Laurence Fishburne admits starring in 1979's 'Apocalypse Now' transformed his career.
Laurence Fishburne
The 57-year-old actor appeared alongside the likes of Martin Sheen, Marlon Brando and Robert Duvall in the Francis Ford Coppola-directed war film, and he's confessed that the film proved to be a turning point in his career.
He said: "That movie was really the beginning of me thinking of myself as an artist.
"It was the beginning of my understanding of cinema, it was the beginning of my understanding of the world, because I was suddenly taken out of Brooklyn and I was in the Philippines in the middle of Asia.
"I was in a place where most of the people looked like me, so it opened up a whole world of possibilities. My work with Francis on 'Apocalypse Now' and all the films I did afterwards with him really shaped me and formed me as an artist."
Laurence also admitted Clint Eastwood has been another influential figure in his career.
He confessed to being impressed by the "simplicity" and "ease" of his film-making.
The Hollywood star told Collider: "I was forty-something by the time I got to work with Clint on 'Mystic River' and I experienced a kind of film-making I hadn't experienced before - his simplicity, his ease.
"He has a crew of people who have been working with him for decades so they have a shorthand and don't have to talk a lot. Things moved very quickly and again I was with an incredible crew of actors: Sean Penn, Tim Robbins, Kevin Bacon, Laura Linney, Marcia Gay Harden. It was fantastic.
"'Apocalypse Now' took two years to make and I was 14 and I thought that was normal, because it was only my second movie. Forty years later I made a film with Clint Eastwood with all these people and it took 25 days. It's a different style."
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