{"id":223132,"date":"2026-01-08T11:44:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-08T11:44:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/223132\/"},"modified":"2026-01-08T11:44:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-08T11:44:09","slug":"netflixs-train-dreams-is-a-happy-cry-movie-let-star-joel-edgerton-explain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/223132\/","title":{"rendered":"Netflix’s ‘Train Dreams’ is a ‘happy cry movie.’ Let star Joel Edgerton explain"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In the last episode of The Envelope video podcast<\/a> before the 2026 Oscar nominations, Joel Edgerton describes the transformative experience of making \u201cTrain Dreams.\u201d<\/a> Plus, our hosts share the names they\u2019d like to hear called on nominations morning.<\/p>\n

Kelvin Washington: Hello and welcome to another episode of The Envelope. Kelvin Washington, Yvonne Villarreal, Mark Olsen, and it\u2019s great to have you both here as usual and especially when this is our last episode before Oscar nominations. So I\u2019ll start with you, Yvonne. It could be a movie, a director, or some rising star or just anything that you hope once they read those nominations that morning, you\u2019re gonna hear.<\/p>\n

Yvonne Villarreal: I\u2019m not going to say the usual suspects because that\u2019s covered. I really want to see Chase Infiniti get nominated for her role in \u201cOne Battle After Another.\u201d I just think she\u2019s been such a revelation for me as somebody who watched \u201cPresumed Innocent.\u201d Seeing her in this role \u2014 and I don\u2019t want to spoil anything, but she really finds herself in a hairy situation in this film and the way she sort of rises to the occasion and really has a moment of triumph for herself, I think it was just striking to watch. And she\u2019ll be in \u201cThe Handmaid\u2019s Tale\u201d spin-off \u201cThe Testaments.\u201d I\u2019m really looking forward to see what she does there. But also I\u2019ll say, as somebody who got thrown into the bandwagon of \u201cKPop Demon Hunters\u201d because of my 6-year-old niece, I wanna see that get some love in the animated category.<\/p>\n

Mark Olsen: And in the music categories. Best song. <\/p>\n

Washington: It better! Do you know how much I have to hear that song in my house with three daughters, 9, 7 and 4 [years old]? Like, I\u2019m going to be \u201cGolden.\u201d <\/p>\n

Villarreal: Are they memorized?<\/p>\n

Washington: That\u2019s an understatement. It\u2019s to the point I got concerned. Is it like some robotic AI that\u2019s taking over my daughter\u2019s brain? Instantly. That and 6-7. I have to deal with that every day. <\/p>\n

All right. Mark, swing it to you. What do you have?<\/p>\n

Olsen: Well, you know, the actress Rose Byrne for the movie \u201cIf I Had Legs I\u2019d Kick You.\u201d She won a lot of critics\u2019 prizes leading up to the nominations. And I think it\u2019d be so exciting if the filmmaker on that, Mary Bronstein, also got recognized either for the screenplay or as director. You know, Mary\u2019s someone that she made her first film, \u201cYeast,\u201d more than 15 years ago and had not gotten a second project going and had sort of been living a life and doing other things. And to see her sort of reemerge with this project in particular, which is so powerful and so specific, it would be really exciting \u2014 as great as it is to see Rose being rightfully recognized \u2014 to see Mary get some attention as well.<\/p>\n

Washington: So I\u2019m gonna jump in with a couple. One, because she\u2019s been on the radar for years as just a multitude of things, she\u2019s multifaceted: Teyana Taylor can dance, she can sing, she\u2019s just all of that and now acting alongside Leonardo DiCaprio. Very impressive for her. And not a debut, but maybe for those who aren\u2019t familiar. So I\u2019d be interested to see, I have a feeling we\u2019re gonna hear her name. And then I\u2019m going super popcorn, Raisinets, Junior Mints, going to the theater. \u201cF1,\u201d for me, I know it was kind of \u2014<\/p>\n

