Jason KingMy Very First Celebrity Interview: Zack Snyder
November 12th 2008 06:02
Category: No Category
I was finally asked to attend my first official interview a week ago. It wasn't until the afternoon but I spent my entire day fretting. I bought myself a MP3 sound recorder, spent hours researching the director in question and the films he has made and set off to interview Zack Snyder. Admittedly not after calling a friend who was a Watchmen fanatic and like minded film junkie that wrote out a list of questions to assist my fretting mind. So big thanks to Dave!!
If you have never heard of Zack Snyder you will do soon. He is the instantly famous and successful director who made for the world the artistic visual extravaganza named 300. "This is Sparta" - that's the one. A confessed action film junkie, the moment 300 became a hit everyone has wanted a piece of him. But this was going to be my little piece so gulp, I set off to The Entertainment Quarter where this was all going to happen. I was met by Father Xmas who led me into private drinks in the foyer of Hoyts and 5min later, Santa brings over one of our Orble Legends, Cibbuano who I had the privilege of getting to know a little better and also some moral support for my upcoming ordeal.
Some time and drinks passed and we were invited into the cinema to meet the man himself as he presented footage from the film and then would answer group questions from the audience followed by us having a break with Santa (Rob my PR hero from NetworkPR), his work colleague and some other like minded souls. After this it would be time for 5 of us to have Zack all to ourselves. A light sweat commenced. Not many of you may know but in any interview I get extremely nervous - I once passed out while being interviewed for a corporate position in the past but that's another story and whenever I get into an interview situation I commence anxiety overload. LOL
For those of you that do not know about the Watchmen story you may find it interesting to know it is the most popular graphic novel (comic) of all time. It is also the only graphic novel listed in TIME's top 100 books of all time. Consider it the bible of comics if you will and something considered for many years to be unfilmable. Watchmen is a 2009 American film that adapts Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' 1986 comic book limited series Watchmen. Directed by Zack Snyder, the film adaptation stars Patrick Wilson, Jackie Earle Haley, Malin Akerman, Billy Crudup, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Matthew Goode, Stephen McHattie and Carla Gugino. Set in an alternate 1985, the film follows a group of former vigilantes as war begins to break out between the United States and the Soviet Union. The film began shooting in Vancouver in September 2007 for release on March 6, 2009. Like his previous film 300, Snyder closely modeled his storyboards on the comic, but unlike 300, he chose not to shoot all of Watchmen using chroma key and opted for more sets. He also fought the studios on many occasions to keep the film as close to the original story as possible, as opposed to the original idea of modernising and setting in the War on Terror instead.
Following the series' publication, the film adaptation was mired in development hell. Producer Lawrence Gordon began developing the project at 20th Century Fox and Warner Bros. with producer Joel Silver and director Terry Gilliam, the latter eventually deeming the complex novel unfilmable. During the 2000s, Gordon and Lloyd Levin collaborated with Universal Studios and Paramount Pictures to produce a script by David Hayter (who set it in modern times). Darren Aronofsky and Paul Greengrass were attached to Paramount's project, before it was canceled over budget disputes. The project returned to Warner Bros., where Snyder was hired to direct (Paramount remained as international distributor). Fox is now suing Gordon for failing to pay a buy-out in 1991, which enabled him to develop the film at the other studios.
Anyway, the footage blew my mind - I am choosing to read the book after I see the movie - I want to see it as Zack's work first then will compare this to the book, something the people I met on the day thought was odd. But anyways I thought it would be scary interviewing Zack but once he came out and started talking I knew this would be easy. He is a well built guy who could have passed as one of the Spartan's in 300 and dressed so casual with some awesome tats and "lack of shaving" beard slowly spreading. This guy was passionate and loves what he does. When he talks about his film he is smiling and this is re-assuring. For someone that had to sit through question after question when you think this would be the last thing they would want to do he took it all into his stride and bonded with everyone in the cinema. I think I got a bit of hero worship! Or Stockholm Syndrome? LOL
The group questions went really well and after a few drinks it was our time with Zack. Is that a shake I saw starting in my hand? Two questions were asked from my goup when it became my turn to ask a question - on playback you can actually here my voice shaking! But my first question to Zack was:
"What is a typical day like on set for you?"
Zack: You know it varies sometimes, you know we shot 100 days and I don't use second units so I shot every shot. And you know, there was a lot of montage style shooting in the movie as well as a set for every shot. It was crazy - we had tonnes of phases where we would run from stage to stage. It was very physical, not like 300 which I had to operate and friggin muscle through, this was more mentally exhausting. It was a pleasure though because the crew I worked with was amazing and my son is in the movie so it's cool (his son has managed to be in both 300 and Watchmen, watch this one take off in the future). And also my wife is the producer so it's kind of a family affair. And the guy who shot it I went to college with so I keep my guys pretty close.
WOOT THAT WAS IT - MY VERY FIRST ANSWERED INTERVIEW QUESTION!! WOOT AGAIN. LOL. A few more questions were asked and I asked another one related to the footage we had seen. It was basically a handshake with one of the characters to President Kennedy and between us we had debated whether it was Forrest Gump style of compositing the character into archival footage or whether it was recreated. His answer was simple in that they had recreated the entire Kennedy assassination and the handshake with the president was all with an actor. Totally cool!!
Watchmen will be out next March and get ready people - it will be H U G E!!!!
Below is the complete transcript of the group question and answer section that followed the screening of footage. This may appeal to Watchmen junkies out there - this also answered all remaining 8 of the questions I had written down. I would very much like to thank Rob and Leslie from NetworkPR for setting this up and a big thanks to the people I met who do the same stuff as me. It's nice to know I am not a mutant film obsessive.
Moderator: The first question to ask is about casting because I know that some of in the past we’ve heard names like Keanu Reeves was interested in being in it and John Cusack and, who else, Tom Cruise was keen to play Ozymandias ….
