The Big Picture

Collider’s Steve Weintraub sits down with the cast and crew of
The Cut
during TIFF 2024.
Orlando Bloom talks about pushing his body to the limit, admiration for Sean Ellis’ eye, and filming in reverse chronological order.
The cast teases that
The Cut
is an original and unique sports film, future seasons of
Severance,
and wrapping up
Outlander
‘s 11-year run.

While on the surface, The Cut may seem like any other sport or boxing film, it really is a visceral drama that also explores life outside the spotlighted ring. Orlando Bloom leads the drama as a nameless protagonist dubbed “The Boxer,” who was sidelined ten years ago and now owns a boxing gym with his wife Caitlin (Caitríona Balfe). When another boxer gets injured before a title fight, Bloom’s character returns to the sport to take his place, facing the dire problem of dropping a lot of weight in only six days. He enlists the help of Boz (John Turturro), who ruthlessly guides him through the painful whirlwind of cutting his weight so dramatically, all while Bloom’s protagonist is haunted by his past.

In the Cinema Center of the Toronto International Film Festival, Collider’s Steve Weintraub talks to director Sean Ellis and cast members Bloom, Balfe, and Turturro about their experience filming The Cut and how it differentiates itself from other sports films. Bloom recounts his harrowing experience of maintaining such a low body weight and how he managed to pull through by relying on the crew. They also talk about filming in reverse chronological order, teasing future seasons of Severance and the final season of Outlander. Hear about Ellis’ acute skill with lenses and taking mesmerizing shots of boxing in the video above, or you can read the transcript below.

What Is ‘The Cut’ About?
Image via TIFF

COLLIDER: Congratulations on the movie. Everyone who is watching this will not have seen The Cut yet, so how have you been describing it to friends and family?

SEAN ELLIS: It’s a boxing film from a point of view that hasn’t been tackled before. It’s got a very dark psychological edge to it. It’s like Conor McGregor checks into The Overlook.

JOHN TURTURRO: He never got out, he’s still there. [Laughs]

That’s an interesting way of describing it. I had not thought about that.

TURTURRO: That’s a good description.

ORLANDO BLOOM: It’s like an assault on the senses.

100%.

‘The Cut’ Is an Original Take on Sports Films
“I hadn’t seen a movie like it. I hadn’t done anything like it before.”
Image courtesy of Photagonist at TIFF 2024

For the three of you, what is it like actually reading a script like this? I won’t talk about any of the specifics, but this is a hardcore movie at times. What was it like reading the script and for you, Orlando, deciding “I want to put myself through this?”

BLOOM: Mark [Lane], our producer, pitched me this idea — we’d worked on a movie a few years ago, Retaliation — and I was like, “That sounds really cool as a concept.” As it came together, it was leaning more into a genre space, heavily genre in its feel, with this idea of body dysmorphia, the mental [side], and all the things that would go there. But like Sean said, it was a really fresh take. When Sean came in and read it, he had a vision for it, which was something that brought in John, who also had an amazing vision for his character, and Caitríona [Balfe], who took so much from on the page and helped bring the characters together. I wanted to do something transformative in terms of the physicality of something. When you put your body through something like that, it’s surprising what comes out in terms of the mental and the physical, and the way that it lent to everything that was on the page for boxing.

CAITRÍONA BALFE: Our agent brought it to me, and I read it, and I was like, “Okay, this is wild. This is crazy.” But it was also super interesting, and I’ve always been such a fan of sports films, because sport is usually inherently such a positive thing, right? “It’s healthy, it’s positive, everyone should be doing sports.” But this was a take on it that looked at the dark side and the obsessive side of it, which I thought was really fascinating. I hadn’t seen a movie like it. I hadn’t done anything like it before. I just thought all of the people involved and the journey that Orlando was gonna go on, I was like, “Okay, that could be something really cool to be part of,” and it was fun.

TURTURRO: It was a very original script. That’s what you respond to — you respond to the material. Very few films talk about what it takes to get there, especially at the end of a career. It’s an interesting exploration of a person’s body and his mind and the people who care about him and the people who push him. I’m a fan of everyone, and I’ve admired Sean before. I hadn’t seen something like that, and I’ve seen a lot of boxing movies, from the ’30s on.

I’ve never seen a boxing movie like this. I give you props for making something completely original.

