MOB LAND: An Interview With The Southern Noir Writer/Director Nicholas Maggio

Cinema Scholars interviews Nicholas Maggio, writer/director of the southern noir Mob Land. John Travolta, Shiloh Fernandez, Stephen Dorff, and Ashley Benson star. Saban Films released Mob Land in theaters on August 4, 2023, and the film will soon be available digitally on August 25, 2023.

Introduction

Who’s feeling nostalgic for 90s cinema?  Some might consider it “too soon” to be pining after films from the 90s. But truth be told, today’s emerging filmmakers cut their teeth on films from 30-plus years ago. From big-budget summer tentpoles, the burgeoning straight-to-video market, and onto the exciting surge of independent filmmaking, the 90s influence is all over current releases. 

Arguably, none so much as the return to the neo-noir thriller. Perhaps it’s a case of what goes around comes around. What’s old is new again. Or maybe today’s streaming revolution allows more filmmakers to throw their hats into the ring. Whatever the reason, there has been a recent wave of films that call back to the era of the gritty American noir of the 90s. At the very top of this new list, Nicholas Maggio’s Mob Land harkens back to the genre with a darkly classic heist-gone-wrong story.

In Mob Land, Shelby is a hardworking diesel mechanic in small-town Alabama. When he’s not enjoying downtime with his beautiful wife and spunky daughter, he can be found either working on or driving his second love. Drag cars. The high-intensity hobby provides not only an escape for the struggling family man but also a distraction from the health issues he still denies. 

Soon, work around town starts to dry up and Shelby finds himself in a desperate situation. Desperate enough to agree to rob the local pain clinic. Justified as a “Robinhood” job to take from the peddlers doling out the OxyContin ruining their town, Shelby soon learns his one shot at financial stability may also be his last. With local family/law enforcement as well as a seriously bad guy on his trail, Shelby must contend with his current predicament while trying to hang on to his humanity.

While Mob Land checks many of the typical noir boxes as far as story and character development, the execution is what sets it apart. Quiet sequences with rather verbose dialogue help temper the unapologetically brutal moments. Simple yet stunning cinematography by Nick Matthews accentuates the small-town feel by highlighting the imperfect beauty of Shelby’s world. Crafty dialogue editing and well-timed flashbacks sequences help fill in blanks and keep up the tempo.

A big part of the magic of Mob Land is the outstanding cast. As Shelby, Shiloh Fernandez continues to impress with a tragically relatable performance. Even as his character’s judgment comes into question, Fernandez’ thoroughly nuanced portrayal makes Shelby’s irrational leap convincing. Stephen Dorff positively wows as one of the best bad guys in recent memory. His face in a perma-scowl with a demeanor to match, Dorff’s swaggering take on the psychopathic henchman Clayton Minor is a counterintuitive delight.

But the obvious scene-stealer of Mob Land is no stranger to 90s cinema. Or 80s, or 70s for that matter. As Sheriff Bodie Davis, John Travolta ends up providing the beating heart to an otherwise cold and heavy film. His contemplative silences say as much as the careful delivery of his charming lines. Every scene he’s in is elevated by his charisma and endearing take on the aging detective. Of special note, the camaraderie Davis shares with his deputy Ben (played with satisfying easiness by Timothy Murphy) is another high point of the film and another testament to Travolta’s collaborative talents as well.

Like many of its neo-noir predecessors, Mob Land pulls zero punches in the brutality department. While Maggio balances the violence visually and tonally, this is one of those mean stories that leaves you more intrigued than completely satisfied. Just what you want in a nice little slice of redneck neo-noir. Cinema Scholars recently caught up with writer/director Nicholas Maggio to talk about Mob Land ahead of the film’s digital release. They discuss directing a first feature, working with a screen legend, and getting to put your favorite muscle cars in your movie.

Interview

Rebecca Elliott:

Hi. How are you doing today?

Nicholas Maggio:

Doing well. How are you?

