CLOSE TO THE FLAME `LADDER 49' CAST, CREW KEPT IT REAL.

Byline: Bob Strauss Film Writer

If you're going to make the first big movie about firefighters since the World Trade Center attacks, you're going to make it very, very carefully.

And not just because ``Ladder 49,'' starring Joaquin Phoenix and John Travolta, used real fire on set rather than the safe, computer-generated kind. Set in Baltimore and assisted every step of the way by members of that city's fabled fire department, ``Ladder'' also boasts an ensemble that went through fire academy training and clocked time in actual station houses.

But sensibility was as much on everyone's mind as physical safety, if not more so.

``We really wanted to do it right,'' says Travolta, who plays Mike Kennedy, a man married to his job as firehouse captain and, later, city fire chief. ``It was the first movie, really, about firefighters. Even though there had been 'Backdraft,' (it) was about arsonists. We didn't have a gimmick - it was just about us as firefighters.

``So we wanted to make sure, especially in light of 9/11, that we were doing a service to them, as opposed to an inaccurate picture. We wanted to hit it right emotionally, we wanted to hit it right technically, and we wanted to tell a story that reflected actual experiences that one might encounter in firefighting.''

``It was not only learning about the technical aspects of fighting fire but also just spending time with the firefighters,'' adds Phoenix, who as young family man Jack Morrison reflects on his life in the service while he lays injured in a burning building. ``They really welcomed us not only into their professional lives and their firehouses but into their homes with their families, which is an important part of the story as well.''

Through the glass, brightly

The result is a not-unexpected portrait of firefighters as everyday heroes, devoted husbands and fathers, fun-loving blue-collar jokers and, of course, can-do professionals. A few of the guys in the firehouse may have abrasive personalities, and they all enjoy their off-time at the Irish pub a lot. But none of the truly alarming behavior seen on, say, Denis Leary's cable TV show ``Rescue Me'' is much in evidence.

That was completely intentional.

``Of course, 'Rescue Me' is dealing more with the darker side of the personality,'' Travolta acknowledges. ``This is more about putting the best foot forward. Their intent is examined more than their personal off-moments. One's concentrating on aberrations, one's concentrating on the purpose and the clarity of what it is.''

``The focus for me was more about the conflict between what our lead character does for a living and how that affected his family,'' adds director Jay Russell (``My Dog Skip''). ``Whether someone takes out their stress in a pitch-dark way ... there may be stories about that. That just wasn't what I was interested in.''

That said, Russell, a longtime documentary filmmaker whose uncle is a 25-year-veteran firefighter, points out that realism, not blind glorification, was his goal. ``Ladder 49's'' screenplay, which is credited to Lewis Colick, was written before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks that brought down New York's twin towers - and snuffed out the lives of many members of the FDNY, along with thousands of others.

Not a 9/11 movie

When offered the project after 9/11, Russell insisted that any references to that particular tragedy had to go.

``The original script was set in New York,'' the director explains. ``I had lived in New York for 11 years. I would love to shoot a movie in New York. This wasn't gonna be the one. Then it's a movie about one day, obviously the defining moment in the New York City Fire Department's history. And the whole point of this movie is that, while it is absolutely a tribute to the firefighters on 9/11, it's also a tribute to the firefighters on 9/10 and 9/12 and 9/13. The world saw in an extreme the sacrifice and the bravery that they do every day.''

Changes to the script were ongoing even while the film was being shot. Russell says that that was to incorporate stories and observations gleaned from the Baltimore firefighters they worked with. In fact, Phoenix says that the inherently heroic situations Morrison and his colleagues keep finding themselves in permitted them to tone down the kind of rah-rah simplifications found in most big Hollywood action movies.

``9/11 certainly did influence us, but maybe not in the way you'd think,'' the young star of ``Gladiator'' and ``The Village'' says. ``I've always avoided hero characters, because they lack a sense of truth. But because of that, we were then able to explore some other parts of my character, show his conflicts, show where he's not perfect. In fact, we made changes in the script to make him less perfect. In the first draft, I saved everybody and was the best husband and best father. We really had to try to give it a sense of reality and show some imperfections.''

Feel the heat

Some might consider Phoenix's commitment to the project heroic. All the guys in the cast - Morris Chestnut, Robert Patrick, Balthazar Getty, Jay Hernandez and Billy Burke among them - as well as director Russell - spent time in the burning maze at actual firefighter training camp. But Phoenix took it to extremes. He actually graduated from the Baltimore Fire Academy, then spent a whole month living and working with the crew of Truck 10. He got so into it, he even had the unit's ``Busy Bee'' mascot tattooed on his left ankle.

``Now I don't know how to make movies any other way,'' Phoenix jokes. ``I'm gonna need two months' prep always.

``It just seemed like something we had to do in order to accurately portray the firefighters,'' Phoenix continues. ``In my research, I don't think anything adequately described what it was like to be in a fire, because it's almost indescribable. It just felt like something that we'd have to really experience firsthand.''

And Phoenix did. A heat blast chased him out of one of Baltimore's row- house units while he was working Truck 10's ceiling hook. Later, during filming, a loose ember set his jacket on fire (it was doused by real firefighters before the actor even noticed he was ablaze). And he faced his lifelong fear of heights for a rappelling rescue sequence.

``Firefighters will say, 'If you're not scared, get out of the job,' '' Phoenix notes. ``You have to have a level of fear and respect for fire and what you're doing in order to stay on your toes. You never really overcome that fear, but you learn to trust the equipment and trust the team. So when I was rappelling, my instructor told me that nothing was going to break and to look into his eyes. I stared into his f---ing soul!''

If Phoenix sounds a bit, well, modest about his accomplishments, that means that he really became a fireman. According to Travolta, anyway.

``This is a very humble group of guys,'' Travolta says. ``They don't really want to be looked at as heroes. They don't want the attention, and that's what makes them more worthy of having the attention. I think 9/11 showed the world what courage and selflessness they have, and due to that fact, we suddenly have an arena that has not been investigated before.''

Bob Strauss, [phone]

bob.strauss(at)dailynews.com

CAPTION(S):

3 photos

Photo:

(1 -- cover -- color) PLAYING WITH FIRE

Can movies like `Ladder 49' and TV's `Rescue Me' show us the real lives of firefighters?

(2) To prepare for his role as a Baltimore firefighter in ``Ladder 49,'' Joaquin Phoenix actually graduated from that city's Fire Academy and spent a month working with a real crew.

(3) ``We wanted to make sure, especially in light of 9/11, that we were doing a service to (firefighters),'' says John Travolta.