Cillian Murphy

Cillian Murphy first came to our attention as Jim, a man who wakes up in a world full of zombies in 28 Days Later... Since then he's wowed us as the Scarecrow in Batman Begins, and now he's back working with Danny Boyle and writer Alex Garland in Sunshine. Murphy plays Capa, the physicist on the Icarus II, whose bomb to reignite the sun is the last best hope for the human race.

You've been in a few Science Fiction movies that have tackled big themes. Was that part of the attraction of Sunshine?

Yeah, I think there's certainly a connection between Alex Garland's writing in 28 Days Later... and Sunshine in that they are bold, apocalyptic scenarios and everybody always thinks about that. You think what you'd do at the end of the world. And if you can't get drama out of the end of the world, you're not really going to get drama out of anything!

I do like to see what happens to the human condition in extreme situations; they are the sort of roles I've been interested in.

Did you discuss the philosophical themes in the film with the writer?

I did sit down with Alex and go, "Right, tell me exactly what you're trying to say here." I think he's a fantastic writer. He was obviously part of this from the beginning, he conceived it with Danny. He was there for rehearsals, shooting, and post-production so he's a very hands-on writer.

Alex likes to have a good hard talk and he's not interested in talking about frivolities—he likes to talk about the big issues. He's a very bright man. Most of his books have big themes and he writes very cinematically and he has a brilliant set up always.

It's not meant to be didactic—if you wish to find it there you can. Within the guise of an entertaining Science Fiction thriller there may be certain other questions posed or issues raised, but not in any way that is meant to be forced. It presupposes a level of intelligence in the audience, which I think is always an encouraging sign in films.

Are there any SF movies you love?

The masterpieces, which were our inspiration, like 2001, the first Alien, Solaris—the Andrei Tarkovsky version. I didn't mind the George Clooney one, but why remake a masterpiece?

You're playing a scientific genius. Were you interested in science at school?

I gave up science in school very early. I don't really have that sort of a brain so it was trouble for me to grasp the basics of it and hold onto it.

You assume that Capa is the most brilliant of his generation and that is a lot of responsibility. You have to then make the assumption that that would affect his personality. I tried to work from the inside out.

The cast spent two weeks living together before filming began. How much do you think this informed the camaraderie in the movie?

It's very nebulous. It's hard to pinpoint what happens when you live with a group of people and put it on screen. It's hard to say what the difference is between that and not having lived with a group of people and putting it on screen.

What we were trying to achieve was that sense of these people having been in each other's personal space. It's tipping its hat to the classic scene in Alien where they all have their dinner together—it was like they had known each other forever. That was part of our mission.

This is a big effects epic, and that's rare for a British film. Did you have to take a leap of faith that the CG would live up to its promise?

I was knocked out by the movie totally and that's a tribute to Danny and Alex and [producer] Andrew [Macdonald]. They're fearless and they don't seem hamstrung from being from Britain. It competes wonderfully and looks like a $150million movie, yet it cost less than a third of that.

You're right—you hope that the FX live up and particularly in cinema nowadays we are so bombarded by CGI that it's very hard to impress and this really does.

Were you given any indication of what the CG would eventually look like?

They showed us little pre-viz stuff and little models but you can never tell. You go, "I hope this is going to be good," and it is.

There are a couple of scenes where you wear one of the big, golden spacesuits. It looks pretty cumbersome—was it as bad as it looks?

They were beautiful to look at but it kind of became impossible for the actors to stay in them for any length of time because they were so hot and we were shooting late summer. So a lot of that was the stunt guys and in fact one stuntwoman just fainted in it and they couldn't pull her out which was quite scary.

A lot of what we did was this "helmet cam" rig, which was a helmet with the camera built into it. It's a brilliant device because how do you get around wearing a helmet? Once it's put on you lock the audience out unless you have a big visor. So they devised this thing and it was brilliant. That was a beast of a thing and a lot of the effort and exertion is real.

Looking at the DVD of 28 Days Later..., you shot something like four different endings. Did anything similar happen on this movie?

No, I think there was only ever going to be one ending for this movie.

Do you have any regrets about not doing 28 Weeks Later?

Not at all. It was never about us. It was always going to be a different set of characters. But I hear it's brilliant.

Having done the movie, do you think any differently about the sun now?

It has piqued my interest in science, and it highlights the fragility of our whole ecosystem. [During our research] I remember one of these physicists filled a whole blackboard with equations for how they could build a bomb that could reignite the sun. So it is scientifically possible. But the sun isn't meant to burn out for five billion years.