Taking its title from an ominous line in William Shakespeare’s tragicomic play The Tempest, crime thriller All the Devils Are Here is written and directed by Barnaby Roper – a stylish feature debut from the filmmaker who uses his breadth of experience in making shorts and music videos to craft a slick experience. The plot centres around thieves Ronnie (Eddie Marsan), Grady (Sam Claflin), Royce (Tienne Simon), and Numbers (Burn Gorman) who hide out in a secluded house in the countryside after a heist spirals out of control. I took the opportunity to chat with the director and his cast ahead of its world premiere at Edinburgh International Film Festival.
With such a tight number of characters and being shot in mostly one-location, Roper spoke on balancing this theatricality with the cinematic nature of the piece. “In a lot of films, you continually cut to a new scene, cut to a new location, cut to a new thing, so the viewer is always moving. We have scenes around the same table for about 30-40 minutes if you cut them all together, so it’s a real process in the edit to keep that momentum going and the acting obviously helped with that”.
In the leading role, Eddie Marsan portrays old school criminal Ronnie Blake who appears to be seeking some kind of redemption, particularly in the way he mentors their young getaway driver Royce, brilliantly played by Tienne Simon in his first big screen performance. No stranger to these types of parts, Marsan discussed what sets this apart from the rest within the genre. “I grew up around men like Ronnie – they’re were like ten a penny as it was a legitimate career choice in the East End. They are tragic characters, full of regret and trauma”.
Discussing the appeal of the original script from screenwriter John Patrick Dover, Marsan continues. “What we do in this country is we glamourise gangsters and quite often what we see are middle class fantasies of what it means to be a gangster. You get a lot of posh blokes buying an overcoat with a velvet collar who learn a bit of cockney rhyming slang, and they think they’re a gangster. When you meet real ones, their lives are shattered and what I love about this story is that it portrays that in a deep, spiritual, and psychological way”.
Talking about how the cast took him under their wing, co-star Tienne Simon adds “the guys were so supportive. Eddie led amazingly and he helped me through all kinds of stuff. I remember our first day of shooting. It was a night shoot and it was in the car. Everyone helped with any sort of pre-shoot nerves or any questions I had, so I could just feel grounded and feel normal in my environment”. Marsan joked “He was brilliant. If he was crap, we would’ve come and got him!” [laughs]
Perhaps the most damaged soul of them all, Numbers is introduced as the accountant of the criminal organisation and spends most of his time lurking in the room upstairs. Burn Gorman captures these quirks and complexities and brings a dark streak of humour to the film with wicked comic timing. “We’re all a bit ridiculous, aren’t we?” he posed, whilst talking about the part. “Realistically, we’re all only about a bottle of vodka a day from the park bench, so I didn’t see him as a dark character. He felt very separate to the others, because there was that dynamic of fear with him. Barnaby gave me his thoughts on his specific physicality whereas some directors couldn’t care less about that, so it made the experience sort of fun! I miss him a bit!’ [laughs].
With the film programme running alongside Edinburgh’s famous Fringe festival, the cast were glad to be back in Scotland’s capital to celebrate the release. “I love it here!”, Gorman exclaimed. “It’s unlike any other film festival in the world. It feels so international. Where else can you see a Shrek burlesque show one night and a tight chamber-piece gangster film the next?”. Reminiscing on previous trips, Marsan added “I love it up here. I came up here for the first time in 1991 to the festival in a loin cloth to hand out flyers for a play. My loin cloth came off as a Scottish bloke walked past and said, ‘alright peewee?!’…I wanted to go home!” [laughs]
Cinema Perspective 