Rebecca Elliott:

I’m well, thanks. And excited to talk about Mob Land. I loved the movie! And it’s your directorial debut, right? Even more amazing. I was born and raised in Oklahoma, so I’m loving this wave of Southern Noir, or what I like to call “Redneck Noir,” in recent years. And you nailed it with Mob Land. What sort of movies, noir or not, inspired you to write and direct this film?

Nicholas Maggio:

I’ve always been obsessed with neo-noir and the Renaissance of the 90s. So Reservoir Dogs, even Boondock Saints. Everything that started the Renaissance, especially the American neo-noir. Paris, Texas all the way to No Country for Old Men and Taylor Sheridan’s movies. I was a kid in the 90s, so I grew up in that. And so I think it’s been shaping me up until this point, for sure.

Rebecca Elliott:

When you think of mobsters and the mafia, you think of The Godfather, Italian mobsters, Al Capone, etc. in New York and Chicago. But then there’s the Dixie Mafia in the South. Not as well known, which is kind of even scarier. Did you do any research into the southern end of the whole organized crime world?

Nicholas Maggio:

Well, funny. So the film was not initially titled Mob Land. That was marketing after the film was delivered.

Rebecca Elliott:

Ah! Totally get it.

Nicholas Maggio:

That being said, I wrote the film. And I wrote about the organized crime element. I was born in New Orleans, and my family was born and raised in Mississippi, so I have a pretty solid connection to the South. I’ve always known about organized crime down there, whether it’s the mob, mafia, or whatever the group is called. So, as you know from the film, it’s not a central part of the story. It’s just kind of a catalyst to get our characters into action. 

But, yeah, I did minimal only because it’s not about that. I just knew that I needed a criminal element. It was a group that could produce Clayton, and they could produce Ellis, the Old Man. And that was as far as I needed to go with it. The rest is a character-driven story anyway. But I did enough and I know enough to know that it’s not to be fucked with.

Rebecca Elliott:

Exactly! So approximately how high did you jump whenever you signed John Travolta onto this? And what was it like working with the veteran actor on your first feature?

Nicholas Maggio:

Stephen [Dorff] got the script first. I had a couple of conversations with Stephen, and he’s the one who got it to Travolta. They had talked about doing something at some point. So he sent the script to him, and Stephen said, hey, Travolta is interested. He wants to talk. So I get a phone call from him. I mean, it’s still surreal, to be honest. My first feature. Even though I’m doing press for a film I did is still surreal. So honestly, no more surreal than talking to John Travolta for the first time or being on set with him. 

Whatever it was, I think immediately it was scary as hell, intimidating. But he also put me at ease only because he was asking me all the questions I wanted him to ask me right off the bat. It was definitely less like, are you going to fuck this up? This is your first one. Do you know what you’re doing? And it was, you know, tell me about Bodie. Tell me about this, and, why did you write him like this? And he was asking all these very sensitive questions about the character. So I knew that he was already past, are you going to fuck this up? He was straight to like, let’s make this good. And the man did his homework. 

He showed up on set, he knew the character arguably better than I did, and he knew every one of his lines. Never had sides. He just knew everything. And he was very collaborative. We would talk about a scene or something, and maybe he’d have a suggestion or I would and he was open to it. And we did it together. Holy shit. So back to your question. Yay high (motions above his head).

Rebecca Elliott:

About seven, eight feet in the air. Yeah. And I mean, he’s really in this thing. Because in a lot of these smaller films, there’s a veteran actor attached. But he’s on-screen for, like a minute and a half or something. Yet Travolta is in this thing. He’s an integral part. And also, I just have to mention how he plays opposite his deputy, Ben, who is Timothy Murphy. That’s one of my favorite screen pairings ever, I think now. They just had such a natural rapport. Can you talk about sort of the camaraderie that you guys all created there?

Nicholas Maggio:

Absolutely. Tim came in late. Late. That role was actually going to go to another actor.

Rebecca Elliott:

Wow.

