Interview: Clint Bentley and Joel Edgerton on Creating a Portrait of a Life Full of Humanity with ‘Train Dreams’
From the moment it premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, Train Dreams has been the little engine that blossoms into something unique and universal once the credits roll. Following the life of Robert Grainer, a railroad worker in the Pacific Northwest at the turn of the 20th century, we see a man come to terms with the life he’s been given, the love he’s loss, the solitude that comes with his profession, and the realization of his place in a world that’s larger than himself. At the helm of this mighty project are two of the most genuine individuals I’ve spoken with in a long time; writer-director Clint Bentley and actor Joel Edgerton, who is responsible for bringing Robert to life with his magnificent performance.
Bentley, from Dallas, Texas, has become one of the most promising directors to emerge from this decade, working alongside his writing partner, fellow filmmaker Greg Kwedar. The pair have written four films over the last nine years, not to mention plenty of short films before making the jump to features. They were a part of each other’s debut films, Transpecos for Kwedar and Jockey for Bentley, and were both part of the team nominated for an Academy Award for their work on Greg’s second feature film from last year, Sing Sing. As the team reunited to craft the script for Train Dreams, Edgerton came onto the project, and the veteran Australian actor known for his roles in Animal Kingdom, Warrior, Zero Dark Thirty, Loving, brought his experience as a director from films like The Gift, Boy Erased, to the project, and this rich partnership was formed. With Train Dreams, Bentley and Edgerton bonded over the idea of recently becoming father and how that allowed them to relate to Robert’s sorrowful journey within the film. The film also became a personal experience for Bentley, as during the preparation for the film, he lost both of his parents. Taking all of this in, the love of being a parent and the grief of losing the people you hold closest to you, Bentley and Edgerton created one of the most tender, beautiful pieces of cinema this year.
In his review from the Toronto International Film Festival from earlier this year, J Don Birnam wrote that Train Dreams “will linger in your mind and soul,” with Edgerton delivering a “gentle performance,” one that ranks as some of the best work of his career. Last week, the film was nominated for two Gotham Awards, Best Feature and Best Adapted Screenplay.
In my recent conversation with Bentley and Edgerton, we talked about the process of adapting Denis Johnson’s novel and making it cinematic, their collaboration process, how the natural elements of shooting on location might’ve changed the final cut of the film. We also spoke about relating to Robert’s life, how one finds the ability to move on from a tragedy, and how no life, no matter how small, is uninteresting, and thus, makes all of our lives a story to tell.
Ryan McQuade: Clint, I’ll start with you. Obviously this is based on this great novel. How did you find the novel, who gave it to you, and the evolution of creating the project and starting it from the ground up? Was it around the time of Jockey or was it post that time?
CB: It was right after it. I had been a big fan of this novella for a long time and a big fan of Dennis Johnson’s, but I had never thought about making this into a movie, this one. And then Jockey went to Sundance 2021. There were some producers, Marissa McMahon, Ashley Schlaifer, and Will Janowitz. They had the rights to this book and had been trying to make it for a long time. And he had actually got gifted the book many years earlier, had read it, loved it, inquired about those rights to see if he could make it, and it was taken by these producers, coincidentally enough.
But they reached out after Jockey and they were just like, “We’ve been trying to make this for a long time, would you be interested in it?” And I went back and I was like, “I don’t know, honestly.” Because in my memory it felt like one of those, the sound and the fury or something like that. One of those novels or novellas that you’re like, “I shouldn’t touch this. It’s good in its form.” And then I went back and read it and it just felt like it was right for a cinematic adaptation and it felt like it needed to be something very different, which it ends up being. But I just got super excited about it, and then began the long journey of writing it with Greg and trying to figure it out.
RM: And for yourself Joel, I read that you had at one time almost the rights to do this film, so it feels meant to be that you are doing it now. But when you got the script and talked to Clint about the project, what drew you not only to Robert’s story in the way he told it, but also wanting to work with Clint on the journey?
JD: Well, it felt like an amazing, unusual coincidence that Clint had reached out. I remember thinking when I had inquired after the rights, someone had done it on my behalf, so I was like, “Did they know that I had asked about it,” which they wouldn’t have. Then I started to realize that maybe for the same reasons I saw the suitability for myself as this character in the story, that Clint probably did as well. And I was very happy when I heard that he was doing it and wanted to talk about it. And then I was like, “Wow, how did he crack the adaptation?” Because like he said, it’s not an easy, straightforward adaptation.