‘The Cut’ Taps Into How Boxers Visualize A Fight
Image courtesy of Photagonist at TIFF 2024

One of the things I think the film does a really great job of is exploring what it takes to be great, in a no bullshit way. This is an unvarnished look at what a boxer might do. Can you talk about how much you think what takes place in the film is really going on, and how much is complete dramatic license?

ELLIS: A lot of it’s based on fact and what the boxers have to do in order to make the weight. There’s a lot of research that went into that. It is based on fact in that sense, but obviously we dramatize it. We’re making a movie. We’ve probably pushed it a lot further for that experience.

There is a fantastic shot in the film. It’s you, [Bloom], close up, slow motion, the muscles are going, there’s some blood. That’s gonna be in the trailer, I’m sure of it. Talk about that specific shot and what you wanted to accomplish with it.

ELLIS: The idea was to have these vignettes that actually prelude the actual fight. They sometimes say to a professional athlete to visualize the motions, and that if you visualize it enough, it will come into fruition. It’s these ideas that he’s pre-playing the fight. When you get to the end, you realize that you were probably watching the fight. You’ve been watching flash forwards in that sense. We did those with a very, very high speed, photosonic camera and a very, very long lens which squashes the perspective down. It gave this shot, this just incredibly intimate and graphic feel at a speed that’s so slow motion that it seems like time has stopped.

What was your reaction when you actually saw that shot? The muscles are going on the neck. It’s a cool shot.

BLOOM: I’m prepping for the movie, and he’s sending videos of running 25 miles because he’s got the lenses and cameras all about him, doing it all from behind the camera whilst directing. He is a master of lenses, coming from photography, and knowing what would work. I’ve never seen a shot look like that in some ways. It was so, like, odes of Raging Bull in the way that it looked, I was like, “Wait, is that me?” There was another amazing shot where you had the pill and there was a split lens?

ELLIS: Split diopter.

BLOOM: In the movie, there were just so many ways in which he was utilizing the lens and the camera to make what was essentially a space about as big as this, that we were filming in for the majority of the movie, interesting and entertaining to take that story forward. I thought that was just phenomenal. That was amazing. Sean is a director, but what he could do with that was really… And we had 25 days to shoot the movie. We shot it in reverse chronological order.

How the F did you do that? That’s crazy.

ELLIS: Orlando had to turn up at his lightest weight, and that was because when you’re losing that much weight, you can’t function. Your brain is starved of calories and there’s no way that you can even remember your lines at that point. He got to us at his lightest. We shot the ending of the movie first, and then he started to eat. He was putting the weight on as we were filming backwards until we got to the end, and we shot the beginning of the movie at the end. It was a very big Rubik’s cube that we needed to figure out.

Orlando Bloom Pushed His Body To The Limit While Shooting ‘The Cut’
“I don’t really know how he kept it all together emotionally in the sense of the character.”
Image courtesy of Photagonist at TIFF 2024

First of all, holy F, and second of all, I feel for you. Not only are you having to act, but your body is also screaming at you.

BLOOM: It was weird because losing the weight going into it was really brutal. You made a comment, John, earlier — when you’re gorging food, it’s like your body’s just stripped away.

TURTURRO: I was a little worried, actually. I have to say. Because I’ve done stuff, and I was a little worried when I was watching him. “I hope he has enough to be okay.” I’ve been in these situations, and it takes a lot.

It’s not pretend.

TURTURRO: It’s actually happening to him.

BALFE: Also, being so deprived of food and all of that, but then half of your acting is working out. He would just be like, “We have to go again.” You’re on that treadmill, or you’re on the rowing machine, and you’re just absolutely fucked. It was crazy to watch.

ELLIS: That first week, I remember we’d call cut, and Orlando would just be collapsed on the floor. He would just lie there until we were ready to go again. Then he would get up, he would get himself pumped up again, and then he would go again. Then we’d say, “Cut.” You were crazy. He was angry and paranoid, as well, because he was so deprived of any calories. We had to really support him and help him get to that point where he was putting weight back on, and he was starting to bulk up again.

I don’t really know how he kept it all together emotionally in the sense of the character. Where were you? If you’re shooting something in chronological, reverse order, I sometimes struggle with actors who come up and say to me, “What are we doing here?” And you’re shooting it in normal order. But in reverse chronological order, you had to work out where he was in the part, backwards.