Villarreal: Whoa, that\u2019s a throwback.<\/p>\n

Washington: I know, but hear me out. It was fun. It was just fun. And it\u2019s kind of one of those movies like, you know, you forget that you go to the movies, it\u2019s gonna be a little fun, maybe a little cheesy, but dang it, I\u2019m here. I\u2019ve got my popcorn. All of that. That for me was another one that was like, \u201cOh man, that\u2019s kind of the moviegoing experience sometimes we\u2019ve forgotten.\u201d<\/p>\n

Olsen: And it\u2019s always good to see the Oscars recognize a film like that as well. I mean, it helps just for attracting audience to the telecast. But I think it is important that the Oscars recognize a breadth of filmmaking styles and one of the things that\u2019s so exciting about the movies is that it can be so many different things, from like a really small personal story to some big high-tech film like \u201cF1: The Movie.\u201d And so I think, yeah, to see that recognized in some of the major categories would be really exciting.<\/p>\n

Washington: You know why I like Mark? Because he tried to legitimize my choice. And I\u2019m OK with that. <\/p>\n

Olsen: There\u2019s no try. You don\u2019t need the help. <\/p>\n

Washington: Look at how I look in the camera. You know, why? Because I know someone\u2019s going to be highbrowin\u2019 me right now. And I get it. And I am with you. However, as we know, we can get all the types of mergers and some things will happen. Are people going to be going into movies anymore? And I was sitting in it going, \u201cOh, yeah, this is kind of what that feels like.\u201d So ha! Take that.<\/p>\n

Villarreal: My reaction was more, it had been a while since I heard the title.<\/p>\n

Washington: It felt the same.<\/p>\n

Villarreal: Sorry!<\/p>\n

Washington: I like what I like, OK? I enjoyed it. That\u2019s all I have to say about that. <\/p>\n

All right, Mark, coming to you now. We\u2019re talking about Oscar buzz, and just buzz and a lot of traction that someone can get from a role. Talk about Joel Edgerton playing a logger in Netflix\u2019s \u201cTrain Dreams.\u201d What was that conversation like?<\/p>\n

Olsen: It was a really terrific conversation. This is a movie that premiered at Sundance last year and was picked up by Netflix there. And even though it has that machinery behind it, there is still something that feels very organic about the success of this movie. It genuinely feels like it\u2019s word of mouth that people have been discovering the film. And it has just a really quiet power too. And a lot of that comes from Joel\u2019s performance. You know, he originally pursued the rights to this book himself and wasn\u2019t able to get it, the rights were already taken. And so he sort of like thought, \u201cOh, well, that\u2019s that.\u201d And then years go by and the project comes back around and he\u2019s offered this role that he\u2019d been so interested in playing. And he feels like it\u2019s hit him at a very specific time in his life. <\/p>\n

The [story] is set in the early part of the 20th century. He plays a logger in the Pacific Northwest. And it really is just a portrait of a life. And the story deals with grief and family, and Joel, in the subsequent years, has become a father himself. And he said how, if he\u2019d have played this a few years ago, he thinks it\u2019d be totally different than the way that [he\u2019s] playing it now. Also he is a guy who\u2019s been in the business for a few years now. He has, I think, some really sharp opinions, views on like what this business is, what the industry is like right now and where it\u2019s going. So it was a really terrific conversation to have with him.<\/p>\n

Washington: It sounds like it. Let\u2019s get straight to it. Here is Mark and Joel right now.<\/p>\n

\"A <\/p>\n

Joel Edgerton in \u201cTrain Dreams.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Netflix)<\/p>\n

Mark Olsen: As we\u2019re talking, the movie has been building this sense of momentum around it with reviews and awards. And while there is an awards campaign around the movie, there is something about it that feels very organic. This movie seems to be catching on through word of mouth, just people seeing it and responding to it. How do you feel about the response to the movie?<\/p>\n

Joel Edgerton: It feels very good. Coming from an independent film background, I love it when small movies make a lot of noise. And I can\u2019t really analyze or diagnose why, but I get this feeling with \u201cTrain Dreams\u201d that it means different things for different people and it holds up a bit of a mirror to their own experience, being that the film is really this celebration of an ordinary life and shows the majesty in that. What my character goes through, they\u2019re universal experiences and so people find something of their own experience in it and I think that\u2019s part of the reason why. It\u2019s a small movie but it\u2019s also a very big movie.<\/p>\n

