ComingSoon Senior Editor Brandon Schreur spoke to actor Aaron Eckhart and director Jesse V. Johnson about the new action thriller movie Thieves Highway. Eckhart and Johnson discussed what individually drew them to this project, how the movie touches on some real-world issues, and more.
“After a deadly confrontation, lawman Frank Bennett (Eckhart) uncovers a massive smuggling operation,” the synopsis reads. “Cut off from cell service and stranded without his truck, Frank is forced to take on a dangerous gang led by a deranged ex-military commander. Stopping them before they reach the border isn’t just his duty, it’s his only shot at survival.”
Thieves Highway is now playing in select theaters. It will be available on digital platforms on December 16, 2025.
Brandon Schreur: Jesse, I want to start with you and ask just a little bit about the journey of getting Thieves Highway made. I know you didn’t write the script for this one, but you did direct it. What spoke to you about the story of Thieves Highway and made you want to direct it? And what did the process of bringing this movie to life look like?
Jesse V. Johnson: I’m going to encapsulate it because I know we have limited time. It was written by a fellow called Travis Mills, who I was working with in Hungary on a TV show that he was producing. He told me a little bit about this subject matter that he was very passionate about. He had a friend, J.D. Pepper, who gets the co-writing credit, and I believe he was an Arizona cattle rancher who was very familiar with this problem that’s taking place. I’m always drawn to scripts that are written by people who have real-world experience with what they’re writing about. It feels authentic. There’s something for me to get my teeth into. I feel that, if I can do that, the actors that I like to collaborate with are going to read it and go, ‘Oh my gosh, this is something I can get my teeth into.’ This is a real human being dealing with an issue that’s happening out there. There are little details in there that only someone that has lived that life can put into the script.
You know, script writers are wonderful, imaginative people, and they do research, they watch a lot of YouTube interviews. But this guy had driven the miles in Arizona, from ranch to ranch; he’d done it. There were little pieces, little tiny bits of action, little description, and little anecdotal motifs that could only come from someone who had lived that life. That I found very exciting. As I read it, I noticed that the lead character was also an old-fashioned sort of leading man with this calibrated morality and sense of purpose that’s rare, and I like that. I know Aaron is drawn to those sorts of characters, as well — speaking for him, which I shouldn’t do. But I like them as well. I like that as the central motif. From there, the action and everything played off that. Ideally, you have a script that feels like it tells a story that’s familiar to the audience, but in a different way. That’s what I took away from the script; that’s why it appealed. That’s why I took it, auctioned it with my own cash, which I don’t usually do, and ran with it and tried to find financing.
Sure, totally. I have a follow-up question to that, but first, I want to go to you, Aaron. I’m such a fan of your work, and I have to say that I love Battle: Los Angeles so much, and it’s a shame we don’t have like five sequels by now. But can you tell me a little bit about the process of being cast in Thieves Highway and what made you want to be a part of this project? What was the most intriguing aspect that stood out to you and made you say, ‘Yeah, I want to get on board with this?’
Aaron Eckhart: Well, Jesse and I had made a movie called Chief of Station that we made in Hungary, I think a year or two before that. As he said, he got the script and asked me to do it with him. And I loved it. I loved the idea that it was a small, contained story about the American West. About this idea of cattle wrestling and a lawman. I like that a guy who has a moral code, and maybe sometimes has to break that moral code in order to find justice and to punish people — that’s an interesting concept.
I like working with Jesse as a director because he’s got passion. He loves movies. He loves movie-making. I don’t love movie-making as much as Jesse does. If you ask me on the set, ‘Do you love doing this?’ I’ll say, ‘Eh, I don’t know. Not sure.’ Jesse loves making movies. He knows everything about movies. So, it’s a good collaboration because I like to look at my directors and know they’ll do whatever they have to in order to make the movie. I feel like I’m that way, as an actor. I’ll do whatever it takes to get it done, and get it done to the best of our abilities. So I think it’s a good collaboration.
Totally. That jumps into what I wanted to ask both of you, next. I know that you guys have collaborated before on Chief of Station. I wanted to ask about that relationship as artistic collaborators. Since you already had the one movie under your belt, what was it like reuniting for this project, and did you find that your working dynamic had changed at all? Were you guys more comfortable together this time around?
Johnson: I am just thrilled to be able to work with Aaron. I think the dynamic was a little more familiar, but not much. Aaron is very, very easy to work with, as leading men go. Or as leading actors go, he’s very low maintenance. He travels himself to the set; he’s there early and ready to go. The [pressure] is on me to keep making the work better and to put in as much of myself as he’s putting into the character. And that’s good, that keeps you on your toes, and I don’t think much has changed in that degree. We’ll continue to push each other. He certainly pushes me. I don’t think I push him, actually, but he pushes me to be the best I possibly can.
And I love that. That’s the kind of collaborator you want in any kind of endeavor. It’s exciting — my work, I’m very proud when I look back and have done stuff with him. It’s because you have a co-conspirator out there in the water, in the mud, or in the heat. God, it was hot when we were filming this thing. It was like a sauna every day as you stepped out of the trailer; it just swept over you. And we’re doing action in that.
