Summary

Woody Harrelson, Simu Liu, and Finn Cole play a trio of deep-sea divers in a perilous situation in this drama based on a true story.

The three talk about the real-life danger they encountered when filming the project.

The trio discusses their excellent onscreen chemistry and the friendship that formed on set.

I’m of the mindset that humans have no business exploring the ocean or outer space. (It is simply none of my business what’s down or up there!) I am, however, grateful that not everyone shares my opinion for the sake of scientific advancement and the well-being of humanity. Take, for example, the deep-sea divers featured in Last Breath, who submerge themselves hundreds of feet below sea level in order to repair a pipe. Sound like a dangerous job? It is. And the film explores just how dangerous it can actually be.
Based on a true story and directed by Alex Parkinson (who also co-directed the documentary version of the tale alongside Richard da Costa), the film centers on Chris Lemons (Finn Cole), a diver who finds himself living a nightmare when the umbilical cable tethering him to the ship snaps, leaving him without light, heat, or oxygen. His teammates — focused and no-nonsense David (Simu Liu) and joke-cracking veteran Duncan (Woody Harrelson) — are forced to race against the clock to rescue him before it’s too late. The story itself is naturally thrilling and suspenseful, but what sets the film apart is the dynamic between the three main characters. Cole, Liu, and Harrelson have a fun, easy chemistry that elevates this survival thriller.
Collider got the chance to speak to the trio about their on- and offscreen friendship, as well as some scary days on set and the most interesting things they learned about this dangerous job that’s so rarely depicted in the media.
Woody Harrelson, Simu Liu, and Finn Cole Recall Dangerous Days on the ‘Last Breath’ Set

Congratulations on this movie. I found it really inspiring and rather horrifying at times. A large percentage of this film takes place underwater, obviously, which I’m assuming lends itself to some rather unique filming experiences. What’s the most unexpected challenge that you encountered when shooting this film?
SIMU LIU: I was definitely running out of air. We wanted the sequences to be practical, so we shot in this tank in Malta. We used — we got the helmet right there [points to helmet] — the real sat helmet that saturation divers use connected to the umbilical that connected to the surface, though which all of our gas and everything was fed. We really wanted that to be true to life, and I think we managed to do it for the most part, but part of the consequence of that is stuff goes wrong, especially because human beings aren’t meant to survive that deep in the water. I think, on multiple occasions, when Finn and I were underwater kind of prepping to shoot, we just feel our air go out. It’s one of the first things that you learn in scuba diving — is how to deal with your oxygen all of the sudden stopping — so we knew it was happening, but I think it’s one of those things where you go home at the end of the day and you’re like, “Did I almost drown?”
WOODY HARRELSON: Remember that time? You had to get that helmet off.
FINN COLE: Oh, yeah — that was scary.
HARRELSON: I haven’t been stressed like that in a long time. Oh my god.
LIU: I’ve repressed that one from my memory. You just unlocked it. [Laughs] Nice. I’d forgotten about that. I’d moved on — now I’m right back in.
HARRELSON: [Laughs] I wanted to bring that back for you. That little moment. Yeah, that was intense. I mean, you’re going underwater. There is a breath issue if you run out of oxygen, which not everybody’s had that experience underwater. I had it one time, but that was not in this context.
LIU: Oh, man. Deeper story.
HARRELSON: Yeah, I’ll tell you about it later.
COLE: Yeah, when you run out of air, it goes. It disappears. It’s like you’re sucking on like a Coke bottle or something — it’s just gone. It happens immediately, and we had a couple of occasions where Simu and I would look at each other, and we’d be like, “Are you struggling? Are you, like, unable to breathe right now?” And then, obviously, training kicks in, and you get the backup air, and it’s all fine.
And there was another time when I must have bumped my tank — we wear backup tanks on the back for that exact moment — but there was another time where I must have bumped it on something underwater while shooting a scene.
LIU: Oh, when it just started shooting out?
COLE: I just remember him looking at me — and Simu was very, very calm in these situations and a great scene partner — but he kind of looked at me and was pointing behind me, and I kept turning around, but as I turned around, I wouldn’t see anything because it was like coming out of the back of my head. He was like, “Yeah, that doesn’t look good.” And then we actually ended the dive right there. Things can go wrong, but thankfully, we had really good training from the guys and we were prepared for almost anything, but it’s spooky. It’s very, very unusual. You realize actually like how dangerous it can be when something goes slightly wrong.
Woody Harrelson, Simu Liu, and Finn Cole Reveal the Most Interesting Things They Learned About Deep-Sea Diving While Filming ‘Last Breath’

