"How do you make a movie about someone that didn't want to have a movie made about them?" asks Andrew Garfield, star of Mel Gibson's new film, Hacksaw Ridge.
It is a fair question. Gibson's first directorial effort since the thrilling Mayan adventure Apocalypto a decade ago, tells the remarkable true story of Second World War hero Desmond T Doss. He was the first conscientious objector – he refused to kill during the war, serving instead as a medic – to be awarded a Medal of Honor, after he single-handedly saved 75 men during the 1945 Battle of Okinawa.
“What a great story to tell, in the worse place on Earth,” says Gibson, who adds that Hollywood was interested in telling Doss’s story as far back as the late 1940s. “I know Desmond was horrified by that. He was like: ‘No, sorry, I’m just going to pray and grow vegetables’.”
A Seventh Day Adventist, Doss’s modest personality was built around “total humility”, says Gibson. Eventually, he gave the rights to his story to his church, who talked him into allowing a film to be made that “might be inspirational to other people”.
His wartime actions were nothing short of staggering – dragging injured men to safety and lowering them, one by one, 75 feet down Hacksaw Ridge, a cliff face where United States troops and the Japanese engaged in a bloody firefight during the Battle of Okinawa.
“What Desmond did was totally superhuman,” says 33-year-old Garfield, who plays Doss.
“The closest thing I can compare it to is when you see mothers lifting trucks off a trapped child. He was filled with something that gave him the necessary strength.”
Doss, who died in 2006 at the age of 87, would doubtless be satisfied with Gibson's rigorous approach to telling his life story, from the casting of The Social Network star Garfield to showing the battles the soldier faced before he went to the front lines.
Bullied by his peers for refusing to bear arms, even enduring a court martial, Doss refused to quit because he was desperate to serve his country in a way that fit with his personal values and beliefs.
“It’s a pretty good message,” says 60-year-old Gibson.
“Basically, what Desmond was doing was exercising his faith and conviction in the midst of a heinous war, which is hell on Earth. He was exercising that in the midst of a hateful situation. That’s a good message for now. There are people killing themselves in the name of religion and killing others in the name of religion.”
The script, by Andrew Knight and Robert Schenkkan, does not dismiss the characters who were antagonistic towards Doss as monsters.
One of them is his superior officer, Sergeant Howell, who is played by Vince Vaughn. The 46-year-old actor, best known for his roles in Hollywood comedies such as Wedding Crashers and Swingers, says he can sympathise with the military's reaction when Doss declares he will not carry a gun.
“Having someone who won’t have a weapon is a liability,” he says. “You cannot go into a conflict and feel like the guy in the foxhole with you is not going to [be with you].”
The film was shot in Australia – primarily in New South Wales, where the crew cleared 500 hectares to create the battlefield – the country where Gibson spent his teenage years.
“It was very familiar,” he says. “It was like putting on a comfortable pair of shoes.”
For Garfield, re-enacting real-life battle scenes was difficult.
“It was brutal, actually,” he says. “There was one point when I texted Vince and said: ‘Fake war is hard.’ Such an actor – pathetic.”
Hacksaw Ridge's combat scenes are among the most graphic you'll see on screen – every bit as compelling as those in Gibson's Oscar-winning 1995 movie, Braveheart.
"We got away with murder," says Gibson of the making of Braveheart. He reveals that he and his crew had only 59 days to shoot Hacksaw Ridge, little more than half the 105 days he had to make Braveheart, and, at US$40 million (Dh146m), just half the budget.
“It makes you think – were we wasting money back then? Maybe,” he adds.
If Hacksaw Ridge is a technical triumph, it is also a richly-crafted spiritual journey – something Garfield admits seeped into his performance.
“I found myself praying a lot for the sensitivity and consciousness to serve Desmond, as I can only imagine how he would want to be served,” he says.
“How do you inhabit that very humble stance of: I’m not a hero, I didn’t set out to be a hero? That is an interesting challenge. So I found myself asking for divine assistance at every turn. I knew I alone wasn’t enough to bring this man’s soul to life.”
Hacksaw Ridge is expected to be a strong contender during the coming awards season.
“One of the things I love about the movie is that it leaves you a little inspired,” says Vaughn, “to elevate, to do a little better yourself.”
Doss would surely be delighted, in his own humble way.
• Hacksaw Ridge is in cinemas from Thursday, November 10
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