce’s ability to bring the character to life and talked about how the main character Munro is fascinated by Maori culture, which influences his journey throughout the film.

Lee Tamahori wanted “another story about a humanist hiding in clerical clothing”

Tamahori explained how the story of The Convert changed after he got hold of the script to make the character more appealing to him. Instead of following a religious zealot who wants to convert the indigenous people of New Zealand, as the title suggests, The Convert takes a different path. Munro and the Maori influence each other.

Lee Tamahori: Well, I took the script from my producer, which was about a character that didn’t appeal to me. I didn’t like him at all. He was a religious zealot, and I don’t like characters about religious zealots. That doesn’t have much of an impact on me. They don’t have a sense of purpose in what they’re doing. They just believe in a higher power and that dominates the story. That’s not what I wanted to tell. I wanted more of a story about a humanist who is kind of hiding in clerical clothing, trying to escape a nightmare in his head.

He tried to get as far away from the United Kingdom, or Britain as it was called then, as possible, and took his demons with him everywhere. I was more interested in creating a character who was interested in other cultures and trying to find meaning in his life. So when I started adapting this script, a lot of things fell away from this script and were replaced with new things, new elements. Which I’m very happy about.

One of the things I had to do was make sure that the languages ​​spoken are Maori, te reo as it’s called, and I didn’t want everything to be subtitled. I needed someone to translate. So I invented a translator, which became (Charlotte). Anyway, she translates Maori into English so that we, the audience, can understand. And sometimes it’s subtitled and sometimes the spoken Maori is not subtitled because you don’t need to know what’s being said. It’s not relevant to the narrative. It’s just things that people say to each other or whatever, and it doesn’t have to be that way. So it was interesting to go through all these different elements of having the Maori not speak English.

One of the things I was curious about was what the title, “The Convert,” meant to you, because it completely upended my expectations based on the title and knowing that it was about a preacher.

Lee Tamahori: Yes, exactly. That’s why I was interested. I like the title because they had not been converted, unlike the Maori, who it is supposed to convert.

Unlike a James Bond action sequence, “The Convert” has to be “terrifyingly authentic”

Tamahori has directed many films throughout his career, including the James Bond film die Another Day. He explained how the plot in a James Bond film differs from the way he tells the story in The ConvertThe brutality of close combat is shown in The Convert This is partly because the plot is very stripped down compared to most action sequences seen in films today.

Lee Tamahori: We haven’t seen much of that fighting on film. There was a film called The Dead Lands and a few others. There are now a well-trained number of rākau experts. That’s Maori hand-to-hand combat with cutting weapons. They call them patu and taiaha. So there are weapons like most indigenous cultures had spears, clubs and cutting weapons. So there are a lot of people trained in that now, young Maori. They’re all in the film. They’re a fighting unit that we’ve put together.

Action is something you think up in your head and then you do it shot by shot by shot and work your way through it. For me that’s always important and the difference between a James Bond action sequence and a Convert action sequence is that in The Convert the action has to be frighteningly authentic. It has to be brutal. It’s fast. There’s no slow motion, no tricks. It’s just shot by shot by shot, edited together to a certain point. Whereas in most modern action films there are speed ramps and all sorts of post-production tricks. But I didn’t want to do anything other than show the brutality of hand-to-hand combat as it was.

Can you tell me what it was about Guy Pierce that brought to the role of Munro that immediately made you think, “Oh, that’s my lead role”?

Lee Tamahori: Well, he instinctively understood who the character was. When I spoke to him, I told you he was a humanist who was in hiding, searching for something. He doesn’t even know what he’s looking for, but he’s looking for redemption. Even the Maori notice that. There’s a character who’s a tohunga, a medicine man. He says, “Are you looking for redemption, Munro? Only blood can redeem, blood etc. etc.” Guy’s authenticity to the character brought it to life.

I knew he would do that because everything I’ve seen him do is just so spectacular. He makes you believe in the character he’s playing. So we talked about the character a couple of times, but then I just let him get on with it. I said, “This is what I want from the guy.” That’s the way he talks. He’s taciturn, but he’s open to whatever anyone has to say. He’s not biased in any way. He’s just a humanist. So I just gave Guy a quick packet of instructions like that and he just did the rest himself. Just brilliant.

Guy Pearce’s character is “fascinated by what they look like as a tribal structure”

Tamahori analyzed the dynamics between Munro and the Maori tribes he encounters in the film, revealing that Munro’s mission was primarily to convert the indigenous people of New Zealand to Christianity, but this quickly fell by the wayside due to Munro’s humanistic leanings and fascination with the Maori.

Lee Tamahori: He comes there because the leaders of his mission in Britain had told him to go there and convert the natives to Christianity. So he is initially hired as a local preacher for his European congregation, but his intention is that 50% of his work will be to convert the natives to Christianity. There are many records of this. The first Europeans in New Zealand were missionaries and lay preachers. When he first encounters Maori, he is fascinated by what they are like as a tribal structure and a people.

His first encounter with them was brutal. There’s the thing with his horse, but then he gets into a fighting situation where he realizes the whole thing is just a bloody mess. However, that doesn’t stop him from thinking that if he has a chance, he can lead them down a peaceful path, and so on and so forth. He is fascinated by the young woman he saved, Rangimai, because she is such an unknown figure. He can’t understand her customs, and the way she acts and what she says and does is all foreign to him.

But at the same time, they’re fascinating and as the story progresses, he has more respect for them and their tribal structure and their father and others like him. But at the same time, he’s also a little bit disturbed because he doesn’t realise that he’s being used as a mechanism by their father as well. There’s a line from Charlotte, the other female character, who says, “Look after Maianui. He will always act in the interests of his tribe.”

Basically it means you’re irrelevant to the bigger picture, but if you talk to this man and he decides to go down the path of peace, I’ll believe in your God and things like that. That’s what fascinates him, the Maori culture, it fascinates him because they’re able to build such beautiful things like canoes and they’re just fascinating people to study from his point of view.

What was the most difficult aspect of shooting a historical film?

Lee Tamahori: The hardest part was finding locations that were untouched by human hands. That meant we had to shoot in regional and state parks where there are no buildings. Everywhere I looked for a town, there was already one. So I had to find parts of our natural parks.

So I wanted to create a vision or an image of New Zealand that no one had ever seen before, an image that was completely untouched by human hands, with vegetation everywhere, birdlife. (Munro) was fascinated by that. To him it’s like a Garden of Eden. But that was the hardest thing. It’s a patchwork of about 12 places all cobbled together to look like one place. I think it works quite well.

About The Convert

A lay preacher arrives in a British settlement in the 1830s. His violent past is soon questioned and his faith is tested when he finds himself in the middle of a bloody war between Maori tribes. A fight for peace.

Check out our The Convert Interview with Guy Pearce.

The Convert (2024)

director

Lee Tamahori

Release date

July 12, 2024

Authors

Lee Tamahori, Hamish Clayton, Shane Danielsen

Pour

Guy Pearce, Tioreore Ngatai-Melbourne, Antonio Te Maioha, Jacqueline McKenzie, Lawrence Makoare, Dean O’Gorman, Ariki Turner, Duane Evans

Characters)

Thomas Munro, Rangimai, Maianui, Charlotte, Akaterewa, Kedgley, Uenuku, Pahirua

Duration

119 minutes

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