Zack: Was he keen, I don’t know? You know it’s funny because it actually evolved, that evolved in a really nice way. The studio would have like to have had big stars…I think they just, for whatever reason, I guess people like movies with stars in them. And so I think the first thing we had to exhaust, or work on was whether or not stars wanted to be in the movie and I think that it was not…because it’s ‘ensemble-y’, and because for whatever reason, I think…and frankly, stars are expensive. I mean, really, to be honest, it’s like the biggest student film ever made, really, the way it should be viewed. For me it was like, ‘should I sacrifice like $20 million dollars or should I put it up, in the movie?’ and I think that’s kinda how it worked out. And also you know, my cast is , I think Patrick Wilson was the first guy I hired and you know I’d seen him in ‘Little Children’ – I’d seen him in other movies, I saw him in ‘Little Children’ and …..I just like, it’s funny, I saw Jackie in ‘Little Children’ too – and I knew about Jackie but it was kinda the movie I saw them both in and went like ‘Whoa, these guys are great’ and Jackie is awesome in the movie – he’s really great. I don’t have a scene, a Rorschach scene, I should have brought one but it’s, he’s amazing in the movie.
M: All the scenes are looking fantastic. You know what’s interesting is with the proliferation of the superhero genre now, where you can see a superhero movie every year, you’ve got tv shows like Heroes, do you feel that this will make Watchmen maybe a little but harder to market because of that so you think that this is the perfect opportunity, because now cinematically we can refer to those movies as the comic once did, to other comics…..?
Z: Well, I think that you know when you look at something Like Heroes for instance, I don’t think Heroes (um), because Heroes is a, I’m not going to say it’s a rip-off, but, it’s a, Heroes is its own, it’s like the tv version of, Watchmen or of other comics for that matter. And so, you know, it never can go all the way, it’s always just going to be like, a soap opera version of, you know with visual effects. I don’t know, I think that it’s good; I think that the more superheroes people get the better. The more easy this is to understand.
M: Yeah, definitely. Look I don’t want to hog all the questions so just by a raise of the hand, who would like to ask anything……
Question from audience: You were talking before about your mother knowing superhero mythology through Spiderman films and Batman and all those sort of things, I mean, how do you….and obviously we’ve had the Dark Knight as well which sort of darkened, I guess, superhero understanding within mainstream society or filmgoing culture, I guess how do you think all that will help mainstream audiences connect with the film?
Z: I just think that it’s like, you know, they get, they’re a little of the way there, you know, I think, with the, with what they know in movies now. You know they’re a little, they’re down the road, they know a lot of Batman’s baggage gets to be, you know, you don’t have to like, (inaudible) I don’t have to go do a lot of back story with Batman into his psychology because, you know, they’ve been working on it for, you know, six movies, or more, to kind of tell us that he’s dark, and he’s upset his parents got killed. But what they don’t say is that, he has, like you know, he has sexual fetishistic, you know, um… problems, without his costume, you know, which is inevitably true, you know, I mean I can’t imagine that that’s not the case but in a PG13 movie, you can’t really do that.
M: They probably think anyone who’s suffering from impotency, uh, go out and dress up a superhero….that seems to help you out.
Z: No, it completely does. I mean, not that I’d know that.
Q: Two questions: firstly, does it bother you that Alan Moore apparently has kind of disowned the movie and why is that and secondly, are you fussed with Fox taking a lawsuit against Warners trying to stop the movie or is that something you, that is out of your control and you’re kind of, getting on with finishing the film?
Z: Yeah – as far as Alan goes, the why of Alan not wanting to be involved in the movie, um, I don’t know. Alan had asked to not be involved in the film before I was involved in it although, you know, he said ‘Look, I don’t want my name on the movie, I don’t want to be involved in it’ and you know, I think that a lot of problems have come up with Alan when people make assumptions about what he thinks about either a movie or having a movie made or any of that stuff, so I try not to make any assumptions about Alan. And he’s just created an incredible work.
M: Pretty much all of his work he’s gotten, given the royalties over to the artist, hasn’t he?
Z: Yes, he has. They’ve, you know we’ve had a great collaboration with Dave Gibbons, the illustrator and there’s actually a really cool book out right now called, I think, “Making Watchmen’, which is the new, which is Dave’s kind of chronicle of how they created Watchmen, it’s super awesome, it’s an amazing thing. Yes.
….Oh I forgot t talk about Fox. As far as Fox goes, I’m not a lawyer so I hope that they, ah, resolve that. I think they will. They seem, um, decent people. (laughs)
Q: Can I ask you a kind of, a more general question. There was some speculation about why the superhero/comic book movie has become so popular with Hollywood and the cinema-going public and it seems to be, particularly this year has really taken off with audiences and there are more and more films that are in the pipeline. I just wondered if you had any ideas about why this phenomenon might be happening. Obviously digital effects and the sophistication of them is one reason that a lot of people are floating, but I suspect there’s more to it than that and I just wondered what thoughts you had?
Z: You know, I think that, look, it’s been an evolution, I think that, you know, even the early Superman movies were popular, you know, but only till recently that it’s, especially this year, you know, with the, I mean we had the Spiderman phenomenon and then we had the early Batman phenomenon and now we have The Dark Knight and Iron Man and we’re gonna get a lot more Marvel titles, so, you’re gonna get like, cra-zy stuff now, you know. Everyone should not have gone to Iron Man because now you’re gonna get like…
M: Yeah, Ant Man? We all needed an Ant Man movie, didn’t we? Right?
Z: Yeah, you’re gonna get movies that you know, are like…but anyway it will be awesome ‘cos you’ll get good actors in them, so it’ll be cool ‘cos everyone will wanna make a, their Iron Man movie. By the way, Iron Man’s a great movie, um, so you know, I don’t know what to say about that, but I will say that I just think, that you know, that they offer a, it’s like everything combined, it’s like, you know, modern mythology, um, it’s visual effects technology at its height and, you know, it’s also, if done right, then compelling characters and now we have like, really like A-list actors and so I think, it’s kinda like a Hollywood wet dream in that way, I think, that comes together in box office madness.
M: It’s kinda tapped into the zeitgeist I think as well to a certain extent, that we’ve lived in uncertain times and there’s nothing better than going and seeing a movie with a protagonist who takes things into their own hands and makes everything right as well?
Z: I mean, like, you know, Death Wish – it’s like any revenge movie is always good. Revenge is sweet. (laughs)
Q: I just wanted to know how much involvement you’ll have with the video game version of Watchmen and what are your plans for the game?
