Alec Baldwin’s ‘Rust,’ marked by tragedy, holds premiere in Poland
- The San Juan Daily Star
- Nov 22, 2024
- 4 min read
By Alex Marshall and Julia Jacobs
It was just more than three years ago that Alec Baldwin was practicing drawing a gun on the set of the western “Rust” in New Mexico when it went off, firing a live round that killed its cinematographer, Halyna Hutchins, and wounded its director, Joel Souza.
The shooting resulted in criminal cases, lawsuits and a reassessment of the use of real guns in Hollywood. In the midst of it all the movie was completed in Montana, with a new cinematographer and only fake weapons allowed on the set, by a team that said it wanted to ensure that Hutchins’ final work reached the screen.
On Wednesday, the 133-minute film had its world premiere at a small if starry film festival in Torun, Poland, called Camerimage, which is devoted to the art of cinematography.
The decision to complete and premiere “Rust” has drawn criticism from inside and outside the industry, and the premiere was accompanied by an undercurrent of controversy. The day before the screening, Hutchins’ parents and sister released a statement through a lawyer expressing dissatisfaction with the decision to go ahead with the premiere, and several attendees in the festival’s official messaging chat encouraged others to boycott it.
But as the premiere began, the theater was about three-quarters full, and the screening began with a moment of silence for Hutchins.
“It is not easy to keep Halyna centered in the whole story,” said Rachel Mason, a filmmaker and friend of Hutchins’, before the movie began.
Here’s what to know about the event.
Was Alec Baldwin there?
Though Baldwin stars in the film, as a grizzled outlaw named Harland Rust, he was not in the audience Wednesday.
The film’s main spokespeople at the festival were its director, Souza, who was injured in the shooting when the bullet passed through Hutchins and lodged in his shoulder, and Bianca Cline, the cinematographer who completed it.
Souza and Cline completed the project after Hutchins’ widower, Matthew Hutchins, gave it his blessing and stepped in as an executive producer.
Souza said in an interview after the screening that he was relieved to finally show the movie and proud to show Hutchins’ work. “I want people to learn a little more about her beyond what happened to her,” he said.
How did the event address the tragedy?
In a Q&A directly after the screening, Souza explained that for months after the fatal shooting, he could not have conceived of returning to finish the film. But eventually, he said, it became his mission to salvage as much of Hutchins’ work as he could and to honor her final project.
Cline described stepping in with the intention of emulating Hutchins’ style as much as possible, studying Hutchins’ personal notes about the movie and speaking with her crew to figure out how to style each shot.
“Halyna and Bianca danced a duet together,” Souza said of the two cinematographers, “and they really danced it beautifully.”
In the film, the odd parallel between the plot and the real-life tragedy is immediately apparent when one of the central characters, an orphaned 13-year-old boy (Patrick Scott McDermott), accidentally shoots a rancher. The boy’s grandfather, played by a gun-toting Baldwin, breaks the teenager out of custody and then tries to lead him to safety.
“I think it’s really hard to separate what happened as you watch the film, especially with all the weapons,” said Samuel Romero, a cinematographer who attended the screening. “But more than that, it’s the story itself: It’s about an orphan caught in a myriad of tragedies and you can’t help but think of Halyna’s son.”
How did the shooting happen?
The shooting took place Oct. 21, 2021, on a ranch outside of Santa Fe, in a set built to look like a 19th century western church, where the script called for Baldwin’s character to be cornered by lawmen.
Baldwin was told on the day of the shooting that the gun he was given was “cold,” meaning that it should not have been capable of firing or wounding anyone. But as they set up for a close-up of Baldwin drawing an old-fashioned revolver, the gun fired a live bullet.
The realization that live rounds had made it onto the film set was shocking. Real ammunition was banned on the set — as is typical in Hollywood — and the armorer was supposed to load the gun with only dummy rounds, which are inert and built to resemble real rounds for the camera. Five more live rounds were later found on the set.
Who was held criminally responsible?
The film’s armorer, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, was convicted of involuntary manslaughter and is serving an 18-month prison sentence. Dave Halls, the movie’s first assistant director, who was in charge of safety on set, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor, avoiding prison time.
Baldwin had several reversals of fortune. He was charged with involuntary manslaughter in early 2023, but the charges were dropped a few months later so prosecutors could consider new evidence. He was charged again in early 2024 and went to trial over the summer. After a series of dramatic episodes in the courtroom, the judge dismissed the case against him, ruling that the state had withheld evidence that could have shed light on how live rounds got onto the set.
Why was the movie completed?
After the death of Hutchins, a 42-year-old up-and-coming cinematographer from Ukraine, her husband and son sued the production and Baldwin, saying that the production’s lax safety protocols had led to her death.
As part of a settlement agreement, Matthew Hutchins stepped in as an executive producer. He and his son will financially benefit from the movie’s release, but its theatrical distribution partner has yet to be announced.
At the time of the settlement, he said in a statement, “I am grateful that the producers and the entertainment community have come together to pay tribute to Halyna’s final work.”
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