With director Martin Campbell’s Memory now playing in theaters, I recently spoke to Liam Neeson about making the action thriller. In the film, Neeson plays an expert assassin that’s dealing with getting older and suffering from a memory that is beginning to falter. When a job goes wrong because he refuses to kill a child, Neeson must figure out who hired him while staying ahead of the FBI and his failing memory. Memory also stars Guy Pearce, Monica Bellucci, Taj Atwal, Ray Fearon, and Harold Torres. The film is produced by Cathay Schulman, Moshe Diamant, Rupert Maconick, Michael Heimler, and Arthur Sarkissian.

During the interview, Nelson talked about why he wanted to make Memory with Martin Campbell, why he spent a lot of time preparing for the role, how he loves his work in Neil Jordan’s Michael Collins, why he loves showing a character’s vulnerability, and how he hadn’t seen Memento until before making Memory with Guy Pearce. In addition, he talks about how he just watched a cut of Jordan’s Marlowe and how it plays homage to Raymond Chandler. The character of Marlowe is perhaps best remembered from the highly influential 1946 noir film The Big Sleep starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall.

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Image via  Open Road

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Watch what Liam Neeson had to say in the player above and below is a list of everything we talked about.

Liam Neeson

  • Which of his previous films deserves another look?
  • Why Michael Collins is his favorite film.
  • Which of his 100 films did he spend the most time preparing for the role?
  • Why he spent a lot of time preparing for his role in Memory.
  • Why did he want to make Memory and take on this role?
  • Why he loves showing a character’s vulnerability.
  • What he enjoyed about working with Martin Campbell?
  • How he hadn’t seen Memento until before making this film with Guy Pearce.
  • How he just watched a cut of Neil Jordan’s Marlowe and how it plays homage to Raymond Chandler.