Involved in movies for nearly four decades now, Dimitri Logothetis is an award winning filmmaker who has worked in a broad range of genres. The Producer on such films as 1986’s Hardbodies 2 and 1992’s Sleepwalkers, he has also directed a list of others, including the 1988 Horror flick Slaughterhouse Rock, the 1989 documentary film Champions Forever, among others. Truly a diverse creator, some of his most beloved areas of work would have to be within the Action world; where he worked on such films as 2015’s Kickboxer: Vengeance, and most recently, 2024’s Gunner.
Gunner, a new Action Drama released in theaters and digitally on August 16th, follows the story of a returning home war veteran determined to win back the affection of his children. Unfortunately he is faced with some extremely horrifying circumstances when his sons are abducted by ruthless drug dealers. Stopping at nothing to save them, it raised the question, how far would you go to protect your children? A story that should connect with many on different levels, Dimitri Logothetis took a bit of time to sit down and chat about Gunner, his love for Action cinema, plus more.
Cryptic Rock – You have been involved in a long list of films through the years ranging from Drama, Action, and Horror. Tell us how the Gunner project came about for you.
Dimitri Logothetis – Well, I got a script from Gary Scott Thompson (who wrote the Fast and Furious film franchise) about two and a half years ago. I read the script and I thought the relationships in it – especially the relationship between the leading character and his boys, as well as the lead bad-guy drug dealer and his son – was really interesting. I thought that really carried the whole story forward. That’s what really got me excited about grabbing the script, moving forward, and putting the project together.
Cryptic Rock – There is also definitely a very high pace to it with a lot of action. As you pointed out, there is that interest with the father and son relationships. In a way, there feels like there is an underlying theme about parenting in this film. Would you agree?
Dimitri Logothetis – Yeah. The leading character is a hero. He has a lot of secrets that he wants to keep from his children; specifically, because he’s trying to protect them. He didn’t want to burden them with the kind of things that happened to him during the war. I think that in and of itself is really fascinating. How do you, on the one hand, not explain why you haven’t been around for several years? On the other hand, how do you try to mend this relationship where these kids have grown while you were away at war and you haven’t been able to spend any time with them? You can see that he’s burdened with all that. That probably translates with a lot of parents, so they can relate to that in many ways.
Cryptic Rock – Most certainly. The most powerful moments in the film are the one-on-one dialogues between Gunner and his children. The scenes with him and Morgan Freeman’s character are really powerful as well. That kind of makes the action aspect that much better; because you need those strong points in a script to make it work.
Dimitri Logothetis – I agree. You can have the most wonderful action sequences in the world, but if you don’t care about the characters and the reason that they’re going through what they’re going through (with the chaos and putting their life on the line), it won’t work. In this particular instance, you really do care about Luke Hemsworth’s character, and you care about his family.
Cryptic Rock – Agreed 100%. It seemed like there was good chemistry between everyone involved. What was it like working with the cast?
Dimitri Logothetis – They were wonderful. It’s just one of those projects that you get involved in and everybody was very professional. Everybody was really warm and kind to each other. Of course, Luke being a father with the two boys in the film, he was really sweet. Morgan Freeman is just a joy to work with. You can’t do better than that.
Cryptic Rock – That is great. It has been said that Morgan Freeman is very passionate about his roles, and he will do everything it takes to make the film work.
Dimitri Logothetis – Yeah. Also, he’s a lot of fun on set. He likes to joke around a little bit and throw people off every once in a while. He makes the set a lot of fun.
Cryptic Rock – It sounds like it was a great experience. As mentioned, you have worked in many genres. Do you enjoy working with Action stories like this?
Dimitri Logothetis – I’m very passionate about that. I love Action filmmaking. I’ve done television. I come from Action television, and it’s a mechanism that’s enjoyable. I think it’s entertaining. It should bring audiences to be able to live through characters, do the kind of things that you can’t do, and the kind of things that you’d love to be able to do… especially when it comes to protecting your family.
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