Hart also tells us how he prepared to step into the role of Vault Hunter Roland.
Director Eli Roth‘s upcoming big-screen adaptation of Borderlands has been a much-anticipated project since it was first announced over a year ago. Over the last few weeks, both new and long-time fans of the looter-shooter post-apocalyptic video game franchise have been treated to a lot of exciting reveals now that the film is officially in production, from a stacked acting line-up to a teasing image of almost the whole cast to date — even if they’re only in silhouette. Cate Blanchett leads the movie’s cast as Lilith, as well as Jamie Lee Curtis as Patricia Tannis, Jack Black as Claptrap, Ariana Greenblatt as Tiny Tina, Florian Munteanu, Haley Bennett, Édgar Ramírez, Janina Gavankar, Gina Gershon, and Cheyenne Jackson.
Among the cast is Kevin Hart, who will be stepping into the role of Roland, a playable character from the first Borderlands game and Vault Hunter, as well as a former member of the Atlas Corporation’s private military force known as the Crimson Lance. Collider had a chance to catch up with Hart recently in speaking with the actor and along with Bryan Smiley, President of Film and Television at Hartbeat Productions, about their upcoming Netflix film Fatherhood and their company. Our own Steve Weintraub asked Hart about stepping into the Borderlands world and what he could tease about the project.
“Once again, it’s all about the shock factor. This is me stepping into action full speed ahead, no comedy. I’m responsible for the action,” Hart said, revealing that this is a definite change of pace for him in terms of his career. He also spoke about an early conversation he had with Roth in regards to proving that he could take on the part of Roland:
“He said, ‘Kevin, if you tell me that you can show up prepared and that you want to come in and knock this out, then you’re my guy.’ So I went, I did some training with some Navy SEALS, I got real good with weapons, I got real good with my hand-to-hand combat. And the experience here in Budapest filming Borderlands has been unreal. Cate Blanchett, Jamie Lee Curtis, myself, Flo [Munteanu], Ariana [Greenblatt]… I mean, our cast is unreal. He truly is knocking this movie out the park. And I can say visually, it’s like nothing you’ve ever seen. Somehow I find myself in these spaces where you get a part of these IPs that are hitting the big screen and have the potential to become so much more. … Borderlands, nobody knows what to expect, but if this thing comes and it smacks people correctly, you could be looking at Borderlands 2, Borderlands 3. It’s that good.”
Fans of the video game franchise already know that Borderlands has such a distinct style, but Hart wanted to stress to us that with Roth behind the wheel, the Borderlands movie will definitely be taking a page from the games in terms of visuals too. “The fanbase that follows the game is already huge and unreal, but I don’t think they even have a clear understanding of how close we’re coming to the game. It looks like the game. It’s unbelievable, truly unbelievable.”
Borderlands currently has no official theatrical release date. Check back later this week for the full interview with Hart and Smiley.
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