And I watched Jockey and it felt like the big three things that happen when you want to get involved in a film, which are very rare for all three of them to line up, which is a good script, a really good director, and then a character that works with you inside of it, that I got very excited when we met. And then the fourth thing that I always want to happen is that you get along with the person that’s going to make it and you get excited about the relationship that you could have together. But also, more than anything, I felt like as I was moving towards it, I’d become a father since I’d read the novella at first. Clint, his eldest, is the same age as my kids. My kids were one and a half at the time we met about doing the film.
I’m a husband and I’m in love and all these things that Robert goes through, plus the fears I have around losing the things that I really cherish meant that this was going to be a very personal thing that was closer to me than my usual attempts at hiding behind character in other movies, which I love as a thing to do. I’m always looking to do something wacky or wild or interesting, but it seems like part of that pursuit is hiding who I really am. I’m not really that fascinating to put on screen myself. But I was like, “Wow, this is probably going to be the most personal thing I could do, is to not hide behind things and just give myself to Clint and give myself to the character. It felt like maybe it reset the dial for me for the future as well, the kinds of things that I’m willing to do and not hide from.
RM: Clint, when you’re working with Greg, you have this strong collaboration, both of you being filmmakers and everything. And when you’re working with Joel, he’s also not just an actor, but he has an excellent visual sense as a director as well too. Is that a tool that you guys get to bounce off in this collaboration with a little bit and in framing Robert’s story? Does that make it a little easier from a technical aspect of making this film, that he knows the language of what it takes to direct a film?
CB: Yeah. No, it’s amazing in two ways. One is that he knows what it’s like to go through it and knows how difficult it is because he’s done it, directing a film. And so there were so many times where he just gave bits of encouragement along the way that really kept me going, or could see, as a director, when you’re panicking inside, you’re trying to just be like, “Yeah, we’re going to be fine. No, yeah, take your time. It’s okay. Yeah, go get that thing. You forgot at face camp. It’s all right. We’re going to be fine.” And then you’re dying inside and you’re thinking about, “Oh no, what am I going to cut from the scene? How are we going to get this done?” And so him being able to recognize that and just give encouragement along the way was huge.
This was a big step up for me and I’m working with somebody who’s very experienced, has done a lot of these things. That kindness went a long way. And then the other thing was, you inevitably as a director get into jams, and sometimes big ones, sometimes small ones, but sometimes they’re just as little as where you’re like, “I don’t know what to do with this. I don’t know where to…” Adolfo and I were racking our brains over how we get into this. Now you’re three weeks into filming the movie and you’ve done a certain type of scene the same way a few times and you’re like, “We got to mix this up or it’s going to get boring.” I remember one time in particular, and this is where it’s good to have his brains as a director as well. One time in particular, we just had him chopping so many things. He had just been chopping. We’re like, “All right, we’ve seen this so many different ways.”
JE: Chopped a squirrel. Good idea.
CB: And we were like, we need to do… It was the moment where the wind changed and he gets sick. It’s cold all of a sudden and it’s showing him getting on in the years and he’s not the young guy that he used to be. And I’m like, “What do we do?” And he’s like, “I saw a guy the other day, one of the construction guys, was up on the cabin fixing the shingles and repairing the roof, and maybe I could get up and do that.” And we’re like, “Yeah, great. Perfect. I can’t recommend that, but yes, $100. You can suggest that.” And then we got them up on the roof and it’s a beautiful shot and it gives some… So it’s a small thing, but it’s just like, those little things along the way were huge.
RM: Joel, I’ve read where you’ve said that every single person is interesting and every single story is worth telling, no matter how ordinary the man or the woman are. And within telling a story of this man who’s quietly working with his hands and working in isolation in the woods, you find this beauty and that’s where the poetry of the film comes from. So I’m curious also about the fact of that premise Because I know that you want to say, Joel, that your life’s not interesting, but I’m sure if we picked it apart-
CB: There’s something there.
RM: There’s something there, right? Because it is for everybody.
JE: I think it’s something I really understood from my parents, and even now that I’m father, I look at my mom and I go, “Wow, this woman has a power and a nobility and a courage that never gave her credit for.” She raised two kids on her own, more than 10, 12 hours a day, she was looking… My dad was around but he was studying business. In a very isolated rural environment, my brother and I were raised and dealt with the madness of two young boys.
CB: You guys are just being very chill.
