Were you guys always in sync on this project or were there times you maybe disagreed?

Ben Affleck: Sure, there were times we disagreed.  You’re not doing the right thing kind of if you’re always agreeing, that’s a bad thing.  The worst mistakes I’ve made creatively have been when I’ve just always agreed.  I’ve just made terrible mistakes just agreeing with folks, Jesus (laughs).  We made a lot of stuff a lot better just going through like what are you talking about, why you want to do that, well that doesn’t make sense and almost always the scenes got better doing that.  Sometimes we maybe talked ourselves in circles and that’s the nature of the creative process.  He’s very smart.  He’s a very smart guy and he focuses always on making the scene better and the movie better.  I think he’s the guy you want doing a movie with you because you know he’s a really good actor and he’s a really good protagonist in the sense that you know protagonists are on camera for most of the movie so he needs to be kind of interesting.  Casey is really authentically thinking and living and surprising and engaged throughout while you’re photographing him and giving you a wide array of stuff to use.  And also engaging you and kind of challenging you to make sure that you know what you’re doing and you have an answer for these questions while you’re making the movie. 

What does it feel like being part of this Boston trilogy of Mystic River, Departed and now you…and what did you learn from Kevin Smith as a director?

Ben Affleck: I mean to be in a Boston trilogy it’s kind of like that’s Everest, Kilimanjaro and you (laughs).  Obviously, those are towering giants.  I’m just happy to get my movie made, man, you know, those guys are legendary filmmakers and this movie is just a little movie that I’m glad to get out there and hope that people go see and I hope that people like.  I will be pleased that if in 40 years that I get some portion of those guys’ great success…some fraction of that would be wonderful.  For now, I’m just trying to just cobble together a little directing career.  Part two involves a different kind of answer.  No, what I’ve learned from Kevin Smith is…in a way this movie has a very simple actor focused feel to it and it’s similar in some ways to a Kevin movie.  Kevin’s got a little bit more verbally rigorous like writing focus.  He doesn’t permit any deviation of the word whereas this is like it’s OK to change a syllable or two.  One of the things I learned from Kevin is that he really pays attention to language and this is definitely something I took away from him, the rhythm of language and how actors sound and that’s something I really came to appreciate working with him.  I think that’s something that’s really important, like not just what they say, but the cadence of how they say it and also make stories that oftentimes are being told in the interest…just holding your interest.  Kevin’s kind of relying a lot of times, the raw power of the writing and the importance of the writing and that’s always been the centerpiece of his movies.  It’s a reminder that that’s the underpinning of movies and I think that’s a really good thing to learn and remember.

Working with Kevin, did you know that you already wanted to direct.  What triggered you?

Ben Affleck: Working with Kevin, I mean when I first worked with him in I think ’93 in Mallrats, and I didn’t know anything in ’93.  I was very new and just trying to figure things out.  But over the course of working with him, I just became really good friends with him and picked up a lot from him and from the other people we worked with and just tried to study and learn from him as I have from all the directors I’ve worked with and over the course of that time developed an increasing interest in trying to direct.

What do you think about the difficult moral choice that Casey’s character has to make at the end of the film?

Ben Affleck: Obviously it’s the choice that’s presented in the book, but in terms of trying to convey it in the movie, I tried to present it as provocatively as I could in the sense that I wanted it to feel really difficult.  I think it’s a tough choice and underneath it, there’s this sort of pull between these sort of classic things in our society whether we’re willing to forgive people or judge them, whether we think it’s OK for us to make decision for other people…if the right thing was easy, everybody would do it.  The idea that Casey really believes that once he’s – I don’t want to give this whole thing away so I’m trying to figure out what to say that won’t give it away – but you know the movie Rules of the Game? I stole a line from it where at the end of the movie she says “everyone has their reasons” and it’s like his accusation really is that everybody is kind of rationalizing their actions based on their own self interests.  In other words, you’re all sort of claiming this moral high ground but really it’s just based on what you all want to do…you just want to have this girl and he’s the one doing the difficult thing and sometimes the thing that doesn’t seem pleasant or totally right or totally comfortable but it’s right.  And if it’s the right thing based on the rules that we have set down, the reason the rules are there is that they’re there to protect us from our own subjective prejudices and those are the things we have to follow.  And it’s really difficult to make those choices.  But we have to make them.  That’s a strong argument and yet when you’re sitting there, at the end of the movie with the choice that he’s made, it’s profoundly ugly and disturbing.  So the idea was to try and set both those things up as strongly as I could and build both arguments as strongly as possible so that they would be at loggerheads with one another because I thought it was a coming of age movie, not like American Pie like losing your virginity kind of movie…that coming of age kind of movie.  I’m not disparaging American Pie but that level of age of teen or early 20s.  Real coming of age meaning like you become an adult is like 30 I think because it’s around the time you discover that the decisions you make in life have lasting, real consequences and that you never really know if you’re right or wrong.  That there is no answer, there is no end of the book to turn to tell you Oh, actually I made a mistake there.  And oftentimes those decisions have real consequences, not only for yourself but for other people.  At the end of the day all you can do is live with them and try to be at peace with them.

I just wanted to ask you if had any Project Greenlight like moment in there where it was one of those things in terms of first time director.  Obviously you’ve been exposed more than people that were there, but just kind of like having a moment…

Ben Affleck: They did tell me that I was running out of film at one point (laughs).  I was shooting too much film and I was running out of film.  I was like Where’s the film store?  Is there a place that is selling film.  They were like the film store is in New York City.  I was like well, someone go to the film store…we got into like where’s the film store discussion.  But actually in truth they were just kind of manipulating me.