Lawless is in the running to be my favorite film of the year, so I was very excited to sit down with Matt Bondurant. Matt’s book The Wettest County in the World is the novel Lawless is based on. The novel itself is fiction but is based on the events of Matt’s grandfather and two great-uncles as they navigated the moonshine business in Virginia in the 1930s. As Matt explains, there were no diaries or written accounts of what happened exactly during those years, but he drew his story out of the stories he did hear from his relatives.
I am always happy to talk to authors because it is out of their mind and creativity that the film version was born. Matt was not really involved with the film production but was included in what was happening with the film. He explains in the interview the process and length of time that it took for Lawless to be made. One cool fact that people might not know is that Terrence Malick had a film in production that was titled Lawless and basically gave the title to this film team to use after they asked for it.
Lawless is in theatres August 29, 2012.
by Sarah Ksiazek
Video edited by Ryan Davis
