George Clooney speaks to Yahoo UK alongside The Boys in the Boat cast Callum Turner and Joel Edgerton about the biopic's intense rowing scenes.
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00:00 I wanted to say I was particularly struck by the rowing scenes because I loved how intense they were.
00:05 Like I was on the edge of my seat for every single race.
00:08 And I wanted to ask you George, how did you want to approach as a director in New Calum?
00:12 How did you find filming them and preparing?
00:14 We just wanted to make it exciting. You know, rowing's a hard sport.
00:18 It's one of the hardest sports to do physically in the world.
00:21 You have to be one of the greatest athletes in the world.
00:23 On the other hand, it doesn't look fast from far away.
00:28 You guys were moving by the end.
00:30 Yeah, we were moving fast. I think we got up to 46 strokes per minute,
00:34 which is what the boys did in the last race to win the gold.
00:37 We trained for two months. We did four hours a day and it was an arduous process.
00:42 We rowed in the snow, we rowed in the rain and the sunshine.
00:45 You know, eight actors who don't know how to do something,
00:49 all learning at the same time at different paces and different ways.
00:53 It was an incredible experience.
00:56 I read the book a couple of times in preparation,
00:59 and I thought I understood what they were talking about.
01:02 Now in hindsight, reading the book again,
01:04 it's so profound what we did and what we were able to achieve,
01:08 especially as we started out with nothing.
01:11 The way they started out was shocking.
01:13 It was not good.
01:14 It was literally like, "Dudes, you know you're all rowing together, right?
01:18 You understand that."
01:19 Grant and George came down to check in after four weeks or something,
01:24 and we were awful.
01:26 It's funny, they had actually rowed better before.
01:29 They were trying to show off.
01:31 And we got there and they said, "Yeah, they're doing a pretty good job."
01:33 And I watched them and Terry said, "That's the worst thing I've ever done."
01:36 And I was watching going, I'm like, "It's the worst I've ever done."
01:39 I could see the pain through the smile.
01:41 Grant, literally, we got in the car driving home and we're both like this.
01:45 Okay, we could maybe replace their heads.
01:48 Maybe we could, I don't know, what can we do? What are we going to do?
01:51 I was like, "We're dead." And then they got together.
01:54 I was terrified before the shoot.
01:55 Not because I'm not scared of water or boats,
01:58 but just knowing that boats move and trying to put a camera from one boat
02:03 to shoot another boat, you just figure this is going to be a disaster.
02:07 And it wasn't at all.
02:08 It was still incredibly efficient.
02:11 Rowing is one of those sports that's probably far more exciting to do
02:15 than to watch, and yet in a movie you have the chance editorially
02:19 to really put the scissors in and build a momentum
02:23 and build a point of view and a narrative structure
02:28 around even just the sequences.
02:31 [ Silence ]