Author Mike Fury follows up his book Life of Action with a second volume, Life of Action II. As with his first volume, Fury has conducted several interviews with those filmmakers whom have made their career within the action genre. It included interviews with Scott Adkins, David Leitch, Chad Stahelski and Dolph Lundgren, as well as many lesser known players. Fury follows the same formula this time around and again casts the net wider than just household names, and grants the spotlight to some of the true unsung heroes of the field of action cinema.
Trust me, whilst you may begin reading an interview thinking, ‘I’ve never heard of this person’ (unless you’re a die-hard fan of the genre), you’ll likely soon come to realise that you’ve seen most of their films. The more prominent interviewees this time around include frequent Tarantino collaborator Zoe Bell, Harrison Ford’s double on the Indiana Jones films – Vic Armstrong, X-Men 2 villain Kelly Hu, Ong-Bak‘s Tony Jaa, Gareth ‘director of The Raid’ Evans, and everyone’s favourite action movie ‘that guy’, Daniel Bernhardt amongst others.
The interviews themselves are intimate and extensive, Fury goes fully in-depth with every subject, starting with the interviewee’s upbringing and essentially steps through their career pretty much movie by movie. This means that there’s a lot of information to digest within each interview. Given that fact, Life of Action II is not a book that one speed reads, you instead need to pace yourself and allow the time to properly appreciate the shear breadth of experience shared.
The openness and willingness to share all manner of details, not only about their past, but also about their training regimes and advice for those aspiring for a similar career, elevates the book from just being a standard collection of interviews. In many ways this book could also be viewed as a ‘how to guide’ with each subject having had pretty much an entirely different route into the industry.
An intimate and informative collection of career retrospectives, this is a book best savoured rather than devoured. With Life of Action II Mike Fury offers the perfect way to pass the daily coffee break, taking the reader on a journey through every corner and role within the movie business. A must-read for fans of the genre, and essential for anyone thinking about a career in any aspect of action cinema.
Life of Action II is available now in Limited Edition hardback, softcover and kindle formats.