Olsen: The other side of that, in a way, you were recently on a red carpet and you were asked about some comments that James Cameron had made regarding movies on streaming services and the awards race. And I don\u2019t know if you want to say anything more about that, but also do you feel like people do somehow hold it against \u201cTrain Dreams\u201d that it\u2019s on Netflix?<\/p>\n

Edgerton: Look, the world we live in now is so in the hands of the audiences because of social media. I feel like in the old days, well before I was born, we were told who our movie stars were. The studios would make those decisions for us, and things were very narrow. And now people have the power to choose what they want to watch, who they want to watch, they choose the movie stars. They speak about the movies, and Letterboxd, for example, is such a big thing. And in that same vein, it\u2019s really interesting to hear what people, regular people, moviegoers think of how movies should be exhibited, how they feel, regardless of whether they know about the business side of things or not, or why things are the way they are. They have feelings, sometimes very passionate points of view on where and how we should watch movies. And of course, for all of the business side, if we put it aside, I do believe people want to go to the cinema and watch movies.<\/p>\n

My comments come from understanding now where I am in my life. I\u2019m all about creativity and all about story, but I do understand business, and I feel like I emerged out of my bubble in Sydney and felt like the whole world of cinema had suddenly changed. My views on streaming had started to evolve just after we showed a movie at Cannes called \u201cThe Stranger.\u201d Another very small movie we made down in Adelaide and Netflix picked up the movie and I remember thinking, \u201cShould we go with them?\u201d So many people saw that movie because it was on a streamer. And so my feelings are very mixed and they\u2019re very much tailored to what the movie is \u2014 and therefore according to what the movie is and how big or small it is, where it should live. I\u2019m all for pushing to fight for keeping cinema alive and I believe a younger generation feels the same thing. But I also feel like there are chances that some people have that are narrow as they get their start in the business, which means sometimes the first things you can do, you\u2019re not necessarily going to get a 2,000-screen release on your very first movie. So I have many, many opinions about it. But I feel like we all need to fight for cinema. We also sort of hopefully don\u2019t allow streaming, as great as it can be, to take over everything. That\u2019s my feeling.<\/p>\n

Olsen: You\u2019re also a producer as well. This feels like we\u2019re in the middle of a transformative moment for the industry. What is it like for you as a person in the middle of that tide, just trying to navigate that for yourself?<\/p>\n

Edgerton: Again, it\u2019s all about what is the story and where should it live. My feeling always is that if I ever get behind making something, I want as many people as possible to see it. I also want to have an exchange at the cinema. One of the great things about \u201cTrain Dreams\u201d is I\u2019ve done about 50 Q&As so far \u2014 I haven\u2019t counted them up, but around that, and we\u2019ll do a bunch more. We\u2019ve been to a number of festivals and we have an exchange with the audience. We get to watch and see people\u2019s reaction to the film in like an analog way. Sometimes the feeling with letting a movie go on streamer without any fanfare is that it feels like it disappears with a whisper, and you don\u2019t get to have that exchange. And I think that\u2019s very important. <\/p>\n

My dream would be to make a film exhibited at the cinema, knowing that at some point it will end up on TV screens and in people\u2019s lounge rooms all over the world. And finding the right way to get a balance of both. There\u2019s nothing better than sitting in the cinema and watching a movie with a bunch of other people. The sad thing at the moment [is] it seems \u2014 and again, I don\u2019t know the full diagnostics of it \u2014 you get a cinema release and you\u2019re there for like two weeks and then you\u2019re replaced by something else. I\u2019m old enough to remember the days where a movie would sit in the cinema for six, seven, eight weeks if it was good.<\/p>\n