Nicholas Maggio:

That actor fell out only about ten days before principal. And yeah, that was crazy. Then that’s when Kevin Dillon signed on. And we moved his character to Trey because Kevin was absolutely perfect for it. Then Tim stepped in. I mean, honestly, maybe a week before. It was crazy. And I will say this, I will give those two full credit, John and Tim. I wrote the dynamic slightly differently. It was just a different dynamic between the two. So, it added a little levity in a different way than the way they played it in the film. 

Because that was always going to be where I got the levity, where I got the jokes in a little. Tim was written as more of a small-town deputy. Not that he didn’t know what he was doing, but he was just a little bit more green. Tim had a couple of conversations with me right when he got on the set the day before. And John and Tim came up quickly with this idea that they just razz each other. But they know their relationship, and they respect each other. Ben knows when the sheriff’s giving it to him and he plays off of it. He owns up to it and he kind of encourages it. 

So that was them. And once they started doing it, we started quickly tweaking the dialogue so that could fit in. But so much of it comes from Tim. Those looks he gives, those throwaway laughs and everything. It makes it so fun to watch. And I love the relationship. A lot of people talk about that because you’re looking for something to laugh at.

Rebecca Elliott:

Right.

Nicholas Maggio:

Especially with Tim. John, the way he plays it is kind of straight. But it’s Tim’s reactions that give it levity, which is really fun. That’s when you really see the relationship.

Rebecca Elliott:

Oh, that’s so cool to know that was a big collaboration and that it did kind of evolve to what we see. 

Nicholas Maggio:

I would love to say it was all me and take the credit. But Tim Murphy’s just so great. And especially in the moment on the fly. It was really fun for them to do.

Rebecca Elliott:

Totally. You also have this incredible ensemble cast. So, you mentioned Kevin Dillon. Then you have Shiloh Fernandez and Stephen Dorff as well. And they are also executive producers, I believe, on the film? 

Nicholas Maggio:

I don’t know about all the dealings and the agents and managers and whatnot. It was a low-budget movie, whether you believe it or not. With that cast, it was incredibly low-budget. We stretched everything. So I think that was like, hey if you do this, we’ll also give you a producing credit.

Rebecca Elliott:

Part of the incentive. You get an EP credit. So it wasn’t like you were working intensely with them behind the camera and in front of the camera. 

Nicholas Maggio:

I would be open to it, I love all of them. And I got along with everyone very well. Luckily, we all respected each other. But no, with the schedule we had, an eleven-day principal photography schedule. Eleven days just weren’t enough time for filmmaking, in the traditional sense, if you will.

Rebecca Elliott:

Okay, that all makes sense. But I’m gasping at eleven days because you really do give your performers real room to breathe. And there’s some really lovely, and some very intense, exchanges and dialogue going on. Did you have to cut much of that or did you find a way to kind of fit it all in? 

Nicholas Maggio:

It’s a great question. Up until I had done the feature, filmmakers always talk about the three films, right? There’s the film they write or the film that’s written. The film that’s shot. Then there’s the film that’s delivered. And it’s always three different films. But I did not find that. I wrote this script and I shot every single page and every single line of dialogue. Every single scene. And at the end, I ended up cutting two very small half-page scenes. That’s it. The rest is in there. If you read the script, it’s almost verbatim. 

And so for me, my experience was that I made the film that I shot, which was the film that I wrote. Whether that’s a good thing or not, that’s just the way it turned out. So, there are a couple of scenes where we tweaked a couple of things in Post, in the edit. It just kind of made it flow a little bit better. 

We cut about half a page out of the Cadillac scene at the end for Shiloh. That was actually the very first scene that Shiloh shot. Sitting in the Cadillac with Stephen Dorff. Which was an epically, huge scene for them to start day one, morning one. We shot that. And so it was interesting how over the next eleven days or ten days, Shelby as a character kind of shifted slightly. So I ended up having to change that dial just a little bit to make it kind of land, but that’s really the only thing we changed.

Rebecca Elliott:

Wow, that’s pretty impressive, especially for your directorial debut.