Z: Um, the game, we had big plans for the game and I think that the game is actually, um, kind of, it’s evolved into something pretty cool. I’m pretty happy with it now. There was a time when I was little worried about but I think it’s turned into something pretty cool. It’s just the story, the story is where I kind of really, um, I was busy with the movie and when they started talking about making the game I was kinda, I don’t know, I wasn’t sure. I kinda thought it would be cool if they could really do it in an awesome way and I think that with higher production value and I think that, um, they kind of, it’s a downloadable game now and it’s shorter stories so they’re able to get more production value into it without like a super long, super long story but, yeah, that’s kind of it and I hope it’s, I think it’s, pretty cool. The story I know is cool, by the way.
Q: There’s a lot of talking on the net in regards to the ending of Watchmen – like I’ve heard they’ve actually, Warner Bros are testing endings, and an atomic bomb ending. Will the ending differ from the comic book?
Z: Let me say this. First of all, I mean it’s cool, I like the idea that people think that we’ve got enough money to make like two entirely different movies, that’s cool, that’s like, that’s a lot of, what’s it called – faith. And even testing two endings is cool, it’s a cool concept. There’s not two endings, there’s one ending and I won’t say exactly what happens in the ending so I know that, you know, there’s a lot of speculation and I like it, frankly, um , but I will say this, I mean for me Watchmen is really, the crux of the movie, the thing that was changed along with Richard Nixon and the war on terror, you know, in that whole thing, was the ending was changed when I got a hold of it. And maybe in different ways than people think, but, it certainly was changed in a way that, um, I would call more Hollywood. The big fight I had, of course was, for me was, and probably the biggest fight of the movie, was getting what I would call a, a ‘Watchmen’ ending in the movie. And um I’m not trying to, this isn’t really a spoiler but, the vehicle of that, I had, there is a slight difference from the graphic novel but, I will say, that the, what Watchmen is to me, is the moral imperative of the ending, to me that’s the most important thing and that was the thing that I was in most jeopardy of losing, you know was the, was the, the bad guy, or whatever you want to call him, his plan, how the superheroes react to it, and what happens to him, and what happens to the other characters and how they’re changed by it. That’s the movie to me, you know. Without that, there’s no, that’s the mind-blowing part of the piece. You know, when you finish it and you’re like, ‘wait a minute, that’s fucking wrong, that’s crazy, that can’t be right, when did the?’ ..you know…no…um and so that is there. That’s all I’ll say.
M: Well this isn’t going to be a franchise, you won’t see in two years time….
Z: There’s no Watchmen 2….
M: Yes, Joel Schumacher….
Z: ‘Watchmen babies’…..
M: Nipples on everyone you know…..
Z: Maybe there’s a, maybe there’s a, you know……
M: Musical?
Z: A prologue. A musical is cool. See, that I endorse. (laughs)
Q: Watchmen’s a very dense book and a very dense story with many undertones and how did you, purveying that in a movie medium is going to be very difficult. How did you choose what you were going to include and what you weren’t? Because you can’t please everyone.
Z: No, no you can’t please everyone and you know what, I knew that going into it, I knew that there would never be, I mean, look, you know, (hardcore fans might want to see) a Black Freighter version of the movie that’s like 3 and a half hours long or whatever, sure those things will exist and you know, maybe that, you know, um starts to get at, you know really what hardcore fans want to see and for me too, to be honest, I have the same restraints on me, you know it’s not an open chequebook and an open medium, it’s a movie, you know they don’t just say ‘Oh look, you know, five hour movie and you know, 500 million dollar budget’. That would be cool, don’t get me wrong, I would love that but, and to keep it, you know I have to make deals, you know, to keep it rated R and to keep, you know, at a length that I think is appropriate and all those things. I gotta, there’s trade-offs that I make as well, you know, so the thing is that I tried to, with what to leave, what to put in and what to take out, you know, we shot more and then, you know in the editing process we kind of, you know, some stuff, that doesn’t drive the story has to get taken out but I really endeavoured to keep the movie weird….(laughs)
M: That’s good.
Z: …in a good way
M: It’s swings and roundabouts – you miss out on Tales of the Black Freighter but you get to see Dr Manhattan in the nude so, you know, it’s still true in that sense.
Z: It’s really kinda true. Those are the kinda things.
Q: First thing I wanna say is that was pretty cool what we saw so far. Got a question about how you guys are trying to reach out to the non-comic book fans because obviously a lot of people know about Watchmen and with movies like Batman, Superman, Spiderman they’re well known characters, with Iron Man they had big-name actors which you said you’d chosen not to go with, you’d rather use the money for production, so is it recognized and is there concern and how’s it being dealt with?
Z: Well, Iron Man and X-Man, Men, and Superman had man in the title which is cool so we do too, sort of, (laughs) so we’re gonna go with that for one thing, people are gonna, ‘Boom, look at that – Men – you should go see that!’ (laughter from audience)…
M: Must be a Superhero movie!....(more laughter)
Z: I mean I think that there’s two things that we’re trying to do right now is, we’re trying to create like, you’re going to have two audiences they are going to respond to the movie in two ways, right? They’re gonna have, you know, average movie goer who doesn’t know anything about graphic novels who doesn’t care about Watchmen and doesn’t care how many Hugo Awards it won They’re like ‘Whatever, it’s a comic book’, you know ‘It’s stupid’, not to be mean to them, that’s totally valid, um, but on the other hand you’re also gonna have people who are open to the sort of, bringing pop culture to Watchmen aspect of it, you know like, getting out the character bios, getting out the kind of, what the movie’s about, how it’s the answer instead of like just another one in the line, you know how it’s sort of a little bit more sexy and violent and maybe thinks a little bit harder, you know those things being the, part of the reason to go see it, maybe get a little bit more from your superhero movie than you’ve been getting in the past. And then I think that also it’s cool to just cast a wide net and say like, ‘Come see Watchmen cos it’s, you know, it’s got superheroes in it and you know, there’s like an Owl Ship that looks kinda like an egg (audience laughter)……that’s a reason to go….. it’s like a spaceship, I mean come on, it’s sci-fi.