Olsen: I don\u2019t want to belabor the point, but I\u2019m so curious about this. I\u2019m assuming when you went to the Gotham Awards you were not thinking \u201cI\u2019m going to give James Cameron a piece of my mind tonight.\u201d Do you find in the time that you\u2019ve been doing this, now you may show up to something and you have no idea what someone\u2019s going to ask you, you have to be ready to talk about just about anything?<\/p>\n

Edgerton: You\u2019re right, and I never expect a red carpet is a mine field. I do go home sometimes and think, \u201cWhat did I say?\u201d I knew what I said. And I also stand by what I said. What I don\u2019t love is the process of reduction of someone\u2019s comments. Someone had sent me this thing that said that I \u201clashed out\u201d or used a word that was quite a violent one, like I was lashing back at James Cameron. I was like, \u201cNo, I wasn\u2019t doing that at all.\u201d I actually had a fair and balanced opinion about the fact that James is, excuse the semi-pun, a titan. He is a pioneer and an inventor and we\u2019ve seen that he\u2019s created technology that has made movies better. He can exhibit movies in this broad scale because he\u2019s dared to dream big. And I feel like there\u2019s a world where there are people who are never going to get their first film on 2,000 screens because it\u2019s a small story, movies like \u201cSorry, Baby.\u201d They\u2019re not 2,000-screen release movies. There\u2019s a world where they live somewhere, whether it\u2019s in small art house cinemas or whatever. So I was like, \u201cAll right, don\u2019t make it feel like I\u2019m putting the gloves on and have a fight with James Cameron, because he\u2019s probably going to win if that\u2019s the case.\u201d And that\u2019s certainly not what I was doing at all. Just saying my point of view is slightly different. And I also understand his point of view. But [comedic wrestler voice] \u201cI\u2019ll meet you on the top oval, James. Let\u2019s do it.\u201d I\u2019m not trying to start a fight. I\u2019m a lover, not a fighter.<\/p>\n

Olsen: To start talking about \u201cTrain Dreams,\u201d you\u2019ve talked a lot about how you read the book around 2018 or so and the rights weren\u2019t available so you set that idea aside \u2014<\/p>\n

Edgerton: Sulked a bit.<\/p>\n

Olsen: What do you feel like you were responding to then in that book?<\/p>\n

Edgerton: I\u2019ve heard the term neo-western, which I understand now, but it didn\u2019t really make sense to me at the time. When I first read the book, we come into the story with this violent act towards the Chinese worker, for anyone who\u2019s seen the film. And I didn\u2019t know Denis Johnson\u2019s work at all at the time. The book had been gifted to me as a wrap gift on \u201cBoy Erased.\u201d I thought, \u201cIf someone gives you a book, it means they think there\u2019s some meaning in it for you, that it will resonate with you,\u201d and it did. But I thought, \u201cOh, this is a western.\u201d And then within a handful of pages, I realized it was a different kind of western. It would look and feel like a western, but it was a rumination on a life itself. Not that it was going to answer the big elusive question of the meaning of life, but swirling questions of what is the purpose of a life and what is in the extraordinary details of a life we may never care to remember because the person is not the great inventor, the great general, the great president or superhero. I love the ordinariness, I love the idea that it resonated with something that my parents had always instilled in me, which is that every single human being has a great story to tell and that we all shouldn\u2019t be considered insignificant. And I just was so moved by the sort of glimpses of one man\u2019s entire life. Wanted to get my hands on it, couldn\u2019t, and I\u2019m happy to say that it\u2019s good that I didn\u2019t get my big fat lumberjack hands on it then. Mostly because I think [director and co-writer] Clint [Bentley] is a remarkably sensitive, excellent filmmaker [and] has done a much better job than I ever would if I was in control of things. And because in the four years since he reached out to me to be in the film, I\u2019d become a dad. And that was like everything to me. And if you\u2019ve seen the film and you know what\u2019s inside of the film, I really believe that my performance, I don\u2019t know what my performance would have been like pre-Joel the Dad, but now that I am a dad, it\u2019s like there\u2019s stuff inside of me that makes this performance possible.<\/p>\n

Olsen: But when it came back to you, do you feel like you responded to it differently? Did you recognize that difference right away?<\/p>\n