Nicholas Maggio:

It was a lot.

Rebecca Elliott:

Yeah, but it works. I mean, you get it all in there and it’s beautiful because you kind of need that balance. And speaking of balance, with any sort of neo-noir, you’re going to have the violence aspect. But also noir isn’t always gratuitous, necessarily. You have to show some, but not all. How do you strike that balance between the more subtle sequences and other sequences where you go for it? Because you kind of have a less is more approach in some spots, but then obviously you have to show some stuff for impact.

Nicholas Maggio:

Yeah. Again, great insightful question. Or observation. I think that there are two parts to that. One is that I was reserved and I walked that line when I did let it go, usually with Clayton, whether it was an act of violence or it’s even a dialogue. I let him kind of go those extra 2 feet more. I think that those land ten times more because we hadn’t seen it already. 

And so it’s not necessarily that I get gratuitous. I think I just let it go slightly more than feels almost natural, in a way. To really punctuate that violence. It’s usually with violence and brutality. And it feels like so much more because we were restrained throughout the rest of it. So there’s that one aspect. And then the other aspect is Nick Matthews, my DP, who I think is an absolute genius. We’re both obsessed with natural, ambient light. So almost everything is lit with practicals or no light. I mean, we love finding the shots. I’ve worked with Nick a few times on commercials, some personal projects. So I knew that it was going to be pretty. I knew that we were going to have a pretty film. 

And so I told him that allowed me to be more brutal at times or more ugly. Or use handheld even more or get to push it in other elements or other aspects of the film when we might not be able to otherwise. Because I knew it was going to be pretty. And I knew we could push further and get away with more on the opposite side of the spectrum. So I think that’s the other part of it, too.

Rebecca Elliott:

Yeah, definitely. That was one of my notes. I was, like, so shiny. Because when I say shiny, I mean it has that little sparkle and visual intrigue that really catches your eye. Okay, I probably have time for one more question, and this is more of a fun one. You have drag racing in this movie, so you have all the drag cars. But you also have the Sheriff’s sweet Bronco. Old style, Bronco. Shelby drives a Charger, I think?  There’s even a souped-up Regal in this film. Plus, Trey’s Japanese street racer. Are you a gearhead? Tell me about getting to use all those cool cars!

Nicholas Maggio:

I love cars, so I wanted the cars. That was a huge part of this. It was actually the catalyst for writing it. Because I spent time in northern Alabama and spent some time with some friends with cars. So that was kind of the impetus for the story. But, yeah, I love cars. One of my favorite things is I poured over the cars and I obsessed over them because I wanted them to all be absolutely correct. He can’t drive a brand new Camaro or, like, a souped-up 69 Camaro that looks like a trailer queen. It’s a duster that he drives, and it’s the right one. And his drag car is the right Monte Carlo and just everything. 

I wanted the right cars. And so when we shot in Georgia, Transpo [transportation] was really great. Because I’d say, like, I need a ridiculous JDM. And they found me that Honda. Or I told them I want an 85, 86, 87 Buick. They found me that T-type and I swapped the rims to be from a Grand National so it looks like it was souped up a little bit more. So, yeah, it was a huge part of it.

I’m obsessed with it. It’s something that I think other car people will appreciate. But also, it just gives that touch of authenticity. I think people who even don’t know cars, if they see the wrong car, they might not know exactly why it’s wrong. But I think for this, we chose the right cars. I spent a lot of time getting the right cars and called in a lot of favors.

Rebecca Elliott:

I knew it! That’s awesome. After about the fifth one, I’m like, okay, this guy’s a car nerd or something, because there are tons of cool old-school cars. Well, it’s time to wrap it up. Thank you so much for chatting with me about Mob Land. Good luck with everything, and hopefully we’ll meet again on your next film. Take care. 

Nicholas Maggio:

Thanks so much. Bye!

Saban Films released Mob Land in theaters on August 4, 2023, and the film will be available digitally on August 25, 2023.

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