This project goes as far as 1998. While it’s been in development and in the works for a while, this suspense thriller is one worth the wait. With those tough New York private eye stories as an inspiration, writer/director Scott Frank brings A Walk Among the Tombstones to the big screen. “We talked a lot about those films of the 70’s and it’s shot like that.  It’s lit that way.  It’s cut that way.  But the good guys weren’t all good or all bad.  They all lived in this kind of grey area,” said Frank about the characters in the film.

Based on Lawrence Block’s best-selling series of mystery novels, A Walk Among The Tombstones is a suspense thriller that follows the dark trials and tribulations of a complex character, private detective Matt Scudder. His internal struggle is just as difficult as the violent work he lives for. Bringing that character to life is award-winning actor Liam Neeson. “To get the chance to do this, which was very much one of those sorts of characters, you know not good in the relationship world and tortured.  In Matt Scudder’s case, of course, he’s a recovering alcoholic so those guys. You know, they wake up in the morning and they have to think of a reason to get up, and then, once they’re up, to not have a drink.  It’s like all these little heroic battles they have that they fight with and against every day of their lives.  And I think Scott brought that out very lovely and beautifully in the film.  So he’s [Scudder] not larger than life He’s just one of us really.  But his career was in the police force.  These guys see a side of humanity that we just don’t want to know about on a daily basis.”

Scudder agrees to help Kenny Kristo, a drug trafficker hunt down the men who murdered his wife. After learning this is not their first crime, Scudder walks the streets of New York to find the murderer’s before they kill again. Actor Dan Stevens talked about the dark side of his character Kenny Kristo. “That was one of the really interesting things that Scott wanted to explore with, I think the whole film, but particularly with Kenny.  When bad things happen to bad people, how does that make us feel?  What happens to Kenny is deeply unpleasant and I wouldn’t wish it on anybody. And I think the challenge of trying to evoke any kind of sympathy for a role that ordinarily we would say, ‘Oh, this is a bad guy’ and dismiss him actually to kind of, you know to walk those sensibilities a little bit was really kind of the challenge of the film.  All of the characters in this film have, to one extent or another made a series of bad life choices that have led and ended them up in this dark place.” 

While that decision is left to the audience, the actor’s as well as the filmmakers have developed sympathy for these characters. Scott Frank shared, “What I like about these kinds of stories is that it’s about men or women who have to become the worst of themselves in order to do good.” He also commented that Neeson’s character is nothing like the Taken films. He said, “This movie is not Taken.  What he [Liam] liked was this guy who had this whole history.  He liked the idea of this man who was not a super hero.” Neeson may not be a superhero in the film, but he sure saves the day.

While the film centers on the lives of “bad guys”, becoming one of them is not the message. The film features a scene between friends TJ (Brian “Astro” Bradley), a young homeless artist and Matt Scudder, in which a message relating gun control is directed to teenagers.

Entertainment Affair asked director Scott Frank about the scene and its message. He answered, “It’s not in the book. I did it ‘cause I have kids and I have a certain feeling about guns… TJ is definitely in the book; he’s a different character in the book… The scene for me was because in the middle of this mayhem you have a man who is sort of, the worst part or his personality is the violent aspect of his personality, and I thought I wanted to find a way for these two to connect that wasn’t cute and that was different. I wanted this kid to be desperate for some kind of acceptance and thinking mistakenly I’m gonna be that guy, and the last thing that Matt Scudder wants is for this kid to be him.”

The killer’s are not fully given away. In fact, understanding them was not part of the film. Scott explained why, “These two guys were a harbinger of something coming that nobody noticed, that there they were every day in the world and nobody was taking them seriously.  Nobody was paying attention to them. Nobody could even describe them when it came time to describe them.  That, for me, was really interesting and more frightening… You don’t know what they are.  Are they lovers? Are they brothers?  You don’t understand them and I don’t go into any of that because I think it’s more interesting, rather than going into their bad childhood and what happened to them.  You just don’t know what they are because that’s what evil is.  There sometimes isn’t a reason for it and sometimes it is the most banal thing out there.” 

A Walk Among the Tombstones opens in theaters this Friday, September 19^th.