Edgerton: One hundred percent. And I know it, there was a significant moment. Clint came to meet me in Chicago, I was shooting \u201cDark Matter\u201d and I was very excited that this had somehow come around to me, knowing that I loved the book and the character so much. Then I watched \u201cJockey\u201d and knew that he was a really solid filmmaker. His adaptation was extraordinary. And then when I met him, I realized as a filmmaker he was like a director version of the central character of the film \u2014 kind, honest, generous, a really great observer. And I went home and I spoke to my wife, and she obviously, her two big questions every time I want to do a project [are] when and where. Because it means moving us around, uprooting our family. I told her and Spokane didn\u2019t exactly make her click her heels, because her life is about being plugged into big cities. She said, what\u2019s the story about? And I started trying to tell her the story, and when I got to the stuff that happens to Robert in the middle of the film, and my 1 1\/2-year-old twins are in the other room, I couldn\u2019t even finish telling her the story. And I realized then how much the story now kind of terrified me. But also was so much more connected for me. And she watched me, my chin was quivering and and she was like, \u201cAll right, I guess we\u2019re going to Spokane.\u201d<\/p>\n

Olsen: Have you done a project that felt this personal before? And did that have its own kind of anxiety attached? Did you have any reluctance to do this for the reason that you were connecting to it so strongly?<\/p>\n

Edgerton: I feel like I learn something about myself on every job and every time I approach a new job, I always describe it in rudimentary terms, like a toolkit. What aspects of myself do I bring to this? Which parts do I leave behind? And how would I approach this? For example, \u201cGatsby\u201d for me felt like, \u201cThis is about me turning myself up to 11 out of 10, bringing something bigger.\u201d And with \u201cTrain Dreams\u201d what I\u2019ve really learned was how much in the past I\u2019ve tried to hide from myself. And I feel like it\u2019s a trap a lot of actors fall into, is thinking they\u2019re not enough and you have to adorn a performance to be really seen or heard or impress. And I realized how much I\u2019ve avoided playing characters that are very much like me. And though Robert\u2019s a lumberjack, I\u2019m putting all the trappings of it aside on an emotional level. How much is a character like you? And I\u2019m constantly trying to play dress ups and really interested in being people that I\u2019m not and I think that my favorite actors have often been transformative character actors. So I felt like my task in my mind was always to do something different and run away from the idea of just showing my own self really. And I realized that as a husband, as a father and as a guy who\u2019s constantly guilty and struggling with the idea of being away from my family for work, these are all things that Robert is [dealing with], just doing a different job. A contract worker, which I am too except I\u2019m not chopping down trees. And I have my greatest fears around my kids and the safety of my kids. So it felt to me like this was a chance to be very open about my own feelings and bring that to the work without feeling like I had to put too much garnish on things. And that\u2019s a bit scary for me. But it now makes me realize it\u2019s probably a better path in the future to do a bit more of that, just be a bit more open rather than hiding who I am, if that makes any sense.<\/p>\n

Olsen: Completely. Because a lot of reviews of the movie, I sort of said this myself, have noted how it feels almost as if your career has been building to this performance, leading to it somehow. Does it feel like that to you?<\/p>\n

Edgerton: I know that in decades to come I\u2019ll look back and say always that \u201cTrain Dreams\u201d is one of the great experiences I\u2019ve ever had. The process and the result. I think the movie\u2019s fantastic, but what I got out of it personally, it was extraordinary. Look, I hope that I\u2019m building towards something else extraordinary in the future, and it\u2019s like a new mission with each film and each story and each character. But this one definitely feels special for me, and it feels like I use the word \u201csuitable,\u201d which feels so boring. But I played characters that are not suitable for me in the past, and I\u2019ve really challenged myself to bend into shapes that are different from who I am, rhythms that are different from what I\u2019m like, successfully or relatively unsuccessfully. I can\u2019t really judge it for myself. But this felt really suitable. It felt like it belonged to me.<\/p>\n

