On Interviews with Producers and Filmmakers

This is something I have come to wonder about recently.

During this whole process of the Blade Runner franchising fiasco, a number of interviews with producers at Alcon took place. The most notable of which took place on the science fiction/science blog IO9.

While I have no strong negative opinion towards a Blade Runner universe continuation, I feel that the breadth and complexity of the film is all encompassing in its storytelling and that sequels and prequels are ultimately redundant and will likely not add anything to the film canon. Nor do I think Nolan is capable of telling a satisfying Blade Runner story. Ridley Scott's film is ultimately a huge budget art film that actually forces the story into the background and is instead more of an observational exploration of a futuristic city and darker possibilities of the future in terms of humanism and technology. Nolan by this comparison is a far more narrative focused Writer/director whose only observational type film was his early student/indie film Following. Further more the advancement of computer, television and communication technology has rendered much of this film's finer future tech aspects redundant and archaic.

But I digress, the question that has always arisen in me when these interviews come out is why are most interviewers, when given an opportunity and access to people such as these Alcon producers, ask only doaty questions that allow a producer to boast about themselves without actually answering anything? It seems as if everyone who interviews these people want to keep their mouths shut so don't anger some invisible demon that is the movie industry. I desperately want someone to go to one of these interviews and actually ask a simple straightforward question that requires a frank answer. It doesn't seem like real journalism anymore and instead everyone is just a cog in a marketing scheme.

Why is asking, honest, hard questions so difficult?

In fact I would be completely satisfied with an interviewer asking the interviewee this one question: "You spent all this money acquiring the rights to franchise Blade Runner and have all these lofty aspirations, but why couldn't you have put this cash and enthusiasm towards an original project instead of mining cinema history so familiarity will buy you a few more tickets?"

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chris Myers 

If I were from Alcon, I'd say "We are not doing this to mine familiarity for additional tickets - we are doing this to get something made at all. See, if you're not working with one of the top, let's say, top ten commercially successful directors working today, not having Will Smith attached to star and are not basing your script on any existing success, it's absolutely impossible to get any funding or studio support for a sci-fi project northern of 75m dollar, no matter how creative or amazing your scripts, artworks and concepts may be. So our alternative to "mining cinema history", as you call it, would simply be to just give up. If you're making a living from it, that's kinda difficult."

And isn't that kinda obvious? There are always two kinds of concepts behind doing a sequel: A a guaranteed basic public interest and B actual good ideas for a sequel. No one is going to frankly say that they're only in for the money, so why bother asking? A better question would be "How will this differ from the original? Will it be able to stand outside it's shadow?". This way, you're not stepping on toes.

And yeah, most interviewers actually see themselves as a form of extended movie promotion. Every movie interview is PR, and while they obviously want to have a positive effect on readers, writers just want interesting material. Now if challenging or pissing off actors, directors, producers and writers is necessary to get more interesting material, it'll not last long. You'll get shut out of interviews, screenings and set visits. They don't want you to swallow everything and be a kitten about everything, but when you go tiger on them, endangering their desired effect, they'll use their right to kick you out. Instead of boring material you'll end up with no material. It's like in a relationship, it's compromises. You gotta find the right tone of your questions and they'll give you something to work with.

 

What actually annoys me is people doing interviews who've actually no idea about the interviewed person, or his movie, or movie-making itself. Seriously, how do you answer a question like "What was it like fighting Megatron on those roofs?" or "What was it like working in blue paint all day on Avatar"? I may understand questions like that from eight-year-olds, but professionals?

And I would accept that answer. Because it was honest. An answer doesn't have to be one I like, I'm not that kind of person. I just want someone to ask an honest, straightforward, non pr question from time to time and have a straight answer given, which is something we never get from hollywood. Hell Even Bay apologizing for Revenge of the Fallen felt dishonest and pr to me. (I don't hate Bay like other cinephiles, though I do criticize some of his editing and casting choices. The Island I feel is his objectively best film and one that I like.)

I don't want people to stop what they're doing and grovel at my feet saying, "Forgive us Phill, for we have angered your sensibilities of cinema history and marketing." That would be unfair and Devin/Moviebob territory, which I refuse to enter.