How do you find family, emotional depth and spirituality in a hitman thriller? Writer-director Bassam Tariq had to answer that question when making “Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother,” and a big part of the answer was to let his stacked cast take control of his screenplay and find things that he couldn’t on his own.
Tariq talked to TheWrap at Toronto International Film Festival about his feature, which follows a devout Muslim hitman named Latif (Mahershala Ali) coming to terms with the contradictions of his life after his children are threatened.
The filmmaker said that his collaboration reached another level when Esposito told him that there was “something missing” in the script that prevented the audience from fully understanding Latif’s relationships and the paradox of the life he has chosen. Tariq said that the conversations that came from Esposito’s suggestion led to what he believes are some of the most important scenes in his film.
“We did a whole read through of the script just to kind of understand what makes sense and what doesn’t. I was sometimes wanting things to have more action, more this, more that. But then they’re like, ‘Wait, where’s the heart?’” Tariq said. “They always kept me honest.”
Ali said that the balancing act of heart, action and pulp is partly what drew him to the role of Latif, as he reluctantly takes on one last hit job to kill Hwan Yoon (Cho), a Bible-thumping, grill-wearing Iraq War veteran turned cult-leading preacher who kills those he deems sinful.
“I had some real curiosity about how Bassam was going to stitch the worlds together, because there’s a world where Latif is a student with a mentor and I could understand what he was wanting from that relationship. But then there’s a responsibility that he has as a father, and beyond that, there’s this … porn element and a preacher with gold grills and a gun-toting Southern minister element,” Ali said.
Esposito was key to connecting those worlds playing Abdul, Latif’s father-in-law, who is mourning the loss of his daughter and Latif’s wife, Khadijah. Abdul does not approve of Latif continuing down his violent path while serving as a sole parent to his three children.
Esposito says that he sought to bring the most out of Latif and Abdul’s relationship with the few scenes he has in the film. The actor’s deep talks with Tariq helped him understand Abdul as a person who has been through Latif’s struggles.
“He’s speaking to Latif from a place of really knowing and having experienced that there is a time to put down the sword,” Esposito said. “That deepened all of my thoughts about who this man is.”
“Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother” will be released to theaters from Amazon MGM and Orion on Sept. 25.