JE: Beating the shit out of each other. But with those guys, I remember sitting, watching this TV show was this guy on ABC in Australia and he would go out in the street and he would interview just regular people in the street. And it was a very popular show. And if you imagine him pitching it to the network, any network, and they’d be like, “Eh, no thanks.” Because what he would do is he’d just pull someone up on the street and say, “Hey, do you have a second? What do you do for a living?” And he just started asking them questions and in a half-hour section, he would pull out the most fascinating stuff.
And there are people who would pass you by that would fit into the cardboard category of life. And I went through certain experiences in my mid-twenties where it really, really threw up in the air any sense of judgment and taught me a lot about empathy. I don’t even know where it comes from, but I’ll get in a cab or an Uber or mean old person or whatever, if you do ask the right questions, you’re going to get a noble story or a dangerous story or something really fucking black comedy twisted. Something fascinating. And I think that to disregard anyone or to underestimate anyone is a crime.
RM: Joel, within the physicality of the role, I know that you had previously done brick laying for Loving, but this is an entirely different physical element working in literally the elements. So for the two of you, was there something for yourself in the research of doing it and then in the physicality of doing it, that you didn’t expect?
And then Clint, when you’re filming all of this out there, it’s one thing to have it on a page, it’s another thing for you and Adolfo (Veloso) to actually go out there in the elements and do it. Did the film change from what you wanted it to be because of the natural elements?
JE: Well, the obvious thing was to go there and pick up the tools and make sure that I looked right and just do the things I needed to do, chopping wood and saws and whatever. I wasn’t so worried about that. But then you learn things by doing it. For example, I learned the importance of conservation of energy. And it became a thing that was very much a thing for me with Robert is that when you work so hard, when you stop working, you want to rest. And so there’s a certain calm conservation of energy in a walk that comes from a hardworking person. But most importantly it was like, how does emotional experience and the physical labor shape a body or shape an aura or a personality? How do the experiences of life, emotional or physical, bear down on a person? And so really interested in how to play Robert as an old man and imagining how his spine felt inside of his body or locked up and tight muscles.
RM: How slow he might walk and get out of the bed.
JE: Yeah. And why when we’re in that urban setting is his whole body tone when he needs to look at things. It’s like that old people used to stop and look at shop windows a lot and flowers a lot. But it’s that conservation of energy too with age. So I love the physical aspects of work, particularly when the frame is wide and you can’t just be working from your mind and your eyes. It has the whole body work for that character.
CB: As for Adolfo and myself, the approach that we had started exploring on Jockey that we wanted to bring into here is not trying to bend the will of the world and the elements to what we’re trying to do, but bend ourselves into that. And obviously there are things you have to consider and think about and all that. But you don’t want it to be like, well, I wrote this as a sunny day a year ago when I was writing this script and it needs to be a sunny day. We can’t do it if it’s not. And so just really bending ourselves to, okay, is it raining today? Okay, is it cloudy and we hoped it would be sunny, or vice versa. And finding ways within that to, I think, be open to the process. And rather than saying, this is a problem, it’s supposed to be sunny and it’s cloudy, what are we going to do, looking at whatever the world is giving you and asking, okay, how can we use this and how can this be something that we can exploit and make it more interesting than not.
RM: This movie showcases many layers of Robert’s life. It’s a full life. The first one is the love for his family, and a lot of that includes working with Felicity [Jones] and creating that chemistry. Could you both talk a little bit about creating the first third of this film with her and building that foundational family. Because then once the tragedy does happen, we have to believe that, and that’s from her work with the both of you.
CB: I’ll say first, chronologically working with her, she got the script and really loved it and we had a long conversation about it and clearly, she understood what the script was going for. And yet also we both recognized that the character needed some work. And the character had been expanded. I think she’s maybe got a couple scenes in the book and she had been expanded from that, but she wasn’t as well-built out until Felicity came on. And we really worked together to build that character out a bit more and build out her moments as an individual.
Because the reality would be she’s keeping this farm going and keeping this life going while he’s going and having his life and they’re having separate lives that are running parallel and then they come back together and then they go apart. And so just seeing the evidence of that when he comes back home and we see it from his perspective. And then I’ll let him speak to whatever. But it was very easy putting them together. What I hoped for with the relationship was that it’s this really beautiful marriage of two people and marriage of two souls, without being treacly and without seeming like a fairy tale. Also showing that, yeah, they argue sometimes and they don’t always see eye to eye, and like any real marriage, that yeah, we’re sometimes pissed at each other, but we deeply appreciate and love each other.
