General Movies - "Hard Candy" Poster, Trailer, Info, & Interview with Ellen Page 
RebelMan says: Trailer: Release Date:
April 14, 2006 (Limited) & April 28, 2006 (Everywhere) Studio:
Lionsgate Director:
David Slade Screenwriter:
Brian Nelson Starring:
Patrick Wilson, Ellen Page, Sandra Oh, Jennifer Holmes Genre:
Thriller MPAA Rating:
R (for disturbing violent and aberrant sexual content involving a teen, and for language) Official Website:
HardCandymovie.com & MySpace.com/HardCandy Plot Summary:
A smart, charming teenage girl, Hayley probably shouldn't be going to a local coffee shop to meet Jeff, a 30-something fashion photographer she met on the Internet. But Hayley's ready to have fun, and soon she's mixing screwdrivers at Jeff's place and stripping for an impromptu photo shoot. It's Jeff's lucky night – until his vision blurs and he passes out. Turns out Hayley isn't as innocent as she looks after all. In fact, she has a lot on her mind. Like getting Jeff to confess to his penchant for teenage girls – and to what he did to Donna Mauer, the girl who disappeared from Jeff's favorite coffee shop. When Jeff awakens, he's tied to a chair. If he doesn't cooperate, Hayley has something to help him along--a little surgical procedure she picked up on the Internet. All she needs is an ice pack. And a knife... An edge-of-your-seat psychotic thriller, "Hard Candy" exposes the visceral terror and violence that lie at the heart of the battle of the sexes. \/ Interview with Ellen Page on "Hard Candy" Ellen Page: Hard Candy From Strangers
Source: Edward Douglas April 10, 2006 19-year-old Ellen Page is not your typical teen actress, and she'll never be confused with the recent spate of Hollywood-processed bimbettes. Not that there's anything wrong with the Lindsay Lohans, Hilary Duffs and Amanda Bynes of the world--they all have their fans--but Page is different, tougher, and she can probably hold her own if ever forced to face the paparazzi and tabloids that come along with fame. In the new Lionsgate thriller Hard Candy, Page plays Hayley Stark, a 14-year-old, who has been having online chats with a much older photographer, played by Patrick Wilson, and decides to sneak out and meet him. When she goes back to his apartment, that's where the real fun begins, as this inventive and quite sadistic psychological thriller turns the tables on the typical male-driven horror cliches where women are tortured and killed. It's a terrific role for the young actress, and one that may have helped her get the role of Kitty Pryde in the upcoming X-Men: The Last Stand. When ComingSoon.net spoke to the actress on a recent visit to New York, she was handling it all with aplomb and humor, reminding this writer of a younger and funnier Helena Bonham Carter. CS: What did your parents say when you showed them this script? Page: My dad read it first, and his only concern was, "Wow, you're going to be going into this person's mind! Are you ready for that?" But he really liked the script as much I did, so he was very supportive and trusting. Yeah, they're cool. CS: Did playing Hayley freak you out at all? Page: Yeah, I think it's pretty overwhelming. One thing about Hayley is that I didn't want her to just be some kind of superhero. She was still a fourteen-year-old girl, and I wanted some of that vulnerability to be there. I'm sure she was at home practicing in front of the mirror. She's playing a role herself--she's acting herself--to really screw up this man's mind to the extent of being able to do what she does. There are moments when my whole body and my mind are just tired. CS: Did you create a background story in your head for her? Page: Yeah, I had a complete story for her, but, at the same time, I don't think it's even remotely necessary for anyone to know what it is. Yeah, I did kind of have a background, but it wasn't a big, terrible concern for me to even have one to be honest. CS: Was your performance influenced by any other actresses? Page: Yeah, actually, there's one performance Jodie Foster in "Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane," a 1976 film, which is amazing. Her performance in that was so strong and, once again, a 14-year-old girl, that people are constantly like, "What are you doing, girl? You can't be doing that! You're fourteen!" and she's like "Why can't I cook? I'm fourteen!" and then she's teaching herself Hebrew. CS: Have you found that guys and women have a different reaction to the script? Page: Sometimes, you get men that are really angry about it and who really hate my character and all their sympathy goes to Jeff, which is really interesting for him to be excused for a lot of behavior. My reply is there's this whole division in law and order that could basically be called "Naked Women in Dumpsters". Do you know what I mean? But then you meet some women that are really