M: I think people kind of forget as well that things like X-Men, when they were first released, you know, that was a pretty small budget film, no-one actually knew who Hugh Jackman was in Hollywood at that point and then suddenly it was big. Before Iron Man came out they didn’t even want Robert Downey Jr cos they were too scared that they couldn’t bank on him in a big movie so we’re probably looking at things in hindsight and thinking……
Z: Yeah, I think that you know, when you look at the sorta, the artwork we’ve looked at just for the general sort of, marketing, it’s really, if you look at it carefully you can see your crazy movie in there but if you’re just passing by, you’re like, ‘Oh cool, superhero movie’. And that’s kinda what Watchmen did when it came out, you know, as a graphic novel, you know, like a lot of kids picked it up as a comic and were like ‘Oh it’s cool, it’s the new Alan Moore comic, it’s just going to be a cool adventure’ and it’s like ‘Oh my mind just got blown’ so there’s that part of it too. Hopefully the movie does the same thing, a little bit.
Q: In the graphic novel itself, it’s sorta, you get the quote at the end of each chapter regarding a song, so it’s sort of a written soundtrack. Are you aiming to keep that going through, we heard Bob Dylan in the clip you showed, but we’ve sorta had Smashing Pumpkins and Muse in other things, so….?
Z: That’s mostly the marketing materials, I have used a lot of those songs (from the graphic novel), not all of them of course cos there’s more chapters than I have, ah, but yeah, we used a lot of the songs, the ‘All Along the Watchtower’ and ‘Desolation Row’ and there’s a few others.. oh there’s Nina Simone. For me it’s like, ah, I don’t know, I think that as much as I could, I used them and I also tried to use other songs that are iconographic from the era that kinda…it’s funny cos we do have ‘Sound of Silence’, ‘Sound of Silence’ is in the movie, right and I’ve shown it to someone who was like ‘God, Sound of Silence, man, that’s in every movie’ and I was like ‘Really, really? Because you know that song, it’s only been licensed for one other film, “The Graduate”, you know, I know it seems like it’s in every movie but because it’s like…I think the movie does that a lot, you know it feels like ‘Oh yeah, that’s that thing that’s in every movie but when you really think about it, it’s very particular, you know it feels like a cliché, because it’s exposing one, I think.
M: You’ve done that with the imagery as well in the opening credits of the lady kissing the woman after the end of WW2…
Z: Absolutely….
M: …so it presents a resonance…
Z: Yeah, what I was trying to say is ....I mean it does two things I think. It’s like a trip to the twentieth century and sort of, I think that, hopefully the idea is that, when you have superheroes, how does it?…it ripples through, you know, culture and makes you look at something from a different angle.
Q: As Dr Manhattan loses touch with his humanity throughout the graphic novel he wears less and less clothes. Was there any pressure from the studio to keep his blue **** (person clenched mouth and nodded to indicate expletive) out of the film?
Z: Well, of course, I think that early on they said to me ‘Well what are you gonna do with Dr Manhattan’s ah junk in the movie?”….(audience laughs)
M: Did they call it his ‘junk’?
Z: They called it a bunch of stuff, it was in memos and emails so it was always different, but um, you know they’d say ‘penis’, I guess, or ‘cock’ - that was very rarely, that’s when they were mad, um, so, which is an angry word anyway, so you know and I just kept going ‘Well, it’s there, I don’t know what to say, you know it’s a difficult thing’, you know I start him off in less clothes, I never…he’s either in a suit or his battle briefs, that’s what we call them, I don’t know if they have a name, in the sixties he’s in his battle briefs and then in modern day he’s naked, I didn’t do him in the (like) biker shorts, the riding shorts and then the, with the singlet like wrestling outfit, although that’s cool, I didn’t…in the graphic novel he slowly loses touch with humanity so his clothes get smaller and smaller until he’s naked um but we just, we went with him being naked and it’s cool and you’ll see in some of the advertising, like we just finished the trailer and of course the MPAA made me do, like a, you know, defocusing….
M: A Ken doll?....
Z: Well, you know, you just have to look really carefully if you’re into that sort of thing, that’s fine, you know, but the truth is I wanted to put a black bar but they felt like that was too, like too Borat, so I was like ‘alright, we’ll just go defocus’ but yeah, so no it was an issue but it’s like one of those things I just said ‘Look it’s gotta be that way’. In the other, in..not and I love Fantastic Four, not to be mean, but like you know, the Silver Surfer, they said to me ‘Well the Silver Surfer looks fine with his, just, bulge there’ and I’m like ‘Yeah but he’s like having sex with Laurie in the movie so it creates more questions to me than answers’, you know, do you know what I’m saying?
M: Yeah, I know exactly what you’re saying (audience laughs) I just don’t know how far we can go with that so (audience laughs)
Q: What is the main impression you want your audience to leave the film with?
Z: Well, I feel like the main thing thematically is that well, the main impression, is that the movie, first of all like any movie I would hope, that it takes you to another sort of experience, that for me is my favourite thing with movies is that you get to go to another point of view, of another world and spend a while with that. And hopefully at the end, you know, it’s not, by no means am I trying to make some preachy movie about how you should think, um, but you should think a certain way – no just kidding – but I do think that it’s cool that, if a movie can, when you walk out, it would be cool if people could sit down and talk about it and go ‘Like, no, fuck, Adrian was wrong. You’re an idiot’ or whatever, rather than just ‘Hey that was cool, what else/” and shut it off, the second they walk out, you know, it would be cool if it rings for ten minutes, it’d be cool, or longer (audience laughs)
M: Ten minutes in this time?
Z: Like if they get to the door of the theatre….
M: ‘That was great.’
Z: ‘That was great, what was that again, I forget that movie’ (audience laughs)
M: Whatmen?
Z: (laughs) cos that’s kinda how it is today, it’d be cool if it was little deeper.
M: That brings us to the end of the questions (Moderator thanks Zack and audience offers final round of applause).
M: Moderator
Z: Zack Snyder
Q: Question for audience
If you have never heard of Zack Snyder you will do soon. He is the instantly famous and successful director who made for the world the artistic visual extravaganza named 300. "This is Sparta" - that's the one. A confessed action film junkie, the moment 300 became a hit everyone has wanted a piece of him. But this was going to be my little piece so gulp, I set off to The Entertainment Quarter where this was all going to happen. I was met by Father Xmas who led me into private drinks in the foyer of Hoyts and 5min later, Santa brings over one of our Orble Legends, Cibbuano who I had the privilege of getting to know a little better and also some moral support for my upcoming ordeal.