Olsen: You\u2019re also a director, writer, producer. What is it like for you when you show up to a project and you\u2019re just an actor? Does it allow you to focus more on your performance? Or are you always like, \u201cI was thinking you could put the camera over there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Edgerton: It\u2019s such a relief. I think directing is the best job in the world, but I wouldn\u2019t want to be doing it every time I went to work, because there\u2019s a lot of stress, a lot of responsibility. Many times I\u2019ve described the difference between acting and directing. An actor is like a child. Literally you could turn up to work in your pajamas, somebody will put makeup on you, dress you, you have one \u2014 well, I don\u2019t want to be reductive about it \u2014 but you have one job, to play your character and fit into the story, serve the story. As a director you\u2019re running the household. You\u2019ve got to do everything. You\u2019ve got to stock the fridge, you\u2019ve got to make all the decisions about everything in the household, and there\u2019s so much responsibility to that. <\/p>\n

I was curious after I directed my first film, how I would be walking onto another director\u2019s set. And it would just be a sin to walk onto someone else\u2019s set and start to look over their shoulder and check their homework and sort of impose yourself on that process. I realized the two things that fascinated me the most were what lens was being put on the camera according to what the shot was. So I just became like really quietly observant. Actors who direct get this sort of great luxury of visiting so many sets and watching other directors and learning from them, good and bad things. And behavioral stuff. It\u2019s not just about how their craft works or how they apply themselves as filmmakers, but how they conduct themselves as people, how they treat their crew, how they elicit the best out of their heads of department and give them freedom or not. Like Clint, for example, on \u201cTrain Dreams\u201d is amazing at deputizing his heads of department, giving them freedom, and I think that\u2019s the greatest show of power as a director, the confidence of relinquishing control because you hired the great people and you\u2019re trusting them to collaborate with you. So as an actor I love the freedom of just being there to serve the story. And then watching and putting little things in my ideas bag for next time if I\u2019m lucky enough to be the director again.<\/p>\n

Olsen: You were recently on [\u201cLate Night With Seth Meyers\u201d] and he said that he thought it was a very wonderful performance and he noted how you don\u2019t have very much dialogue in the movie and you said you think it\u2019s wonderful because there isn\u2019t much dialogue. And you were kidding, but I wonder if you could unravel that a little bit. How do you think the lack of dialogue in the movie impacted your performance?<\/p>\n

Edgerton: Words are there to confuse us in the world. There\u2019s the things we say, what they actually mean, there\u2019s so many layers to any conversation you have with any person. There\u2019s something really interesting about people who don\u2019t speak very much. There\u2019s a mystery often to them. I think there\u2019s a lot of mystery to men that I grew up with in my life. I find myself drawn to people that don\u2019t speak very much because I\u2019m wondering what they think, what do they think of me, what\u2019s going on in their mind. As an actor, I guess I really cut my teeth on \u201cLoving\u201d with Jeff Nichols. He\u2019s a character, again, a very good man who had a lot of feelings and a lot to say, but for whatever reason or for different reasons, with Richard Loving and with Robert, chooses not to say things or doesn\u2019t know if he has the right to say certain things. As an actor I think what becomes the focus is knowing that the camera sees, is looking into your soul. The thought is the imperative, to put the thoughts in the right place, to just be present, knowing that the camera will read those things. And of course the story\u2019s job is to help guide us along and we have a narration. But I was always hoping that the camera will see what\u2019s on my mind and for me to then fill that with words would actually kind of be counter to what the character is, which is one of these very stoic nonverbal men that I think we can all identify with or that we\u2019ve met in our lives. So it\u2019s just putting the right thoughts in my head.<\/p>\n

Olsen: It is remarkable how often in the movie it\u2019s as if we\u2019re just watching you feel, you\u2019re sort of taking in your surroundings, you\u2019re not really saying much, but it does feel like we\u2019re in your head, that we can understand what the character is thinking and what you\u2019re conveying as a performer.<\/p>\n