JE: Yeah, that’s what I was going to speak to, is that it’s not just one thread of a relationship, the full fabric of it. That you identify with it perhaps, hopefully more because it has the other threads of conflict and domestic practical life. It lacks glamour and yet there is something romantic. But there’s tenderness in the hellos and goodbyes. And the shared concerns around parenthood and future and economics woven into that short space of the chunk of the film, we’re invested I think because we can see hopefully our own relationships or marriage in some of us that are dealing with being in a marriage, that are in a relationship with another human being where you do have to share duties, but you also get to be deeply intimate and care for each other.
And Felicity, I remember those early conversations is pushing also the being insistent on for the right reasons of finding the capability, determination, strength, and durability of Gladys, knowing that while Robert’s off making his stack of cash chopping down wood, she’s pulling food out of the land, probably skinning deer and protecting a child on her own, so making her a capable woman.
RM: The film is also deeply about the resilience of someone grieving and also the world around them growing. You talked about the ending earlier, how his life seems small in comparison to these giant structures in the modern world. But he has the scenes with Carrie where in a typical film you would think, “Oh, well this is the second chance,” but he doesn’t allow himself that because he’s deeply grieving. And could you talk about the resilience of Robert you can both relate to, and that within the final shot of the film, his acceptance of the life he’s lived?
CB: Quickly because I know we’ve only got a second, but I think that was what drew me to it early on in looking at it as a movie. There were all the cinematic things of going this way in that way, all the things that would be exciting to film. But the big thing was I had lost some folks. We’d all gone through COVID, I’d lost some folks very dear to me and was struggling with that, okay, well how do you go on with that feeling that is articulated in the movie where it’s like, sometimes I’m just bowled over by the grief and then sometimes it feels like it happened to somebody else and sometimes I don’t even think about them, which is a sad thing. And so trying to show that long tail of grief and how it was really inspiring to think about this guy is dealing with it, but also just putting one foot in front of the other and all right, I got to do something to just move forward.
And then that ending moment really being difficult to find, how do you wrap up this movie in a way that’s emotionally cathartic for an audience. And we probably cut 35 different endings for this film trying to find that. And really it came down to, in concert with getting notes back from the audience that I realized what I want to show in that moment is not an answer. He doesn’t understand everything. He doesn’t have a particular like, oh, this is the one sentence that makes it all make sense. But that feeling that we all have sometimes, when you’re sitting in the kitchen and the light’s coming through the window just the right way and you hear kids in the other room playing. Or you’re sitting at a coffee shop and you hear the birds in the right way. Whatever those moments are where everything clicks into place and all the gears seem to be turning the right way and you’re just at peace and you’re like, “Oh, it’s really lovely to be here. Here in the world.” And that’s what I wanted to get across.
JE: Yeah, I agree with everything Clint says about that. I think that the worst you’re ever going to feel about an event, the loss of a relationship or the loss of a human being, the acute nature of that pain in the early phase is so intense. And the solace that we know that…. And I’ve said this before. Years ago, I remember writing this down, I think that life and the world swallow events up, meaning not just that we forget about them, but the pain diminishes. And what we’re left with is actually hopefully only the memory of something special, the memory of the special person.
The reason you’re feeling so much pain is because you felt something really special and good for that person. So Robert’s endurance and durability and resilience, which also speaks to people on the land and having their fucking homes ripped away by a natural event, but the world keeps turning. We do have to put one foot in front of another unless we fully tap out of life. And there is something left for us. And I think the film’s really hopeful in that sense that life is worth it. And we’re going to get knocked on our ass but I think life is very special. But you’ve got to choose to keep moving.
CB: For sure.
RM: Thank you guys for your time.
JE: Thanks man.
CB: Thanks. We could talk to you all day.
Train Dreams will be in select theaters on November 7 and on Netflix November 21.
- Ethan Hawke on How It Was the Right Time To Make ‘Blue Moon’ with Director Richard Linklater [VIDEO INTERVIEW] - December 2, 2025
- Jeremy Allen White on the Responsibility and Hard Work Needed to Transform into The Boss in ‘Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere’ [VIDEO INTERVIEW] - December 1, 2025
- AwardsWatch Podcast Ep. 317 – Oscars Retrospective of the 68th Academy Awards - December 1, 2025
‘Frankenstein’ to Receive Visionary Honor from Palm Springs International Film Awards 
Robert Yeoman to be Honored with American Society of Cinematographers’ Lifetime Achievement Award 
National Board of Review: ‘One Battle After Another’ Tops in Film, Director, Actor, Supporting Actor; Netflix Lands Four in Top 10 
41st Spirit Awards Nominations: ‘Peter Hujar’s Day,’ ‘Lurker,’ ‘Train Dreams’ Lead