Image via Focus Features

Yeah, absolutely. It feels like a very physically demanding role, of course, but I imagine it was also rather intellectually challenging because there is a lot to this job, and they sort of speak another language in a way. I’m curious, what’s the most interesting thing that you learned about deep sea diving through filming this?
LIU: I think it was everything around sat chambers and why sat chambers are necessary and the whole science of compression and decompression — the way the gasses in your body behave when they’re compressed in a certain way. That’s why, when our divers go to sat, they go in there for four weeks at a time, and then, when it’s time to get decompressed, it doesn’t happen instantaneously. It happens very, very slowly over the course of four days. There is just so much science behind it, and Alex, again, I thought did a wonderful job communicating that in a movie that ultimately people go to watch because of characters. But in order for you to even understand and appreciate the journey, there’s so much surrounding requisite science that you have to kind of wrap your head around.
HARRELSON: It’s a wild thought to imagine when they were first starting out and they didn’t know exactly, “Okay, you’re gonna need this much helium or this much nitrogen.” It’s wild that it took a while before they developed the proper combination of elements for the sat chamber.
LIU: It’s wild to think of the consequences of getting it wrong, too. How would you possibly have known? It was probably a trial-by-error sort of situation. [Beat] Not to bring the energy down. What am I doing? [Covers face] I’m always bringing the energy down.
HARRELSON: I mean, always morbid. [Looks at Cole] Now you’ve got to do something to lift it up.
COLE: All my serotonin’s gone.
HARRELSON: I was in the best mood.
LIU: I’m so sorry.
Woody Harrelson, Simu Liu, and Finn Cole Discuss Their Onscreen Chemistry and Real-Life Friendship

Image via Focus Features

I love that you mentioned the characters because the characters are so strong in this, and I feel like you can even just see through this interview that you have such a great chemistry with each other that I feel is very necessary for a movie like this to work. How did the three of you develop that onscreen dynamic?
HARRELSON: It was really necessary. These guys, I tell you, it was—
LIU: Tough.
HARRELSON: [Laughs] What could have been a really difficult shoot just because of the tight space was fun. By the end of the day, you were disappointed when they said, “That’s a wrap.” It’s like, “Come on, man — I’m having such fun with these guys.” That was really important for this project, and I personally feel lucky because I got saddled with some pretty cool scene partners.
COLE: To the extent that we would be stuck in a bell for however many hours of the day — just taking the mickey out of each other the whole day — and then we’d leave, and we’d go and play paddle or we’d go for dinner, and we were pretty much with each other the whole time. Apart from when we were sleeping, we were hanging out the whole time. That’s like credit to how easy it is to just slot in. Even today, we haven’t seen each other in months, and it’s kind of straight back to being in those claustrophobic environments. But yeah, I couldn’t have done it with two bad people.
LIU: I would say, one exception — which I don’t know if you noticed [looks at Cole] — is that any time we invited Woody to go underwater with us, he would be strangely absent. He would always be busy with something.
COLE: Oh yeah, he was busy. [Laughs] Now that you say it, yeah. Strange.
LIU: He loved hanging out with us, and then we’re like, “Come down with us,” and you’d be like, “Uhh, what?”
HARRELSON: [Laughs] I like it above the water. I don’t know about under the water. Good point. Good point. I didn’t realize how much that hurt.
Last Breath is now in theaters.

Last Breath

Release Date

February 27, 2025

Runtime

93 minutes

Director

Alex Parkinson

Writers

Alex Parkinson, David Brooks, Mitchell LaFortune

Producers

Jared Underwood, Alastair Burlingham, Danny Mandel, Jeremy Plager, Anna Mohr-Pietsch, Gary Raskin, Stewart Le Marechal, Richard Da Costa, Andrew C. Robinson, Jonny Persey, David Brooks, Al Morrow, Dan Clifton, Hal Sadoff, Paul Brooks, Norman Golightly

Cast

Woody Harrelson

Duncan Allcock

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