Edgerton: Thank you. I was smiling because I was remembering the square root of eight. Do you know what I\u2019m talking about? There\u2019s an episode of \u201cFriends\u201d \u2014 is it Joey who\u2019s the actor? \u2014 he\u2019s like, \u201cWhen you\u2019ve got to act and you\u2019ve got to look like you\u2019re really trying to work something out, you\u2019ve just got to think of the square root of eight.\u201d It actually works. But I wasn\u2019t using it in \u201cTrain Dreams.\u201d<\/p>\n

Olsen: The story does build to this scene with Kerry Condon where your character actually does explain himself. What was it like to flip the switch and have to be verbal and emotional in a more conventional way?<\/p>\n

Edgerton: Talking about emotion was one of the tricky things with \u201cTrain Dreams.\u201d Clint and I had many conversations, very cerebral conversations, theoretical conversations about story \u2014 and emotion was one of them. So Robert\u2019s a character, one of these men who is not really willing to show his emotions. And when he does he\u2019s very quick to put them down, or in the case of the film he apologizes for showing his grief. But it\u2019s all building to this moment, and this is one of the things I love about the film, is that it illuminates the importance of human connection. Robert meets this character Claire that the audience feels like maybe there\u2019s a romance about to happen, which I love that it doesn\u2019t steer in that direction. These chance encounters with strangers that we maybe don\u2019t know that we need to have met on our journey, that are a chance for us to express ourselves. And he has a chance to, whether he knows it or not, he\u2019s going to tell her about his feelings of strange complicity in something he had no responsibility for. And we knew that we were building towards this and yet at the same time we\u2019re still trying to keep a lid on the emotions, but finally Robert gets to speak and it makes so much more sense of his silence up until that point if he we finally hear him string more than a sentence together to try and talk about what\u2019s inside of him and those scenes we shot them in a short one-and-a-half hour window of magic hour with Kerry, who\u2019s just extraordinary. And it felt like time was standing still, even though you would think that there would be a sense that we were rushing. It felt like we had hours.<\/p>\n

Olsen: As you\u2019re making the movie, are you talking with Clint or William H. Macy or Felicity Jones, having these kind of big picture, thematic conversations? Because the movie invites these questions of, what makes a life? How do you define being a man? Are you having those conversations while you\u2019re making the movie?<\/p>\n

Edgerton: There\u2019s something fascinating about \u201cTrain Dreams.\u201d Something I say is so special about Clint is, I know this because I read so many screenplays and I think about story all the time, is this draw to tell an audience what to feel all the time. Whether it\u2019s through words, the story itself, music. \u201cTrain Dreams\u201d does this thing that as much as I can speak about it objectively, and it\u2019s the same in the novella, these moments that aren\u2019t telling you what to feel, they\u2019re just layering on top of each other, and I feel like there\u2019s some compression of all these things. It pulls something out of people in their own way. They find their own experience out of it, which can be quite emotional and quite cathartic in a good way. Particularly anyone who\u2019s been through moments where they\u2019re being knocked down in life. I think there\u2019s some sort of hopefulness in watching Robert\u2019s story. It\u2019s hard to define, but there\u2019s a confidence in the way Clint\u2019s rendered it. It\u2019s not telling you each time what to feel. Robert\u2019s not telling you, it\u2019s not screaming to the heavens. There\u2019s nothing sort of overly melodramatic or cathartic about it. And yet these layers build and compress. I had a very similar experience watching \u201cInto the Wild,\u201d Sean Penn\u2019s film. It\u2019s another character isolating himself in in nature. The credits roll and something in me just was like it was like, \u201cI needed to feel something.\u201d I call them a happy cry movie. You know, you\u2019re crying but also happy at the same time.<\/p>\n

Olsen: There\u2019s a a moment in the film that I find so haunting and I\u2019ve been trying to unravel it for myself. It\u2019s late in the film, it\u2019s the 1960s, you\u2019re portraying the character as an old man. And in the voice-over the narrator Will Patton says something like, \u201cHe never spoke on a telephone.\u201d And there\u2019s something about that I just find deeply moving and really haunting. And I\u2019m struggling to even define for myself what it is about that idea that really gets me.<\/p>\n