Some time and drinks passed and we were invited into the cinema to meet the man himself as he presented footage from the film and then would answer group questions from the audience followed by us having a break with Santa (Rob my PR hero from NetworkPR), his work colleague and some other like minded souls. After this it would be time for 5 of us to have Zack all to ourselves. A light sweat commenced. Not many of you may know but in any interview I get extremely nervous - I once passed out while being interviewed for a corporate position in the past but that's another story and whenever I get into an interview situation I commence anxiety overload. LOL
For those of you that do not know about the Watchmen story you may find it interesting to know it is the most popular graphic novel (comic) of all time. It is also the only graphic novel listed in TIME's top 100 books of all time. Consider it the bible of comics if you will and something considered for many years to be unfilmable. Watchmen is a 2009 American film that adapts Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' 1986 comic book limited series Watchmen. Directed by Zack Snyder, the film adaptation stars Patrick Wilson, Jackie Earle Haley, Malin Akerman, Billy Crudup, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Matthew Goode, Stephen McHattie and Carla Gugino. Set in an alternate 1985, the film follows a group of former vigilantes as war begins to break out between the United States and the Soviet Union. The film began shooting in Vancouver in September 2007 for release on March 6, 2009. Like his previous film 300, Snyder closely modeled his storyboards on the comic, but unlike 300, he chose not to shoot all of Watchmen using chroma key and opted for more sets. He also fought the studios on many occasions to keep the film as close to the original story as possible, as opposed to the original idea of modernising and setting in the War on Terror instead.
Following the series' publication, the film adaptation was mired in development hell. Producer Lawrence Gordon began developing the project at 20th Century Fox and Warner Bros. with producer Joel Silver and director Terry Gilliam, the latter eventually deeming the complex novel unfilmable. During the 2000s, Gordon and Lloyd Levin collaborated with Universal Studios and Paramount Pictures to produce a script by David Hayter (who set it in modern times). Darren Aronofsky and Paul Greengrass were attached to Paramount's project, before it was canceled over budget disputes. The project returned to Warner Bros., where Snyder was hired to direct (Paramount remained as international distributor). Fox is now suing Gordon for failing to pay a buy-out in 1991, which enabled him to develop the film at the other studios.
Anyway, the footage blew my mind - I am choosing to read the book after I see the movie - I want to see it as Zack's work first then will compare this to the book, something the people I met on the day thought was odd. But anyways I thought it would be scary interviewing Zack but once he came out and started talking I knew this would be easy. He is a well built guy who could have passed as one of the Spartan's in 300 and dressed so casual with some awesome tats and "lack of shaving" beard slowly spreading. This guy was passionate and loves what he does. When he talks about his film he is smiling and this is re-assuring. For someone that had to sit through question after question when you think this would be the last thing they would want to do he took it all into his stride and bonded with everyone in the cinema. I think I got a bit of hero worship! Or Stockholm Syndrome? LOL
The group questions went really well and after a few drinks it was our time with Zack. Is that a shake I saw starting in my hand? Two questions were asked from my goup when it became my turn to ask a question - on playback you can actually here my voice shaking! But my first question to Zack was:
"What is a typical day like on set for you?"
Zack: You know it varies sometimes, you know we shot 100 days and I don't use second units so I shot every shot. And you know, there was a lot of montage style shooting in the movie as well as a set for every shot. It was crazy - we had tonnes of phases where we would run from stage to stage. It was very physical, not like 300 which I had to operate and friggin muscle through, this was more mentally exhausting. It was a pleasure though because the crew I worked with was amazing and my son is in the movie so it's cool (his son has managed to be in both 300 and Watchmen, watch this one take off in the future). And also my wife is the producer so it's kind of a family affair. And the guy who shot it I went to college with so I keep my guys pretty close.
WOOT THAT WAS IT - MY VERY FIRST ANSWERED INTERVIEW QUESTION!! WOOT AGAIN. LOL. A few more questions were asked and I asked another one related to the footage we had seen. It was basically a handshake with one of the characters to President Kennedy and between us we had debated whether it was Forrest Gump style of compositing the character into archival footage or whether it was recreated. His answer was simple in that they had recreated the entire Kennedy assassination and the handshake with the president was all with an actor. Totally cool!!
Watchmen will be out next March and get ready people - it will be H U G E!!!!
Below is the complete transcript of the group question and answer section that followed the screening of footage. This may appeal to Watchmen junkies out there - this also answered all remaining 8 of the questions I had written down. I would very much like to thank Rob and Leslie from NetworkPR for setting this up and a big thanks to the people I met who do the same stuff as me. It's nice to know I am not a mutant film obsessive.
Moderator: The first question to ask is about casting because I know that some of in the past we’ve heard names like Keanu Reeves was interested in being in it and John Cusack and, who else, Tom Cruise was keen to play Ozymandias ….
Zack: Was he keen, I don’t know? You know it’s funny because it actually evolved, that evolved in a really nice way. The studio would have like to have had big stars…I think they just, for whatever reason, I guess people like movies with stars in them. And so I think the first thing we had to exhaust, or work on was whether or not stars wanted to be in the movie and I think that it was not…because it’s ‘ensemble-y’, and because for whatever reason, I think…and frankly, stars are expensive. I mean, really, to be honest, it’s like the biggest student film ever made, really, the way it should be viewed. For me it was like, ‘should I sacrifice like $20 million dollars or should I put it up, in the movie?’ and I think that’s kinda how it worked out. And also you know, my cast is , I think Patrick Wilson was the first guy I hired and you know I’d seen him in ‘Little Children’ – I’d seen him in other movies, I saw him in ‘Little Children’ and …..I just like, it’s funny, I saw Jackie in ‘Little Children’ too – and I knew about Jackie but it was kinda the movie I saw them both in and went like ‘Whoa, these guys are great’ and Jackie is awesome in the movie – he’s really great. I don’t have a scene, a Rorschach scene, I should have brought one but it’s, he’s amazing in the movie.
M: All the scenes are looking fantastic. You know what’s interesting is with the proliferation of the superhero genre now, where you can see a superhero movie every year, you’ve got tv shows like Heroes, do you feel that this will make Watchmen maybe a little but harder to market because of that so you think that this is the perfect opportunity, because now cinematically we can refer to those movies as the comic once did, to other comics…..?