Orlando Bloom Survived “Hangriness and Paranoia” Through His Crew
“It was sort of like some kind of weird torture chamber.”
Image courtesy of Photagonist at TIFF 2024

You must have been a completely different person to everyone on the last few days of filming; you must have been in such a better mood.

BALFE: He was just sitting around eating cake, having ice cream. [Laughs]

BLOOM: Just laughing it up. [Laughs] I was so grateful to these guys, particularly the relationship. John would sit next to me in the makeup chair, and he was so generous and loving actually, with the way that he saw me and what I was trying to do and what he knew the character needed. He actually told me, “This is a love story.” We said this quite early on when I was in a real sort of head-spin, it’s sort of like this love triangle. Caitríona, who took what was on the page and made this relationship — they will never let go of each other. She was like the mother I should have had, and we’re clinging to each other. You can feel the history of the relationship because of the performances that they were bringing. It was so supported by the crew and Sean putting up with my hangriness and my paranoia. It was sort of like some kind of weird torture chamber.

This wasn’t one of those, “We’re in Hawaii, let’s have some fun.” This is going for it.

BLOOM: Last night was the first time I saw it on a big screen and a lady passed out. Apparently, she was in the ambulance. She came around, and she was okay, but she was like, “What happened?” That’s how intense this movie was. I was like, “That’s crazy.”

John Turturro Got Used To a Camera Alongside Arnold Schwarzenegger
Image courtesy of Photagonist at TIFF 2024

I have to ask you an individual question. You’re very good at not blinking. [Laughs] There’s some intense stuff with you, and w hat’s funny is you can just turn it on. How long did it take you to master this?

TURTURRO: Years. [Laughs] When you first start out acting in a movie, if you come from the stage, it’s like you go to the dentist’s office — the camera’s that close, and you think it’s the enemy. There were some good DPs who helped me when I was young to make friends with the person behind the camera. In this case, we had the director who had the camera. You become much closer to that. There are things we all learn, like not to move as much.

I did a movie years ago with Arnold Schwarzenegger, and I remember doing something to him, and I said, “Blah, blah, blah.” And he was like, “What did you say? I’m going to destroy you right now.” But he did this slow turn, and it’s so unnatural, but I thought, “Well, it kind of works for Arnold.” I almost started laughing. It’s about being able to be still, and some people move more than others, and you just have to be aware of that.

I’m a huge fan of Severance, and I know that you recently filmed the second season. For fans, what can you tease?

TURTURRO: I’m not allowed to speak, otherwise I’ll be severed. I think it’ll be really interesting. There’s a lot of really interesting stuff for people who really like the show, and it definitely takes a step forward and shows the other side of the characters.

I honestly can’t wait.

Caitríona Balfe Wraps Up ‘Outlander’ After 11 Years

I do have an individual question for [Caitríona]. You’re almost done filming a show, [Outlander], that’s been a part of your life for –

BALFE: 11 years.

What is it like to be coming to the end of this chapter? And what was it like reading that final script?

BALFE: It’s wild. It’s wild coming to an end. I feel every emotion possible, sometimes all at the same time. We had our 100th episode the other day. We had a big moment for that. It’s been amazing. The show has given me so much, and it’s going to be really sad to say goodbye to it, but it’s also kind of exciting to move on to the next stage. The last script, I don’t think any of us have read the full script. I think they’re still keeping parts of it to themselves until the very day that we film it. It’s kind of interesting. I can’t give any spoilers because I don’t know.

Image courtesy of Photagonist at TIFF 2024

No fan wants to know what’s gonna happen. They wanna watch it. You two, [Sean Ellis and Orlando Bloom], clearly work well together. My last question for the two of you is, when are you working together again?

ELLIS: I don’t know, I hope so.

BLOOM: I’d love to. It was such a get when Sean called Mark and said he liked the script because I’ve been a fan of his anyway. So, I’d run to it. It would be great. We just gotta find the right thing.

BALFE: Surfer movie in Hawaii. [Laughs]

BLOOM: [Laughs] Exactly. Something that involves eating.

Special thanks to this year’s partners of the Cinema Center x Collider Studio at TIFF 2024 including presenting Sponsor Range Rover Sport as well as supporting sponsors Peoples Group financial services, poppi soda, Don Julio Tequila, Legend Water and our venue host partner Marbl Toronto. And also Roxstar Entertainment, our event producing partner and Photagonist Canada for the photo and video services.