angry about it too. I met this woman in Palm Springs accosted me, "You're sadistic!" and kind of went off. So, it's totally varied, to be honest. CS: Has anyone considered Hayley's actions justifiable? Page: I don't know if people think that she has completely done the right thing. This movie is really not cut-and-dry, which is really why I really like it, because it's obviously not black-and-white. You meet people who are inspired, because they see a young woman with so much intelligence and integrity and passion. We're really devoted of that media right now. I think she's freakin' great. I loved her and I loved her passion. She sees something that she's pissed off about that no one's doing anything about and she takes it upon herself to change it. Obviously, it's up to the audience to determine whether or not what she does is right. CS: Do you think Jeff is a really bad guy or just a sick guy? Is he evil or just misguided? Page: I don't know. I actually had this conversation with friends who saw it, and I was thinking I'd really like to find compassion for all people, especially when there are all these misdeeds in the world. I find it really difficult to find compassion for people that sexually violate young individuals, whether it's male or female. It horrifies me. I find it really difficult for me to see, but everyone has a story. I guess. I find it really difficult when somebody rapes and murders a kid, I'm like, "What!?!" I just don't get it. CS: How did you rehearse with Patrick Wilson? Page: We had three or four days of rehearsal before because it was literally like, "Nice to meet you, here we go!" We worked out a lot. We work out some things that weren't feeling perfect in the screenplay and, thankfully, Brian Nelson was just amazing. He was so flexible and totally on board to help us feel organic. We just trusted each other. I know it sounds cheesy, but to me, I think that's the most important thing, which is just feeling safe and having the ability to feel confident. CS: Have you performed in theater before? Page: No, unfortunately, not since "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" in Grade 5. I played Charlie. That was my claim to fame in elementary school. That was so much fun. I want to do stage again, but unfortunately, that's all that's on my stage résumé, unless someone will really trust me. CS: What was it like acting with the camera so close on you the whole time? Page: To be honest, there wasn't really adjustment because I never even really let it enter my mind. David just did what he did. I knew we weren't doing wides and I knew the style, but it didn't really change anything. I wasn't conscious about it. I just did my thing. CS: What was it like seeing yourself on the big screen like that? Page: Yeah, that was actually kind of difficult because it was at Sundance and I'd never done anything like that or have done anything like that. I decided to take the year off, go home to Halifax and just graduate high school, so I was so out-of-it. And they were like, "This is going to be kind of intense, just so you know." and I was like, "Okay, whatever, whatever," then I got there and was like, "Whoa! What the hell is this?" I saw the premiere for the first time and afterwards, I couldn't even speak. Then I met some guy who was drunk recently, and he was like "You weren't very friendly at Sundance!" and I was like "Thanks." Who says that? I don't care if he's had a couple of martinis. CS: "Hard Candy" is rated R, but do you think that teen girls should be able to see it, almost as a warning against online predators? Page: Of course, I think teenagers should see "Hard Candy." Girls should see it because there's this extremely strong, passionate, intelligent young woman and, for boys… the same reason. Why not? I know why it's rated R, but I disagree with their whole censorship stuff, but that's a whole other debate. I'm sure a lot of people would love to make it PG-13. I think it's extremely unfortunate what we can see. I just shot a film in Toronto and I think that's going to be rated R. That's another movie that teenage girls need to see because we don't get to see characters like this. CS: Obviously, there are girls Hayley's age, who are sexually active and aware, so do you think that it makes it more important for kids to get sexual education earlier in life? Page: Yeah, we're pretty devoid of sex education. I went to a really cool Buddhist high school, and we were talking about everything from a very feminine point of view, which is great. It's unbelievable the censorship in regards to educating. You look at a place like South Dakota right now that just made abortion illegal. That has nothing to do with it, but it kind of does in the sense of talking choices away from women. I don't know. CS: Are you comfortable doing more mainstream action movies after