Z: Well, I think that you know when you look at something Like Heroes for instance, I don’t think Heroes (um), because Heroes is a, I’m not going to say it’s a rip-off, but, it’s a, Heroes is its own, it’s like the tv version of, Watchmen or of other comics for that matter. And so, you know, it never can go all the way, it’s always just going to be like, a soap opera version of, you know with visual effects. I don’t know, I think that it’s good; I think that the more superheroes people get the better. The more easy this is to understand.
M: Yeah, definitely. Look I don’t want to hog all the questions so just by a raise of the hand, who would like to ask anything……
Question from audience: You were talking before about your mother knowing superhero mythology through Spiderman films and Batman and all those sort of things, I mean, how do you….and obviously we’ve had the Dark Knight as well which sort of darkened, I guess, superhero understanding within mainstream society or filmgoing culture, I guess how do you think all that will help mainstream audiences connect with the film?
Z: I just think that it’s like, you know, they get, they’re a little of the way there, you know, I think, with the, with what they know in movies now. You know they’re a little, they’re down the road, they know a lot of Batman’s baggage gets to be, you know, you don’t have to like, (inaudible) I don’t have to go do a lot of back story with Batman into his psychology because, you know, they’ve been working on it for, you know, six movies, or more, to kind of tell us that he’s dark, and he’s upset his parents got killed. But what they don’t say is that, he has, like you know, he has sexual fetishistic, you know, um… problems, without his costume, you know, which is inevitably true, you know, I mean I can’t imagine that that’s not the case but in a PG13 movie, you can’t really do that.
M: They probably think anyone who’s suffering from impotency, uh, go out and dress up a superhero….that seems to help you out.
Z: No, it completely does. I mean, not that I’d know that.
Q: Two questions: firstly, does it bother you that Alan Moore apparently has kind of disowned the movie and why is that and secondly, are you fussed with Fox taking a lawsuit against Warners trying to stop the movie or is that something you, that is out of your control and you’re kind of, getting on with finishing the film?
Z: Yeah – as far as Alan goes, the why of Alan not wanting to be involved in the movie, um, I don’t know. Alan had asked to not be involved in the film before I was involved in it although, you know, he said ‘Look, I don’t want my name on the movie, I don’t want to be involved in it’ and you know, I think that a lot of problems have come up with Alan when people make assumptions about what he thinks about either a movie or having a movie made or any of that stuff, so I try not to make any assumptions about Alan. And he’s just created an incredible work.
M: Pretty much all of his work he’s gotten, given the royalties over to the artist, hasn’t he?
Z: Yes, he has. They’ve, you know we’ve had a great collaboration with Dave Gibbons, the illustrator and there’s actually a really cool book out right now called, I think, “Making Watchmen’, which is the new, which is Dave’s kind of chronicle of how they created Watchmen, it’s super awesome, it’s an amazing thing. Yes.
….Oh I forgot t talk about Fox. As far as Fox goes, I’m not a lawyer so I hope that they, ah, resolve that. I think they will. They seem, um, decent people. (laughs)
Q: Can I ask you a kind of, a more general question. There was some speculation about why the superhero/comic book movie has become so popular with Hollywood and the cinema-going public and it seems to be, particularly this year has really taken off with audiences and there are more and more films that are in the pipeline. I just wondered if you had any ideas about why this phenomenon might be happening. Obviously digital effects and the sophistication of them is one reason that a lot of people are floating, but I suspect there’s more to it than that and I just wondered what thoughts you had?
Z: You know, I think that, look, it’s been an evolution, I think that, you know, even the early Superman movies were popular, you know, but only till recently that it’s, especially this year, you know, with the, I mean we had the Spiderman phenomenon and then we had the early Batman phenomenon and now we have The Dark Knight and Iron Man and we’re gonna get a lot more Marvel titles, so, you’re gonna get like, cra-zy stuff now, you know. Everyone should not have gone to Iron Man because now you’re gonna get like…
M: Yeah, Ant Man? We all needed an Ant Man movie, didn’t we? Right?
Z: Yeah, you’re gonna get movies that you know, are like…but anyway it will be awesome ‘cos you’ll get good actors in them, so it’ll be cool ‘cos everyone will wanna make a, their Iron Man movie. By the way, Iron Man’s a great movie, um, so you know, I don’t know what to say about that, but I will say that I just think, that you know, that they offer a, it’s like everything combined, it’s like, you know, modern mythology, um, it’s visual effects technology at its height and, you know, it’s also, if done right, then compelling characters and now we have like, really like A-list actors and so I think, it’s kinda like a Hollywood wet dream in that way, I think, that comes together in box office madness.
M: It’s kinda tapped into the zeitgeist I think as well to a certain extent, that we’ve lived in uncertain times and there’s nothing better than going and seeing a movie with a protagonist who takes things into their own hands and makes everything right as well?
Z: I mean, like, you know, Death Wish – it’s like any revenge movie is always good. Revenge is sweet. (laughs)
Q: I just wanted to know how much involvement you’ll have with the video game version of Watchmen and what are your plans for the game?
Z: Um, the game, we had big plans for the game and I think that the game is actually, um, kind of, it’s evolved into something pretty cool. I’m pretty happy with it now. There was a time when I was little worried about but I think it’s turned into something pretty cool. It’s just the story, the story is where I kind of really, um, I was busy with the movie and when they started talking about making the game I was kinda, I don’t know, I wasn’t sure. I kinda thought it would be cool if they could really do it in an awesome way and I think that with higher production value and I think that, um, they kind of, it’s a downloadable game now and it’s shorter stories so they’re able to get more production value into it without like a super long, super long story but, yeah, that’s kind of it and I hope it’s, I think it’s, pretty cool. The story I know is cool, by the way.
Q: There’s a lot of talking on the net in regards to the ending of Watchmen – like I’ve heard they’ve actually, Warner Bros are testing endings, and an atomic bomb ending. Will the ending differ from the comic book?