Edgerton: Because there\u2019s these great things in the movie that I call little sidecars or whatever, this idea that the world is sort of moving so quickly it\u2019s going to leave us behind. It reminded me of my grandmother, who when I pointed a video camera at her for the first time, she didn\u2019t move because she was thinking I was taking a photo of her. And I was saying \u201cIt\u2019s OK, this is a camera that\u2019s gonna capture you moving.\u201d She was like Robert. She never saw some of these things. She never experienced a lot of things. I think she went on an airplane, like a jumbo jet, once in her life. And there\u2019s a great thing in the book actually, about Robert and his point of view on the world and as he\u2019s aging, and it talks about his body and his spine and the way his shoulders moved. For example, that scene where Robert goes up to the window and realizes he\u2019s staring at a man walking on the moon and he\u2019s looking up at the sky, wondering, \u201cHow is that even possible?\u201d There\u2019s this sense of his physical dilapidation as he moves. It\u2019s this guy that every time he turns his head has to move his entire body from all the hard work. But all this is sort of just a general sense of wonderment that I remember in my grandmother\u2019s eyes when she would look at new things. But this sort of awe and childlike wonder at the world, which I found very special.<\/p>\n

Olsen: Part of the story also deals with just how to know when your time has past. And you and I are about the same age and it\u2019s something I grapple with a lot, wanting to be sure that I still have something meaningful to contribute. Do you worry about that for yourself? In a way it comes back to where we started this conversation, that there are people who would tell you that movies are on the way out.<\/p>\n

Edgerton: Relevance is a weird thing. I always saw myself as the youngest person in the room. I started very young. I was young at drama school. I was always young, and now I\u2019m not. The beauty of being an actor if we\u2019re allowed to keep doing what we\u2019re doing, if AI doesn\u2019t mess everything up, as long as my brain keeps working, I can keep learning about the new versions of myself as I get older. You know, \u201cTrain Dreams\u201d is a good chance for me to see myself in the middle of my life. But I wonder about relevance. I wonder about my character staring at a chainsaw in the movie and wondering how it\u2019s going to affect his world. I wonder at that for myself, as I\u2019ve never downloaded ChatGPT. I\u2019m sort of terrified, but I also feel like I need to not turn a blind eye to it. I have young kids. I\u2019ve got to accept this thing. But I do worry about what it\u2019s going to do to movies. What I feel optimistic about [is] \u2014 I always evoke Jonathan Glazer\u2019s film, \u201cZone of Interest.\u201d Because I think the genius of that film is the beautiful human thought behind the point of view of setting a Holocaust film in the general\u2019s house over the wall in an opulent setting. And I keep thinking, \u201cI don\u2019t think AI is going to come up with an idea like that, think outside the box.\u201d I think it pushes us into more of a challenge of the unique thought, the unique piece of art, doing things that are bespoke. I don\u2019t think we\u2019ll ever want to stop watching human beings or listening to human stories told by humans, starring humans, music made by humans, paintings painted by humans. I hope. Yes, we can enjoy the wildness of what computers create for us. But I don\u2019t think zeros and ones are going to entirely ruin our lives. But then I can be pessimistic too. I won\u2019t rant on that.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In the last episode of The Envelope video podcast before the 2026 Oscar nominations, Joel Edgerton describes the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":223133,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[138,156,593,133729,424,4462,133730,435,1094,111,139,69,133732,384,133733,133731,4468,54599,437,14047],"class_list":{"0":"post-223132","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-film","11":"tag-kelvin-washington","12":"tag-life","13":"tag-lot","14":"tag-mark-olsen","15":"tag-movie","16":"tag-netflix","17":"tag-new-zealand","18":"tag-newzealand","19":"tag-nz","20":"tag-oscar-nomination","21":"tag-people","22":"tag-small-movie","23":"tag-star-joel-edgerton","24":"tag-thing","25":"tag-train-dreams","26":"tag-tv","27":"tag-way"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223132","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=223132"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223132\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/223133"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=223132"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=223132"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=223132"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}