doing something like this? Page: My next film is the complete opposite of X-Men. That's important to me. It's called "The Tracy Fragments," a low-budget, dark movie. I wouldn't say that that's something specifically that my heart as much as it responds to "Hard Candy" or "The Tracy Fragments." But, I had an amazing experience and I got to work with crazy, talented actors. To be honest, it was a lot of fun. I think that versatility is absolutely key. I'm not veering off into a mainstream action film. CS: Is "Tracy Fragments" really darker than "Hard Candy"? Page: Yes. I didn't think that I could shoot a movie that was more draining and more intense than "Hard Candy," but that just happened. CS: What attracts you to these dark roles? Page: Probably because I read a lot of scripts where it's just girls listening to their iPods or girls who are the girlfriends of the boy who's the lead or girls that fall in love with a boy or girls that play soccer. "Well, this is great, but no, come on!" Especially when you're a teenager, everything is raw, everything is gritty and people are dark. We have really dark sides, and they are typically really honest films in their darkness. Most of the roles that are the most outrageous that I've played have the strongest sense of humanity and that's something that really attracts me. It's fun to just manipulate yourself and your emotions and fall to pieces and try to put them back together. CS: Are you looking into any colleges yet and are you expecting to be recognized when you go there for this and for "X-Men"? Page: I definitely want to further my education. Colleges specifically, no. Yeah, that does freak me out a bit. I'm just a kid from Nova Scotia. You know what I mean? I've never had parents that pushed me into this, even remotely, not even for a second. I'm not going to change because of anything. I'm scared about other people's projection sometimes. I just wanted to make sure that I remain grounded. I don't want this to get carried away in anything because that's just retarded. CS: Do you happen to have any favorite movies? Page: There are a couple of them out there. I love "The 400 Blows". I love "Ratcatcher"--I love Lynne Ramsey. I'm a "Waiting for Guffman" fan. François Truffaut. I just watched "City Lights," a Chaplin movie--oh my God, it's so beautiful! It's so heartbreaking. CS: What books are you currently reading? Page: Right now I'm reading "Kafka on the Shore," Haruki Murakami book. I'm a big Haruki Murakami fan. CS: Are there any books that you would like to see adapted into screenplays? Page: Actually, there's this one book who's this young Canadian author who's best friends with Emily Haines, the lead singer in Metric, and with Amy Millan who sings with Broken Social Scene. She wrote a book called "Skinny." It's about a 16-year-old girl and a 22-year-old girl and they're sisters, and the narrative switches between each chapter. That's a beautiful book. CS: Are you into politics and are there any issues that you're passionate about? Page: Lately, I've been kind of obsessing about Le Santo and the patenting of seeds, which is the most ludicrous thing I have ever heard and makes me want to kill myself, basically. Because it's patenting corn, and then basically, stuffing it in the Mexican market and selling it for so cheap that people who don't have that much money can buy it even though they want to buy their century-old corn because it's natural. Then, it infiltrates their crop and then, all-of-a-sudden, you have Le Santo going down to these farmers and going, "Hey, we're suing you!" So, basically, they just want to control the world by patenting seeds. CS: Do you consider yourself to be a feminist? Why do you think some people consider that a bad word? Page: Yes, and why is that a bad word? It's annoying when people start judging things in regards to these ridiculous categories and names like all of a sudden you can't be a feminist because you shave your legs. That's bullsh*t. You're a feminist when you care about equality and to me, it's like why doesn't everybody care about equality and the power of women? How can something be more obvious that we live in a patriarchal society when "feminist" is a bad word? CS: If "Hard Candy" does well, do you think they'd do some sort of prequel? Page: No and I wouldn't do it. Unless, it was about a girl who was never abused, living her life and then goes, "What the hell is going with society? Let's do something about it!" That's "Joan of Arc", actually. That's the prequel to "Hard Candy." CS: How about a sequel? Would you consider doing that if they wanted you to? Page: No, I couldn't imagine. Obviously, Brian Nelson wrote an amazing script, but, sitting here right now, I couldn't even imagine. Would she do it again? Original post: "Hard Candy" Poster, Trailer, Info, & Interview with Ellen Page |