Z: Let me say this. First of all, I mean it’s cool, I like the idea that people think that we’ve got enough money to make like two entirely different movies, that’s cool, that’s like, that’s a lot of, what’s it called – faith. And even testing two endings is cool, it’s a cool concept. There’s not two endings, there’s one ending and I won’t say exactly what happens in the ending so I know that, you know, there’s a lot of speculation and I like it, frankly, um , but I will say this, I mean for me Watchmen is really, the crux of the movie, the thing that was changed along with Richard Nixon and the war on terror, you know, in that whole thing, was the ending was changed when I got a hold of it. And maybe in different ways than people think, but, it certainly was changed in a way that, um, I would call more Hollywood. The big fight I had, of course was, for me was, and probably the biggest fight of the movie, was getting what I would call a, a ‘Watchmen’ ending in the movie. And um I’m not trying to, this isn’t really a spoiler but, the vehicle of that, I had, there is a slight difference from the graphic novel but, I will say, that the, what Watchmen is to me, is the moral imperative of the ending, to me that’s the most important thing and that was the thing that I was in most jeopardy of losing, you know was the, was the, the bad guy, or whatever you want to call him, his plan, how the superheroes react to it, and what happens to him, and what happens to the other characters and how they’re changed by it. That’s the movie to me, you know. Without that, there’s no, that’s the mind-blowing part of the piece. You know, when you finish it and you’re like, ‘wait a minute, that’s fucking wrong, that’s crazy, that can’t be right, when did the?’ ..you know…no…um and so that is there. That’s all I’ll say.
M: Well this isn’t going to be a franchise, you won’t see in two years time….
Z: There’s no Watchmen 2….
M: Yes, Joel Schumacher….
Z: ‘Watchmen babies’…..
M: Nipples on everyone you know…..
Z: Maybe there’s a, maybe there’s a, you know……
M: Musical?
Z: A prologue. A musical is cool. See, that I endorse. (laughs)
Q: Watchmen’s a very dense book and a very dense story with many undertones and how did you, purveying that in a movie medium is going to be very difficult. How did you choose what you were going to include and what you weren’t? Because you can’t please everyone.
Z: No, no you can’t please everyone and you know what, I knew that going into it, I knew that there would never be, I mean, look, you know, (hardcore fans might want to see) a Black Freighter version of the movie that’s like 3 and a half hours long or whatever, sure those things will exist and you know, maybe that, you know, um starts to get at, you know really what hardcore fans want to see and for me too, to be honest, I have the same restraints on me, you know it’s not an open chequebook and an open medium, it’s a movie, you know they don’t just say ‘Oh look, you know, five hour movie and you know, 500 million dollar budget’. That would be cool, don’t get me wrong, I would love that but, and to keep it, you know I have to make deals, you know, to keep it rated R and to keep, you know, at a length that I think is appropriate and all those things. I gotta, there’s trade-offs that I make as well, you know, so the thing is that I tried to, with what to leave, what to put in and what to take out, you know, we shot more and then, you know in the editing process we kind of, you know, some stuff, that doesn’t drive the story has to get taken out but I really endeavoured to keep the movie weird….(laughs)
M: That’s good.
Z: …in a good way
M: It’s swings and roundabouts – you miss out on Tales of the Black Freighter but you get to see Dr Manhattan in the nude so, you know, it’s still true in that sense.
Z: It’s really kinda true. Those are the kinda things.
Q: First thing I wanna say is that was pretty cool what we saw so far. Got a question about how you guys are trying to reach out to the non-comic book fans because obviously a lot of people know about Watchmen and with movies like Batman, Superman, Spiderman they’re well known characters, with Iron Man they had big-name actors which you said you’d chosen not to go with, you’d rather use the money for production, so is it recognized and is there concern and how’s it being dealt with?
Z: Well, Iron Man and X-Man, Men, and Superman had man in the title which is cool so we do too, sort of, (laughs) so we’re gonna go with that for one thing, people are gonna, ‘Boom, look at that – Men – you should go see that!’ (laughter from audience)…
M: Must be a Superhero movie!....(more laughter)
Z: I mean I think that there’s two things that we’re trying to do right now is, we’re trying to create like, you’re going to have two audiences they are going to respond to the movie in two ways, right? They’re gonna have, you know, average movie goer who doesn’t know anything about graphic novels who doesn’t care about Watchmen and doesn’t care how many Hugo Awards it won They’re like ‘Whatever, it’s a comic book’, you know ‘It’s stupid’, not to be mean to them, that’s totally valid, um, but on the other hand you’re also gonna have people who are open to the sort of, bringing pop culture to Watchmen aspect of it, you know like, getting out the character bios, getting out the kind of, what the movie’s about, how it’s the answer instead of like just another one in the line, you know how it’s sort of a little bit more sexy and violent and maybe thinks a little bit harder, you know those things being the, part of the reason to go see it, maybe get a little bit more from your superhero movie than you’ve been getting in the past. And then I think that also it’s cool to just cast a wide net and say like, ‘Come see Watchmen cos it’s, you know, it’s got superheroes in it and you know, there’s like an Owl Ship that looks kinda like an egg (audience laughter)……that’s a reason to go….. it’s like a spaceship, I mean come on, it’s sci-fi.
M: I think people kind of forget as well that things like X-Men, when they were first released, you know, that was a pretty small budget film, no-one actually knew who Hugh Jackman was in Hollywood at that point and then suddenly it was big. Before Iron Man came out they didn’t even want Robert Downey Jr cos they were too scared that they couldn’t bank on him in a big movie so we’re probably looking at things in hindsight and thinking……
Z: Yeah, I think that you know, when you look at the sorta, the artwork we’ve looked at just for the general sort of, marketing, it’s really, if you look at it carefully you can see your crazy movie in there but if you’re just passing by, you’re like, ‘Oh cool, superhero movie’. And that’s kinda what Watchmen did when it came out, you know, as a graphic novel, you know, like a lot of kids picked it up as a comic and were like ‘Oh it’s cool, it’s the new Alan Moore comic, it’s just going to be a cool adventure’ and it’s like ‘Oh my mind just got blown’ so there’s that part of it too. Hopefully the movie does the same thing, a little bit.
Q: In the graphic novel itself, it’s sorta, you get the quote at the end of each chapter regarding a song, so it’s sort of a written soundtrack. Are you aiming to keep that going through, we heard Bob Dylan in the clip you showed, but we’ve sorta had Smashing Pumpkins and Muse in other things, so….?
