Campbell’s Big Gun

Hastings-born director Martin Campbell, 66, best known for the 2006 Bond film Casino Royale, has told the Los Angeles Times that “there was nobody else” but Mel Gibson for the role of Boston cop Thomas Craven in Campbell’s latest thriller Edge of Darkness. He said the script called for an actor old enough to have a 24-year-old daughter (gunned down in the film) who also possessed a ferocity. The list of big stars that fit the bill was exactly one name long. There was nobody else,” the New Zealand-born filmmaker said. “I liken Mel to the old Hollywood stars like Robert Mitchum, Lee Marvin, William Holden, people like that, and we’ve got none of them now, do we? Everyone now is so lightweight. Even George Clooney, who is a terrific actor, he’s too polished. Mel has this masculine kind of emotional weight that others don’t. Possibly Russell Crowe, but he’s too young for this role. Eastwood is gone [from acting] and Harrison Ford, he’s got the grit, but he doesn’t have the menace or the power.”