Angelina Jolie relished getting ‘pretty beaten up’ while making Those Who Wish Me Dead.
The 45-year-old actress plays no-nonsense firefighter Hannah in the survival thriller and despite being best known for action movies, she enjoyed the fact her character was much grittier and more down-to-earth than the roles she has played in the past.
‘There’s nothing about this character that trained in martial arts or did anything special. I get pretty beaten up through this,’ the Oscar winner explained. In the film she has to wear a 70lb firefighter suit at times.
And playing an expert smoke jumper – the name given to specially-trained firefighters who parachute into the blazing wilderness – gave the brunette beauty more respect for firefighters the longer filming went on.
She told Entertainment Weekly magazine: ‘The first day we were in the fire, [I noticed] the heat and how quickly the winds would change and how quickly the fire would suddenly take to a tree that you weren’t expecting.
‘Our respect just grew day after day for these people on the front lines and how difficult this work is.’
While Angelina has been acting since she was just seven years old, she believes her decision to turn to directing in recent years has improved her performance by giving her a new perspective.
She explained: ‘In very technical terms, I’m more aware of what the director needs, and what other challenges they’re facing, and how many different pieces are moving.’
And as a result, she had a lot more patience and appreciation for the difficult stunts and set pieces in the movie.
She added: ‘Maybe when you’re younger and you’re having a huge day where you have to be cold and wet and emotional and crying, you’re thinking about those things.
In the same interview she insisted it was ‘not possible’ for her to direct after getting divorced.
Th star – who has Maddox, 18, Pax, 17, Zahara, 16, Shiloh, 14, and 12-year-old twins Knox and Vivienne with former husband Brad Pitt – ‘loves’ working behind the camera but has found the shorter schedule of acting projects has been better for her family life since her marriage came to an end in 2016.
She told Entertainment Weekly magazine: ‘I love directing, but I had a change in my family situation that’s not made it possible for me to direct for a few years.’
‘I needed to just do shorter jobs and be home more, so I kind of went back to doing a few acting jobs. That’s really the truth of it.’
And Angelina couldn’t suppress her maternal instinct on her latest job, playing no-nonsense firefighter Hannah in thriller ‘Those Who Wish Me Dead’ as director Taylor Sheridan had to call her out for being too nice on camera to Finn Little’s character, Connor Casserly, who her alter ego was tasked with protecting.
The By The Sea filmmaker previously admitted she thinks she’s ‘lacking’ in the skills to be a traditional stay-at-home parent.
She said in February: ‘I was never very good at sitting still. I feel like I’m lacking in all the skills to be a traditional stay-at-home mom. Even though I wanted to have many children and be a mom, I always imagined it kind of like Jane Goodall, traveling in the middle of the jungle somewhere. I didn’t imagine it in that true, traditional sense.’
The film hits theaters and HBO on May 14.
Source: dailymail.co.uk
