The old friends have reunited for Disney+ boxing drama La Maquina. Report by Nelsonj. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn
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00:00Gentlemen, congratulations on the making of it.
00:03Just to start off with though, I want to talk about a film that's very dear to my heart,
00:07which is The Motorcycle Diaries.
00:09I saw that when I was maybe 16, 17.
00:11It was the first foreign language film I watched on the big screen in the cinema,
00:15and it really affected me about what cinema could be,
00:19the scope, it was beautifully shot, the storytelling.
00:22And it's a film that stayed with me for a long, long time,
00:25and it was a bit of a coming of age experience as an audience member.
00:30And it just made me think, especially with the parallels with this,
00:34what project do you guys feel like you came of age on?
00:38I know you did Itamama Tambien before that.
00:42Was that the film, or even The Motorcycle Diaries?
00:45No, coming of age?
00:47Yeah.
00:48Definitely Itamama Tambien.
00:50It is that.
00:51It encompasses the whole coming of age thing of us being...
00:57You were 19, I was 20, no?
01:01And we were shooting it, and we started to work in films,
01:07started to discover the magic of cinema,
01:11started to discover the way of making it as well,
01:15and it was a very thorough and very entertaining way
01:20of getting to know cinema as such.
01:22So that's when it happened for us,
01:27that it was like, OK, we might have, let alone a career,
01:31a desire to have a career in cinema.
01:34At that point, we decided, let's do more cinema,
01:38let's do more of this.
01:40And the opportunities came about after the films came out,
01:42because we hadn't done any film that had that kind of resonance.
01:48So that was the main coming of age.
01:51And then maybe when you're young, it happens to us,
01:56but it happens to everyone, I guess, also.
01:59Many of the stories are about the coming of age kind of thing.
02:02So you always end up falling into that kind of...
02:06And now we are maybe in a coming of age of like...
02:10We do a story of coming of age of realizing
02:13that there's a boxer that the career needs to end.
02:17And the problem is, how do we say goodbye?
02:20So we finish that career, which is a very short life,
02:24the lives of athletes.
02:27So, yeah, in a way, they are all coming of age.
02:30And I'm taking that expression very literally
02:32because I'm translating it from English to Spanish.
02:35They're kind of like...
02:37Like a loss of innocence, in a way.
02:40And I think it's definitely to Mama Tambien,
02:43because we were old enough to be talking about something.
02:47We had the perspective and the objectivity
02:50to actually reflect on.
02:52It wasn't like that we were going through that in our lives.
02:58But in cinema, yes, we were.
03:00As filmmakers, we were going through that.
03:03We were realizing we had those tools
03:07that we were capable of doing that.
03:10But at the same time, we were telling the story of younger guys.
03:14They were 17, 16 years old in the film,
03:17and we were 19, 20.
03:19So we had a little bit of distance
03:21to actually be making a comment.
03:24It's funny because we felt that,
03:26we look older, no?
03:28No, we were wondering,
03:30maybe we're not good for the characters anymore
03:33because we look a little bit older.
03:35And 10 years later, they kept telling us,
03:38do you want to do this film about this 17-year-old?
03:42But that's over now.
03:44One thing I love about cinema is remembering where you were
03:47when you saw certain films, what your mindset was.
03:50You can feel like you've got certain things figured out at one point,
03:53then you watch the same film 10 years, 20 years later,
03:56and it has such a different impact on you.
03:58You're almost scared to watch things back
04:01because you don't want to tamper with the way it made you feel
04:04at that particular time.
04:06Let's talk about where we are now.
04:08You're right, it is a coming of age,
04:10a different age,
04:12and you deal with not so much your own mortality
04:15but your own frailties in this.
04:18It made me interested.
04:20You've got such different characters.
04:22Was there a debate in the development of this going,
04:24OK, are you going to be the boxer?
04:26Am I going to be the guy with the Botox?
04:29How did those characters come about
04:31and how much of a struggle,
04:33how comfortable were you inhabiting them?
04:36Diego and the prosthetics have a magnetism
04:40that was impossible to break.
04:42It was impossible to break, yes.
04:44Very difficult to leave them behind.
04:47I still wear them sometimes when I'm alone.
04:51No, it was clear from the beginning.
04:55When we decided to do this project,
04:58it was 10 years ago,
05:00or something around these characters
05:02because back then it was a different project
05:04that we had in mind.
05:06And he was coming from training for...
05:08I mean, he loved boxing and training for boxing,
05:11but he was coming out of an experience
05:13where he was training for a film
05:15that didn't happen for him.
05:17And I was coming from doing a documentary
05:20on a Mexican boxer,
05:23one of the greatest, Julio Cesar Chavez.
05:26And we sat together
05:28and we went through a film festival
05:30and the craziness of a film festival.
05:33And like every festival,
05:35you come out saying,
05:37I need to do something.
05:39I need to be able to get something back
05:42on that screen.
05:44And we were talking about this idea.
05:47Let's do something with the idea of a boxer.
05:50But at the end of his career,
05:52that was from the beginning there.
05:54Not the classical story
05:56of seeing someone reach a peak,
05:58but what happens when you are there
06:00and you have to let go.
06:03And it was clear who was playing what.
06:05And I think it always happens.
06:08I've never been like...
06:10If you think about it,
06:12we've never been in a project where it's like...
06:15It's clear from the genesis of the project.
06:22Gael was casted already
06:24and I was casting with him.
06:26And therefore I was playing the other guy.
06:29And then in Rudi Kursi,
06:31it was clear who was who.
06:33And here it's the same.
06:35And it's interesting
06:37because the two reflections
06:39complement each other.
06:41These two characters
06:43trying to hold something
06:45that they're just not capable of letting go.
06:52Those two things complement each other.
06:54Do you think that's the secret
06:56to your real-life friendship
06:58and partnership over the years?
07:00You've gone off and done different things,
07:02but you've been able to signal back
07:04to each other at different points.
07:06Do you feel you've competed in your careers?
07:09We compete in many things,
07:11but not in our careers.
07:13And the few times that has happened
07:16that we've been competing,
07:18not because we want or we even know,
07:21we've managed to find a way
07:23to talk to each other and say,
07:26you're not going to do it, I'll do it.
07:30Let others think
07:32that we are competing for something
07:34that in fact we are discussing on the back.
07:38Because it has happened.
07:40I got this call, I did too.
07:42Are you doing it? No.
07:44Okay, me neither then.