Less than two weeks ago, billiards movie enthusiasts, such as myself, started geeking out, agog over the announcement that Rutger Hauer was going to star in the upcoming snooker film Break. Mr. Hauer had been cast to play an old-time gangster, but for fans of his oeuvre, and especially those who still memorialize him as Roy Batty from Blade Runner, the specifics of the role in Break were irrelevant. It was simply the fact that he would be returning to the silver screen – and in a billiards movie, no less.  Because let’s face it, the recent entrants into the billiards movie genre (e.g., 9-Ball, Massé, HeartBreak) have not exactly been overflowing with megawatt stars.

According to a recent article in Variety, Break is about Spencer Pryde (played by Sam Gittins), a talented kid snooker player from a rough neighborhood who is dragged into crime. A chance encounter with a Chinese billiards champion (presumably played by China’s currently number two ranked snooker player Liang Wenbo) gives Spencer a chance to turn his life around and escape his tough surroundings. Like many other billiards films (e.g., The Color of Money, Kiss Shot, The Baron and the Kid), the movie ends with a climactic billiards match, in this case, the World Snooker Championship filmed at Sheffield’s Crucible Theatre, the true home to professional snooker.

While Mr. Hauer’s casting is news, there has been buzz about Break for years.  In January, 2016, I had the opportunity to interview director and writer Michael Elkin about his forthcoming movie, which at that time, was quite early in its conception.  (Production is now underway with filming scheduled to occur in Beijing and London.)

Mr. Elkin shared with me his reasons for making Break:

I grew up on a council estate in West Norwood, South London and…we had several snooker halls in neighboring areas, such as Brixton, Crystal Palace and Tulse Hill. As a kid, I would often skip school and spend the day in one of them with a pal.

I am now 43 years old and sadly [those] snooker halls are all gone. Many were closed after complaints from local residents about late night drinking, drug dealing, fights and in Norwood’s case, a fatal shooting.

I first started writing Break in January of 2010 after reminiscing with a pal [about] one of the young guys there being a very good player, but he wasn’t interested in pursuing it. We wondered whatever happened to him and the seed was planted.

I started to think, what if this kid had wanted to make it, but was in to something he couldn’t get out of, or maybe he didn’t want to. Maybe he preferred the idea of being a crook, a bad guy. The idea, literally started with an image I had of a young guy in a smoky, dimly lit snooker/pool hall, brandishing a broken cue as a weapon.

I sat down and drew a picture of a kid in a hooded top, standing behind a table ready to strike anybody that came near him with the butt-end of a snooker cue. I stared at the picture a while, cogs whirring and decided on the idea of this troubled kid with a talent, but very little else in the way of guidance.

What this kid needed was a Break…I wrote the first draft in about two months, but wasn’t happy with it, so put it in a drawer and forgot about it for years. Recently I took it out of the drawer, gave it a polish and thought, okay this is pretty good now. Let’s do it.

Like many filmmakers who choose to make billiards central to their stories, Mr. Elkin was aware that too little snooker and the film loses its authenticity and narrative thread; too much snooker and moviegoers will grow restless with the slow pace.

Recent news developments, coupled with Mr. Elkin’s comments to me, indicate he intends to balance this deftly.

The movie’s realism is informed not only by the collaboration with the World Snooker Association, and the filming at Sheffield’s but also the casting of global snooker pros such as China’s Mr. Wenbo, Ireland’s Ken Doherty, and Britain’s Jack Lisowski. Mr. Elkin intends to focus especially on “a variation of pots such as doubles, long pots and plants rather than the cue ball being stuck behind the brown whilst a player deliberates how to get out of it. Clever shots mostly.”

But, at the same time, Mr. Elkin explains, “Although I love to watch [snooker], I am aware that film fans are not settling in to watch a snooker game. Break is an urban drama where snooker just happens to be our protagonists’ way out of a bad situation.  That said, there is of course plenty of snooker action to satisfy fans, but also enough drama to make it a film. Think ‘Rocky with a snooker cue’.”