[ WEEKEND ]
Actors lose fears
in feeding frenzy
WAILEA, Maui » "Open Water" filmmaker Chris Kentis' criteria for his two stars, Blanchard Ryan and Daniel Travis, was not negotiable: nudity, swimming with sharks, and being away from home for a very long time.
"Chris is a gentle, interesting, compassionate but unbelievably strong guy," said Ryan during an interview at the Grand Wailea Resort at the film's premiere at the Maui Film Festival. "He told us in the audition that if we can't do this, then don't return for the call back."
The film, which opens today in Hawaii theaters, follows a young, urban couple who hastily decide to go on vacation and plan to do some scuba diving. But things go terribly wrong when the couple is accidentally left behind miles out at sea when their dive boat heads back to shore.
The $130,000 film was shot on digital video then enlarged for the big screen. Unlike "Jaws," there are no rubber sharks or stunt people here. And in this very atypical movie, there is also a unique ending.
There was more than 120 hours of footage of Ryan and Travis in the ocean shot over 32 days, which included two 18-hour days spent with as many as 50 gray reef and bull sharks 4- to 12-feet long in an area off the Florida coast.
"As soon as we turned off the boat engines, sharks started to show up because they were used to the boats coming and feeding them," said Ryan.
For "Open Water" filming, Kentis and producer Laura Lau threw tuna over the side to make sure the sharks would stay nearby. Then the actors just jumped in.
"Chris would throw a chunk or piece of tuna and then they would all come," Travis said. "He would make sure that we were here and he was standing with the camera. If the sharks were (away), he'd throw the piece of tuna (in between us and the camera) to make sure the sharks would pass in front of the camera."
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THE FILM took two years to complete partly because of breaks for hurricane season, other work commitments, and a nine-month layoff after Travis ruptured his patella tendon playing volleyball.
"I was more worried about calling Chris to tell him I had injured myself than I ever was swimming with sharks," Travis said.
Neither actor was injured by a shark, though Ryan was nipped on the finger by a four-foot barracuda. The actress, who is often mistaken for Charlize Theron, doesn't seem the type to do such an independent psychodrama as "Open Water."
"I'm an actor that works from a very practical perspective," she said. "The approach to my career doesn't necessarily balance the really artsy, creative side of me, so if a film is going to be inconvenient and not going to make me money, I don't do it."
So why did she agree to do a film that entailed doing a nude scene, scuba diving and cavorting with real sharks?
"For some reason, 'Open Water' completely captured my imagination," Ryan said. "When I left the audition, I couldn't understand why I was even considering the role.
"Normally, I can put these things out of my head and be like, 'It's not for me,' and move on, but I was thinking about it for days. Chris said we'd be leaving town for however long it takes us to finish the film, and if we're not up for any of it, he and Laura would understand, but don't take this any further and don't get us all excited about you if you're not going to do it.
"It was an interesting approach, because by the time I went back for the callback, all those issues were off the table. It was a done deal and we never really talked about it again ... the decisions were all made before I even knew I had the part."
Ryan is a former Club Med aerobics instructor. Before "Open Water," she had few credits to her name except for some commercial work and a series of racy skits on "Late Night with Conan O'Brien."
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SWIMMING with sharks was much easier for the actors than appearing nude.
"Daniel got off easier than I did," Ryan said. "All they showed of him was a bit of rump. My dad had no problem with the nudity ... but he's still mad that I risked my life with the sharks."
Travis' parents made him promise to call home every night.
"They wanted to make sure I was still alive," he said.
On the first day of filming with the sharks, Travis jumped in, while Ryan became hysterical and couldn't.
"Blanchard took some convincing," Travis said. "I remember her saying 'No way.' "
Kentis decided to film half of that day the solo water shots of Travis while Ryan watched from the safety of the boat. The filming went without incident, with the sharks looking menacing but acting mercifully. Ryan decided she could do it.
"It was hard getting in the water directly because they're all over the place," she said. "They just don't get out of your way. You literally had to step on them and push them to the side.
"I was never comfortable and I had a few real crying fits when the sharks would keep bumping into me and I would yell 'You have to get me out. I have to get out.' "
There wasn't a moment when the actors and Kentis weren't being bumped or rubbed by the sharks.
"They're very curious and we're in their environment," Ryan said. "I had to tell myself that the only way to guarantee I wouldn't get bitten by a shark would be not to go into the water."
She had some diving experience, and also is a strong swimmer, having grown up on the ocean. But she still wasn't prepared for the rigorous dive work needed for the film.
"We were fighting currents from morning until night; we had to be tethered to the boat with fishing line and the currents were just trying to push us over backwards all the time," Ryan said. "Obviously we couldn't shoot the movie lying on our backs, and had to be fighting underneath the water with our feet and fins to keep upright the entire time. We were supposed to look like we were just bopping there casually in the water, but meanwhile we were struggling to stay upright.
"I got really tired of being wet. You want to go back to the hotel room and dry off. The next morning you're in your wetsuit, still wet from the night before ... and get back into the ocean again."
Because filming was so dependent on light and weather conditions, the actors often ate lunch in the water rather than taking the time to climb into the boat.
Besides Lau and Kentis, there were two unarmed shark handlers to direct the fish to the actors.
"Open Water" has several different story levels, though the lost-at-sea-with-sharks theme is getting the publicity rather than the couple's relationship issues. The film is very much a psychological thriller that goes against the grain of big-budget Hollywood movies.
It's a film as much about character as it is about sharks.
"Sometimes I think the trailer should show a bit more of the quiet times and maybe more as a suspense thriller than like a gory horror movie," Ryan said.
Other acting jobs are opening up for the actress after the buzz of "Open Water," though she hasn't decided what she'll do next, though it won't be "horror thriller things."
One film she rejected was called "Snakes on a Plane" that had 50 venomous snakes loose on a commercial passenger jet.
"The one thing I know for sure is my next film will be on dry land," Ryan said.
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