Brad Pitt: “When you go through a bad moment in life you have to hold on to the small victories”

Special envoy to San SebastianBrad Pitt, the big star of this edition of the San Sebastian Festival, arrived in the city on Sunday, signed autographs for twenty minutes at the doors of the Hotel María Cristina and has spent three days on vacation before attending to the promotional commitments that brought him to the Basque event, where he was already present in 2009 to present Inglourious Basterds. As he did then, the actor took the opportunity to visit the Chillida Leku museum and the Comb of the Wind, this time in the company of his current partner, Inés de Ramón.

This Wednesday, however, it was time to present to the press In the Heart of the Beast, the thriller of survival directed by David Ayer about a retired officer from the United States special forces who has left behind the wars to live in the most remote and uninhabited regions of Alaska with Odin, the combat dog that accompanied him on his missions. Odin and Pitt's character are the only survivors of their battalion and drag their wounds, more visible in the case of Odin, who walks (and runs) thanks to a metal prosthesis. Those of his owner are deeper, and become evident in his very tense defensive reaction to the presence of the only person he crosses paths with during the film.

In In the Heart of the Beast, however, Pitt's only enemy is the wild nature that his character and the dog must traverse to survive a plane crash in the middle of nowhere, caused by an unexpected heart attack mid-flight. "Filming with a dog made every day better; we formed a bond right away," Pitt explained at a packed press conference. "There were days when I was amazed by the things the dog could do, but there were others where he would get distracted by bees or forest animals, which seemed more interesting to him than his co-star, so I had to alternate between being an actor and a dog trainer in most scenes. And thank God for chicken treats."

In essence, the film is presented as a story of resilience and overcoming adversity through two characters who carry their own traumas, a circumstance that Pitt has connected with the prominence of wars and hatred in the current political landscape. "I love that the film is being released at this moment, because yes, it is a survival story, but ultimately it is above all a love story, which is what unites and connects us," Pitt asserts. "We can learn to listen better to overcome what divides us, and perhaps start taking care of what we have around us."

When asked how to overcome difficulties in life, as if the actor were a spiritual guru, Pitt also managed the question by recalling what the survival experts who had advised them on the film explained. "What matters are the small victories," he asserted. "When you suffer a loss or feel a lot of pain, you have to focus on the next goal. And in life, it's the same: when you are going through a bad time, you have to hold on to the small victories and not think about the big picture."

Pitt, who in addition to starring in the film is also its producer, has also reflected on the changes he has seen in the Hollywood industry in the years that have passed since his last visit to the festival: “Platforms have provided many opportunities for writers, directors, and producers, but, at the same time, after the pandemic we have come to value the collective experience of cinema. But the most important change is that film production has become so expensive that only the big blockbusters and the most independent films can recover the investment, so it has become very difficult to make mid-sized ones, which cost 30, 40, or 50 million to produce”.

Julianne Moore, on the way to the Oscars

Already in the official competition, the festival has screened one of the titles that will make the most noise during the awards season that has just begun. The debut is the third film as director by Jesse Eisenberg, who after exploring the memory of the Holocaust in American Jews in the Oscar-winning A real pain changes register to delve into the world of amateur theater and the repressed dreams of a housewife alienated by her husband's indifference, a magnificent Julianne Moore who with this role has her sixth Oscar nomination in the bag.

The film follows Moore during the rehearsals for the production and the premiere of a musical led by the "best amateur theater director in the city" (Paul Giamatti, solid), who struggles to turn the inexperienced debutante into a competent actress. Eisenberg, who also has a small role and signs the script and songs of the musical, imprints a feverish and comic rhythm on the film, parking realism to boost extreme emotions and the vital confusion of a character that Moore draws between kind caricature and tenderness. Despite the ups and downs in tone, The debut convinces with its deep love for the theater and the conviction that art can change your life.