- Hi I'm Todd Haynes.
- Hi, I'm Mark Ruffalo
and you are in studio with Hollywood Reporter.
(upbeat music)
- Okay so it takes a while for a movie to get made,
but isn't it weird serendipity
that you are about to release a movie
about a whistle blower
around the time when the president
is tweeting, "Who is the whistleblower?"
- Yes, that is strange.
- Yes.
(laughter)
- Sometimes a movie lands in the world
right at the moment that it,
we're having a particular conversation
that's appropriate to that movie.
And it feels like this is one of those times.
- There's an urgency to a movie like this coming out
when it is.
Beyond the whistleblower situation
because of our environmental situation
and our heading into an election year
and all of that.
- Yeah, and it doesn't do it justice
to just call it a whistleblower movie.
Can you explain a bit,
Rob Bilott and his quest?
- This is a remarkable true story,
a true David and Goliath story
about a lawyer, a Cincinnati based lawyer
who stumbled onto this extraordinary
back history of the deceptions of the DuPont Corporation
around their production chemical that they used
to produce Teflon.
And what he follows in the course of his endeavor
in trying to release and explore
all of this buried information.
It is a story of staggering deception
and willful contamination of this
known toxic chemical into the environment.
And the breadth in which,
the breadth of this story
and the extent of that contamination is staggering.
- Why do you think that large chemical companies
are becoming kind of a standard villain
in a lot of movies
and also documentaries?
- Because they're assholes.
(laughter)
I mean, there's just,
they do a lot of bad things.
- [Todd] And they get away with it.
- And they get away with it.
And the system
it's been gamed to a place where they can get away with it.
- We've been trained to turn a blind eye
to how much the powers that be
have shifted in favor of big business and corporations.
And how deregulated our government is
and how much there are no stop gaps
to filter or examine or penetrate
what these behaviors and practices are.
- What you see in the movie
is how that comes to be,
how that happens.
And what's exciting about it
is seeing one man sort of unravel this mystery
in real time.
And it's pretty astounding the journey that he makes.
- And when you were doing the initial research for the movie
Todd, did you actually go to the DuPont plant?
- Well, they don't let you into the DuPont plant.
(laughter)
They don't open their doors.
- [Mark] They don't have tours.
- No, there's no E-ride tickets available.
Mario...
- They weren't willing members.
- Participants. - Participants in this movie.
- No so to speak.
- We can say that right out.
- Exactly.
I did go to Cincinnati.
Mark and I all went together with Mario Correa
who picked up the writing task
after Matthew Michael Carnahan got busy,
After he did the first draft of the film.
And we all met in Cincinnati,
met Rob a lot and his family.
And we
- [Mark] Went to Taft.
- We went to Taft Law Offices.
We Skyped with Tom Terp who Tim Robbin plays in the movie.
And then Mario and I got into the car with Rob
and drove to Parkersburg West Virginia.
While in Parkersburg,
Mario and I did drive into the Washington Works plant.
And we were immediately costed by security guards
who told us to get off the property.
(laughter)
But you feel it permeate your body.
You feel your skin tingling after just being there.
- I just think it's kind of cool
that you're fighting to expose the dangers of Teflon.
It feels like something out of a comic book.
I think you know where I'm going with this.
- Not sure.
I don't know what you could be talking about.
- It's just kind of weird that you're,
you're playing a character who is
fighting against this,
I don't know how to make the connection,
but the Hulk's origin story just feels very similar
to what is,
what Teflon is.
It's like a chemical invented
during the atomic age accidentally.
It's this weird nefarious, other worldly comic book thing.
I don't know.
Do you see a similarities?
- You're doing good.
- You're like, "Keep going."
Keep going.
- I'm finding my way into it.
No, listen,
Rob is a hero.
He's not a hero,
I keep saying this,
but he's not a hero
because we want to be him.
He's a hero because we don't.
He goes on a journey
that, how many people turn their backs on the money,
the career, the prestige in American culture today
to do something that's right and really selfless
and really pay a price for mostly your health,
what you lost with your family.
And there's another kind of hero
that wears their strength on the inside.
And that's this guy.
We need heroes today.
It's no mistake that people have fallen in love
with the Marvel Universe
because they want to see a world that's just.
They want to see people who are fighting for the little guy
and on behalf of the little guy.
And this is a little guy
fighting on behalf of other little guys.
The great thing about the movie is
it exposes something that isn't just
Teflon, isn't just PFOA.
It's a whole system.
Whether you're talking about opioids,
whether you're talking about lead,
whether you're talking about Monsanto and glyphosates.
The whole thing has been set up in a way
to allow these businesses to get away with this.
Partially I think
because at the end of the day
we have to pay for our own health care.
If the government was responsible
for paying for our healthcare...
- There would be more incentive.
- Our water would be clean.
Our food would be clean.
The air would be clean.
But this is a vicious cycle.
And we're all caught up in it.
Whether we want to be part of it or not.
And that's not freedom.
That is not American freedom.
- Now we know that Mr. Trump
is not going to be talking about environmental issues
in this next election.
But are any of the democratic candidates
talking about the very things
that you talk about in this movie?
- Bernie.
- Yeah I mean most.
- They all are.
- The democratic brand is a really strong brand.
They're all focusing on these issues.
They're all focusing on
how the system has been rigged against normal people.
They're all focusing on the science.
They're weighing heavily on the science.
They believe in science.
They believe that
there's a system in place
that looks out for a few people in America
but not the whole.
I just think they're all pretty remarkable in that way.
- They are.
- Are you supporting any particular candidate currently?
- I mean, Bernie Sanders is my guy. (chuckles)
- I love Bernie Sanders.
I love Elizabeth Warren.
Pete Buttigieg is a remarkable figure.
We have a really rich slate of people.
Ironically how far right the right has gone
the republican conservative party has gone
has backfired.
And it has emboldened the left.
And progressive issues are not populous issues
and mainstream issues.
And we're talking about things
that we were afraid as a party to talk about ten years ago.
That's their, I think that's their doing.
When one party goes way to the extreme.
It forces the other party, if it has any guts
and any sense of self and any sense of justice
to stand up and defend what has happened.
And so yes, it's about inequality.
It's about regulation.
It's about changing
so many aspects of the culture.
- I'm a huge fan of yours Todd.
I assume that you're probably a huge fan of Todd's work.
- Absolutely.
- Is there a movie, Mark,
that you would've liked to have been in,
one of Todd's other movies?
(laughter)
"Carol" is pretty good.
- You could have played Rooney Mara's part.
- Yeah I would have been great in that.
- That would have been so great.
- Yeah.
"Poison",
(laughter)
That would have been good.
"Safe".
I've been waiting for the day for a part
in one of Todd's movies.
- I've been waiting for this day.
This was a gift for Mark Ruffalo.
This script, this project.
- Thank you so much gentlemen.
- Thank you Marya.
Thank you so much.
- "Dark Waters" out in theaters now.
- Thanks guys.
(whoosh)