Brosnan identifies with character in ‘Love Is All You Need,’ a widowed father

TORONTO – In the sweet-natured Danish film “Love Is All You Need,” Pierce Brosnan portrays a widowed, emotionally unavailable businessman who bankrolls his son’s wedding in a postcard-perfect chunk of the Italian coast, but struggles to engage as the groom-to-be deals with a pre-marital crisis.

And for the debonair Irish actor — a father of five, including four sons — exploring that emotional canyon between father and son was both appealing and challenging.

“I have an 11-year-old, a 15-year-old, a 28-year-old and a 39-year-old man who’s as tender as the 11-year-old is. I call him an 11-teen-year-old,” Brosnan said last September as he whisked through the Toronto International Film Festival.

“So I have sons. And the complexity of bringing them up and trying to guide them — as a man and somebody who was fatherless to some extent in his own life — that comes with a lot of baggage and a lot of understanding and a lot of heartache. But also, an appreciation of life. So I understood something about this young man’s ambiguity.”

Transporting though it is, his breezy romantic drama doesn’t seem bogged down by any baggage, even as it acknowledges heavier themes than escapist love stories typically would.

Upon arriving for the wedding festivities, Brosnan’s dour Philip is initially unmoved by his beautiful surroundings until he meets Trine Dyrholm’s mother-of-the-bride, an ebullient woman resolved to positivity despite an ongoing struggle with cancer and the dissolution of her marriage to an unfaithful boor.

Their romance unfurls slowly as the wedding that brought everyone together begins to seem in doubt.

That the film could address death, disease and sexuality yet remain mostly as light as a panna cotta is something Brosnan credits to director Susanne Bier, who helmed 2010’s Oscar-winning “In a Better World.”

“I think that’s the gift and the talent of Susanne Bier,” said Brosnan, looking typically dapper in a blue suit. “She really goes deep into these areas and … she seems to have a courage and humanity to her and also a complexity of storytelling which … really just brings this level of filmmaking like you haven’t seen before.

“And that’s why I said yes to it. Because of these films that she had done. And it came to me under the title of ‘The Bald-Headed Hairdresser,’ which I thought was rather fascinating. And as I turned each page, I got more and more pulled in by the humour and the tenderness of it, and the frailty of these people.”

And Bier said handling heavy themes with a light tough was pretty much “the premise of the whole film.”

“I think in a way, in North America, there are two types of romantic comedies at the moment,” she said last September. “One is more quirky — and they have a hard time being romantic. They’re often very comical and less romantic. And I think there’s a cynicism where you don’t dare be truly romantic. And then I think there’s a kind where everybody’s great looking, where there’s no issues, and I find those ones slightly disengaging. I don’t really care. I have to be invested in the characters, and they have to have some real things that make me feel for them.”

In addition to the extensive experience as a father that he shares with his character, Brosnan, like Philip, also experienced the loss of a spouse. The actor’s first wife, Cassandra Harris, died of ovarian cancer in December 1991.

And Bier acknowledged that Brosnan’s real-life experiences contributed to his being the right fit for the role.

“Having lost a wife to cancer … definitely it was part of me wanting (him) to do it,” she said. “But also, I think he wanted to do that because it was light. Because it wasn’t self-indulgent, swimming around in the pain.”

In fact, it was an uncommonly joyous experience onset for actor and director alike. Shooting in Italy with mostly Danish cast and crew, Brosnan nonetheless fit right in and was lavished with attention by his collaborators — or so says Biers.

“He was surrounded by any number of beautiful, blond actresses who didn’t want anything but (to be) near him,” she said with a smile. “So I think he had a pretty good time.”

One scene finds the cast dancing and partying in advance of the nuptials — and the boozy, loose sequence more or less captured the genuinely jovial atmosphere around the shoot.

“We all kept stealing champagne,” Brosnan recalled. “A little gin and tonic here and there. No acting required…. I just had the time of my life. It will be forever cherished. Films like this don’t come around that often.”

Even if “Love Is All You Need” was atypically pleasant, Brosnan — who has roles in the upcoming comedies “Love Punch” and “A Long Way Down” — says he usually does find a way to enjoy himself, whatever the film he’s working on.

Really, the 60-year-old — who’s forthright but gives the impression he wouldn’t suffer fools for long — insists upon it.

“Every job is stressful and you want to be good, but I just always have a great time,” he said. “And if there’s toxic people on it, then you just win ’em over with love. You win ’em over, you let them just do their thing. And they get found out one way or another, if they’re stupid and silly and misbehaving.

“You just pull them aside and give ’em a dig in the jaw,” he adds with a chuckle. “I’ve never done that. Only once did I ever feel like throttling someone.”

“Love Is All You Need” opens Friday in Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver. It’s expected to expand to more cities in the coming months.