Z: That’s mostly the marketing materials, I have used a lot of those songs (from the graphic novel), not all of them of course cos there’s more chapters than I have, ah, but yeah, we used a lot of the songs, the ‘All Along the Watchtower’ and ‘Desolation Row’ and there’s a few others.. oh there’s Nina Simone. For me it’s like, ah, I don’t know, I think that as much as I could, I used them and I also tried to use other songs that are iconographic from the era that kinda…it’s funny cos we do have ‘Sound of Silence’, ‘Sound of Silence’ is in the movie, right and I’ve shown it to someone who was like ‘God, Sound of Silence, man, that’s in every movie’ and I was like ‘Really, really? Because you know that song, it’s only been licensed for one other film, “The Graduate”, you know, I know it seems like it’s in every movie but because it’s like…I think the movie does that a lot, you know it feels like ‘Oh yeah, that’s that thing that’s in every movie but when you really think about it, it’s very particular, you know it feels like a cliché, because it’s exposing one, I think.
M: You’ve done that with the imagery as well in the opening credits of the lady kissing the woman after the end of WW2…
Z: Absolutely….
M: …so it presents a resonance…
Z: Yeah, what I was trying to say is ....I mean it does two things I think. It’s like a trip to the twentieth century and sort of, I think that, hopefully the idea is that, when you have superheroes, how does it?…it ripples through, you know, culture and makes you look at something from a different angle.
Q: As Dr Manhattan loses touch with his humanity throughout the graphic novel he wears less and less clothes. Was there any pressure from the studio to keep his blue **** (person clenched mouth and nodded to indicate expletive) out of the film?
Z: Well, of course, I think that early on they said to me ‘Well what are you gonna do with Dr Manhattan’s ah junk in the movie?”….(audience laughs)
M: Did they call it his ‘junk’?
Z: They called it a bunch of stuff, it was in memos and emails so it was always different, but um, you know they’d say ‘penis’, I guess, or ‘cock’ - that was very rarely, that’s when they were mad, um, so, which is an angry word anyway, so you know and I just kept going ‘Well, it’s there, I don’t know what to say, you know it’s a difficult thing’, you know I start him off in less clothes, I never…he’s either in a suit or his battle briefs, that’s what we call them, I don’t know if they have a name, in the sixties he’s in his battle briefs and then in modern day he’s naked, I didn’t do him in the (like) biker shorts, the riding shorts and then the, with the singlet like wrestling outfit, although that’s cool, I didn’t…in the graphic novel he slowly loses touch with humanity so his clothes get smaller and smaller until he’s naked um but we just, we went with him being naked and it’s cool and you’ll see in some of the advertising, like we just finished the trailer and of course the MPAA made me do, like a, you know, defocusing….
M: A Ken doll?....
Z: Well, you know, you just have to look really carefully if you’re into that sort of thing, that’s fine, you know, but the truth is I wanted to put a black bar but they felt like that was too, like too Borat, so I was like ‘alright, we’ll just go defocus’ but yeah, so no it was an issue but it’s like one of those things I just said ‘Look it’s gotta be that way’. In the other, in..not and I love Fantastic Four, not to be mean, but like you know, the Silver Surfer, they said to me ‘Well the Silver Surfer looks fine with his, just, bulge there’ and I’m like ‘Yeah but he’s like having sex with Laurie in the movie so it creates more questions to me than answers’, you know, do you know what I’m saying?
M: Yeah, I know exactly what you’re saying (audience laughs) I just don’t know how far we can go with that so (audience laughs)
Q: What is the main impression you want your audience to leave the film with?
Z: Well, I feel like the main thing thematically is that well, the main impression, is that the movie, first of all like any movie I would hope, that it takes you to another sort of experience, that for me is my favourite thing with movies is that you get to go to another point of view, of another world and spend a while with that. And hopefully at the end, you know, it’s not, by no means am I trying to make some preachy movie about how you should think, um, but you should think a certain way – no just kidding – but I do think that it’s cool that, if a movie can, when you walk out, it would be cool if people could sit down and talk about it and go ‘Like, no, fuck, Adrian was wrong. You’re an idiot’ or whatever, rather than just ‘Hey that was cool, what else/” and shut it off, the second they walk out, you know, it would be cool if it rings for ten minutes, it’d be cool, or longer (audience laughs)
M: Ten minutes in this time?
Z: Like if they get to the door of the theatre….
M: ‘That was great.’
Z: ‘That was great, what was that again, I forget that movie’ (audience laughs)
M: Whatmen?
Z: (laughs) cos that’s kinda how it is today, it’d be cool if it was little deeper.
M: That brings us to the end of the questions (Moderator thanks Zack and audience offers final round of applause).
M: Moderator
Z: Zack Snyder
Q: Question for audience
| 118 |
| Vote |
Add To: 
Comment by Morgan Bell
Science News
Deep Pencil
Business News
Movie Train
Artist Quirk
ill pop back a bit later and read the whole thing thoroughly and leave a decent comment, but i just wanted to throw some karma points at you as a big pat on the back!
i hope this is the first of many exclusive interviews!
Comment by David L
That was such a good read by the way.
Comment by Morgan Bell
Science News
Deep Pencil
Business News
Movie Train
Artist Quirk
i like how youve been chillin with Cibbuano and mingling with professional movie people . . . very cool, very very cool!
i dont know if this style of movie is exactly my cup of tea, but you really did your research!
i like how all anybody is interested in is whether you can see penis or not! haha
overall this seemed like a really fun little chat session, and the moderator seemed particularly funny . . . Watchmen Babies The Musical, ill keep an eye out for that!
is that Smashing Pumpkins on the soundtrack?
look, i may just watch it for Billy Cruddup - now theres a man id love an interview with!
nice work Jason!
Comment by Jason King
Sydney Table
Salty Popcorn
Total Randomness
Yes to Smashing Pumpkins - he loves his tunes!!
Billy Crudip is awesome in it!
Comment by Cibbuano
Hunt Famous
Orble Post of the Day
Fat Cult
Techbreak
Definitely recommend reading the comic - it's glorious!
Comment by Jason King
Sydney Table
Salty Popcorn
Total Randomness
Comment by Louie
Climate Red
randomthoughts
Phil's Wellness Tips
Comment by Jason King
Sydney Table
Salty Popcorn
Total Randomness
Thanks heaps - and yes it was and can only get easier from now on!