'The Mosquito Bowl'; Gino at the Movies

Well, this looks very powerful. The strength, the brotherhood, and the cost of war. The Mosquito Bowl is based on the true story of four college football stars who enlisted in the Marines in the aftermath of Pearl Harbor. Yeah, it seems pretty riveting there. You can see it right now in theaters and on Netflix later this month. Gino, a lot to unpack here. You spoke with the director. What was it like bringing this to life? Well, when you're Peter Berg, you're used to doing big things. But boy, it's like a military operation. So when you're approaching this, There is so much to attend to. How do you do it all? Wow. A lot of childhood trauma that I focus into work ethic. Thanks, Mom. It worked. We weren't. I mean, it's kind of true, though. Like, it's not so much trauma, but, I mean, I think a lot of us directors have issues. Thank I have, you know, ADD and probably a little dyslexia. And I have a lot of fire chi, as the Chinese call it, fire chi, like a fire burning inside of me. And a long time ago, I found writing, you. and I started just sitting down and writing, and I was never trained to write, not that smart, you. average intelligence, but a lot of fire chi, a lot of internal combustion. And when I found writing, suddenly, It was a way to focus all these kind of forces that were swirling in me. And that then, I wrote something and someone bought it. And that was so bizarre to get paid to do this. It felt like I was saving my life by doing this. And then to get someone to finance it, Very Bad Things, my first movie. I'm talking about Very Bad Things, actually. actually. And. Suddenly, I'm on a film set, and the fire is still in there, and I was able to direct it into writing, my mind was able to go there, and then I'm on a film set, and I found that there was a lot to do, but the tempo of the work was fitting to me, and then... The movie worked, you know, and then I did it again, and I did it again, and I did it a couple more times, and the movies maybe got a little bit bigger, but it's still the lessons I learned, and the fire now, I don't maybe work with the same fire, like it's still there, but I can let that go a little bit, and I now sort of know how to do it without having my fists clenched so much. Yeah, I will tell you, though, this is a military operation, and he is the commander. In fact, he plays the commander in the film. He was an actor before that, and everybody would go to do whatever they needed to do for Peter Berg. I look at the actors. I look at the crew. People will go through fire for you. You are loyal to them, and they are loyal to you. I don't see that often. Yeah. I mean, filmmaking is such a collaborative experience that you just cannot do it alone. You'll fail every time. I'm So you have to trust people and you have to form relationships. And, you know, like any relationship, It takes time and there has to be, it has to be tested and there has to be victories and failures and, and fights and forgive, forgivenesses and all that stuff. And I've had that with so many of the people, these are my family, you know, and, um, my brothers and sisters. And so I've got them and I can't, you can't, you can't get rid of your brothers and sisters. They can't get rid of me. I can't get rid of them. There were so many in my crew. And some actors that I've worked with a lot, like Mark Wahlberg, who's a brother to me, we're family, and I will work with them forever. We'll talk to the young stars, four of the most successful young actors today, and they were so much fun to talk. You'll see that tomorrow. Oh, man, he seems like a great person to work with. Very smart. People are loyal to him. We're going to have great people to work with. Yeah. It's your 21st birthday today. Oh, you're too kind. Yeah. We're not going to sing to you like Haley did, but I'll tell you what. I hear music. Yeah, it's the applause from all of Milwaukee right now cheering you on for your birthday. Well, thank you very much. Have a good one. Yeah All right, still ahead. Well, there's something for everyone on the event calendar in the historic third ward. We're getting a peek at what's coming up in November. I remember.