We were dealing with one set where, on the wide-angle shot, where they’re stealing the cows, it was almost a mile from right frame to left frame. This is a big canvas, you know, for a small movie. We shot in 12 days. This is quite a challenge, logistically. And you can only do that, you can only pull it off, when you have a partner in your leading man. And when you have a partner like Aaron, it’s just a joy.
Eckhart: I will say that it is nice to make a movie with somebody you’ve made a movie with before. Because you do know each other’s rhythms. It’s comforting, as opposed to having to get to know everybody. The most important relationship is the director and the actor. You’re not coming into that cold; you have a relationship, and I think it helps the film out tremendously.
Oh, totally. And I think it comes across in the movie, too — like I said, I really enjoyed this. I didn’t know where it was going, but I just found it, especially that whole last half, so tense. This could go in any direction, but the road it took me on, I was all for it.
Johnson: Were you able to stay for the little piece after the credits?
Yeah, I did see that, too. That was unexpected, but I was like, ‘Oh! A post-credit scene! Cool!’
Johnson: It’s so disappointing because we had so many contractual producers on this. I said, ‘Oh, just throw a couple of producer credits on, and then throw in the sequence with the letters.’ But because of some contractual thing, it ended up being about 25 different producers’ credits [laughs]. But I’m so glad you managed to see it.
I definitely saw it, and that was a cool little way to end the movie, I thought. Aaron, I want to talk to you about the character that you’re playing in here, Frank, because he’s such an interesting guy. On the surface, he’s very stoic, he’s very badass, and he will get the job done. But I also think there’s more to him than that, and it’s really fun and interesting to watch you bring that out in your performance when you’re playing this guy. What drew you to this character the most when you were reading the script for the first time? And did you see any similarities between Frank and some of the other characters you’ve played in the past?
Eckhart: Yeah, I think, as you’re saying that, I think the one thing that comes out in my mind is his loneliness. This idea of living alone, living this life. Sort of, that man that’s lost out there on the prairie, and this is his life. He has friends and everything, but he’s isolated. I sort of live that life myself, in real life. I live out on a ranch by myself. And it’s an interesting dynamic for an older guy, because I’m 57 years old. And I guess he’s the same age as I am [laughs].
So, this idea of what you have in life, at the later end of your life — who you are and what you have. Are you happy with it? How was your life? Relationships, are they meaningful, and do you want more? That kind of stuff, I enjoyed about the script. This idea that, yes, he’s a lawman and, yes, he has a moral code, but also, he has a soul and a heart. Is he being nurtured, and is he being fed? Does he want more? I think a lot of men are out there in those similar or same circumstances where life just didn’t go where they thought it was going to go. They have unrequited love, or they lost love, or whatever it is. It takes a toll on a man. Loneliness takes a toll on a man.
Yeah, totally. Again, I loved how this movie explored that and the different directions it goes, I thought it was really well done. Jesse, Thieves Highway is obviously a movie that is about cattle theft. There’s a line of dialogue near the beginning where someone is like, ‘Half the country doesn’t even know that this is a problem anymore.’ And, I’ll admit, I’m from snowy ‘ole Michigan, so I was not familiar with this at all. But I love a movie that opens up your worldview and exposes you to different issues you might not be aware of. So, I’m curious, was this topic something you were familiar with before you started working on this movie? And what did you learn about it when you were making Thieves Highway?
Johnson: It 100 percent wasn’t anything I was particularly familiar with before the script, before reading it. When I read the script for it, it resonated because it was something that I didn’t think existed. It was written by, as we said, J.D. Pepper with Travis Mills, who was an Arizona livestock detective. I think he might have been an Arizona ranger, as well. So it had those nuances, it had those little details of real life in there. Which really appealed to me.
After doing a lot of research on this — not only in Arizona, but Oklahoma, Texas, and where this crime is — I realized that this truly is something that not many know about. And that’s exciting for a filmmaker to find a script like that. It’s the little man, it’s the farmer, the small farmer, the mom-and-pop business, the guys who have been there since their grandfather. This farm is built on the blood, sweat, and blisters of three generations. And it’s been taken away from them because there’s very little you can do about these cattle rustlers. They are usually someone who worked on the problem, at some point, who now has a meth problem. They know where the gates are. They have a bucket of feed, which they shake, and the cows run over to the gate. They put them on the back of a truck, and they’re out of there, they’re gone. And they’ve decimated this farm, they’ve destroyed it.
The farm won’t recover — it’s not as easy as saying that cow is worth five grand, six grand, or three grand. It’s not that easy because the farmer has put ten years, five years, or seven years of investment of his time and energy into that. So it’s a very real crime, and I found that a stimulating backdrop to put an action movie against. It felt fresh and it felt different, and we’re all looking for that. You’re looking for a story to tell that people haven’t seen before. We’re not wanting to make reworkings of the last popular action movie, but made at a low budget. That’s not what we want to do. I don’t want to make a single-take movie because Extraction did well, so I’m going to copy that. This is not where I want to be. I don’t want to pay homage to films that are already being made. I want to do something that has a grain of authenticity and originality to it.
Now, if it harkens back to the 1950s or 1960s westerns, that’s okay! But I enjoyed the script, I enjoyed learning about this world, and I enjoyed the character. I thought it would appeal to Aaron, and I’m so thrilled with the character that he created and we captured on screen. I’m proud of the movie.
Thanks to Aaron Eckhart and Jesse V. Johnson for taking the time to discuss Thieves Highway.
