The War in Bosnia made many change channels when it was reported on the news. 

Actor Linus Roache's new film about the conflict is a powerful reminder that

without consciousness there is no humanity

LINUS BEHIND THE LINES

By Kitty Bowe Hearty

 

For most of us, war has been reduced to an abstraction, something fought on

paper or in movies.  The recent war in Bosnia, however, was conflict of the

most primal sort. It was fought over religion, ethnicity, and land, and it

manifested itself in the harshest, most tangible of human cruelties: rape,

carnage, genocide.  And yet, for all the coverage pr9vided by the modern-day

twenty-four hour news cycle, the Bosnian crisis barely impinged on the

consciences of the majority of people in Western Europe and America-including

those who had the means to intervene in a productive way.

 

A few non-Easter European films addressed the war, notably the little

seen Welcome to Sarajevo (1997).  But now the HBO drama Shot

Through the Heart, which airs on October 4, finally brings Bosnia into

our living rooms, and the story it tells is one that anybody can relate to. 

Two lifelong friends suddenly find themselves on different sides of the

conflict when one of them, Vlado, realizes that the other Slavko, is the

enemy sniper behind a string of cold-blooded killings in Sarajevo, including

that of a friends' young daughter [sic].  Slavko is played by Vincent Perez

and Vlado by English actor Linus Roache, who previously gave superb

performances as men grappling with ethical dilemmas in Priest (1994) and

The Wings of the Dove (1997).  As a man devastated by unacceptable truths

in Shot Through the Heart, Roache gives life to feelings that can scarcely

be borne. 

 

KITTY BOWE HEARTY: 

Why was the civil was in Bosnia so hard for people to understand?

 

LINUS ROACHE:  I think it was two things.  One, it was so complicated, it was

difficult to get your head around it.  The other thing was willful denial,

and I have to be honest, I was guilty of that.  I knew what was going on but

I couldn't follow it; I couldn't relate to it.  What I liked about the Shot

Through the Heart script was that it put faces on the war:  the film follows

two people who actually don't care whether they are Slavs or Muslims but who

get caught up in the conflict anyway.

 

KBH:  Do you think the reason people were in denial was because it was a war

in Europe?

 

LR:  Before doing the film, I thought of it as being a very distant conflict,

but going there blew all that away for me.  Sarajevo is a beautiful city with

a café culture, very cosmopolitan.  The people there are like people in Paris

or London or New York, living side by side and not really conscious of their

ethnic backgrounds.  Even when the war broke out, there were Serbs still

living in Sarajevo and fighting with the Muslims against other Serbs.  The

whole thing was mad.

 

KBH: Your character in Shot Through the Heart becomes more interesting as he

becomes more isolated. You've played other morally isolated loner, too.

 

LR:  Yes, they can be very intriguing to play.  You never know what a human

being is made of until they're tested.

 

KBH:  How does that apply to Vlado?

 

LR:  He's an everyday man placed in an extreme situation where it seems

there's no way out.  He could have backed down.  He could have killed himself. 

There were hundreds of other options but some kind of conscience kept pushing him

to do the morally correct thing---which means doing something atrocious.  It's an

almost unbearable catch-22.  I think that epitomizes this particular sort of war.

 

KBH:  What about Merton in The Wings of the Dove?

 

LR:  Oh, highly ambiguous, that guy! The trouble with Merton is that he's

passive; it was his not acting that caused chaos.  That's why he infuriated

people.  It was quite painful to watch myself in that role.  He's not a man's

man; he's weak, but also very true to some kinds of male conditioning.  Of all

the films I've done, I was the most uneasy sitting through that one.  That may

be my male pride:  I don't want to be seen like him even though I knew I had

to play him the way I did.  To me, The Wings of the Dove is about how much we

are willing to give for the sake of romantic and sexual love.

 

KBH:  Are they the same thing?

 

LR:  There's a kind of illusion about love, especially in the movies.  It's

that idea that finding the right partner is like finding God.  I'm not saying

that love isnt' powerful-it is.  I've been in a relationship for ten years and

it's great.  But in The Wings of the Dove…..was that love?  I don't' think so. 

It was just about self-gratification, but I liked that the film was honest.

The final scene in which Merton and Kate [Helena Bonham Carter] make love is

not erotic-it's a nightmare.  

 

KBH: Your dad [actor William Roache] is very famous in England…….

 

LR:  Yeah.  He's like a national institution.  He's the sole member left in

the original cast of the longest-running soap opera in the history of man,

Coronation Street [which began in 1960].  I played his son on the show for a

while when I was a kid.

 

KBH:  Did his celebrity affect your feelings about fame?

 

LR:  Yeah, I pushed it away---I didn't like the attention.  I remember going

with him to some event and it was just crazy---it was like the Beatles had

arrived or something, just ridiculous.  I got quite upset by it.  It caused a

lot of aggravation at school, as well.

 

KBH:  Do you think your father wanted to have a film career?

 

LR:  Yeah, he's a very striking man.  He could have been a Roger Moore type. 

He fell into his job on Coronation Street very quickly, and I think if he

hadn't found that he would have pursued other avenues.

 

KBH:  Is it strained then, when you talk with him about your varied stage, TV,

and film career?

 

LR:  No, he's very honest about all that.  He told me if he could do it all

again he'd go the route I've gone, which is very sweet.  But he carved out

something quite unique for himself.

 

KBH:  I read that when you were going to do Priest you didn't really think

about the fact that your character, Father Greg, was gay.

 

LR:  Sex is sex whether you're gay or heterosexual; the issue in the movie

was celibacy.  It's a very powerful path for someone to take and there's a

lot to be said for it.  It's an act of renunciation that

has nothing to do with deprivation---but it isn't' for everybody [laughs].

 

KBH:I understand that you're very dedicated to your spiritual life.  How do

you keep that going while building your acting career?

 

LR:  It's been very challenging, but it's becoming easier.  A spiritual life

is twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.  How do you live?  What's true? 

How do you respond? It's not about living by beliefs; it's about wanting to know.

 

KBH: How did you get there?

 

LR::  I was looking for answers in my work, and that's when I got very

disillusioned with it; answers can't be found in acting.  It's art and you can

learn a lot from it, but it isn't everything.  When I realized that what I'd

actually been pursuing in my work was a greater understanding for myself and

other human beings, I started looking into that.  Now I don't feel like I have

to juggle work and spirituality.  They go hand in hand.

 

Kitty Bowe Hearty