There’s a fairly lengthy interview with creature effects master Rick Baker over at the LA Times. Most of the article has to do with his work on the recent Wolfman. But, in an interesting nugget at the end of the piece, Baker confirms that he will be returning to Men In Black III: “I’m just starting up now Men in Black [III], which is another one I wanted to do because I worked on the first two.”
Baker also riffs on the state of practical effects vs. computer effects: “I embrace the technology and I’ve been doing my designs on the computer
for 22 years now. It’s another trick in your bag of tricks. There are
things you can do [with computers] we can’t do with rubber and
animatronics. But I hate when the computer stuff just makes for sloppy
filmmaking, and it has.”
Commenting on how The Wolfman did in theatres, Baker noted: “When you’re working on a movie you always hope that people will go for
it and enjoy what you’re doing. I don’t know what they were
expecting. Frankly, it seems to me that part of the problem was when it
was released. To put out a movie called “Wolfman” on Valentine’s Day
weekend against a movie called Valentine’s Day? I
didn’t really understand the logic of that. What do you expect? Release
it on Halloween and I’m sure it would have done a lot better.”
You can click over for the entire interview, including a video featurette on the makeup of The Wolfman featuring Baker.
15 comments
Rick is dead on about the Wolfman's marketing fiasco. Why couldn't they have waited until Halloween? Hell, Trick 'r Treat was shelved for what, two years, and then went direct to DVD! Both studios could have made a lot of money if they had just released their films at the appropriate time. I know, I'm stating the obvious, but come ON.
Deadfan is spot on. No need for further comments. Shut this page down.
I liked The Wolfman more than the average schmo it seems, although it COULD have been more than it was for sure. Has anyone seen the director's cut yet? Is it an improvement? But as for Men in Black 3 – sheesh, does anyone really want that? Too recent for nostalgia, too tainted by that terrible sequel.
It's not really that simple. There are only 2 Halloween weekends and one has been ruled by Saw for 5 years now.
Heck they don't even release the Halloween movies around Halloween
A friend and I just watched The Wolfman last night, and both of us found it be a pretty terrible film. There was no suspense or horror to it at all. The Wolf makeup was decent enough I suppose.
However, I agree with his take on practical effects vs. computer effects.
Part of the reason Saw ruled the Halloween weekend(s) was because it never got a healthy dose of competition. PARANORMAL ACTIVITY finally knocked it off the altar last year if I remember correctly. But I would have liked to see the outcome of Rob Zombie's HALLOWEEN movies if they were released on October 31st, instead of the end of August when everyone knows to expect turds.
@A-COD – Except for last year when Paranormal Activity beat it at the box office and the year before that when High School Musical 3 kicked its butt on Halloween weekend. Saw is played out. Saw 3D is going to be the last gasp.
I actually saw Wolfman with a chick on valentine's day. It was her choice, which makes her a keeper in my book. But that's another story. I liked it. Probably because I didn't go into the movie expecting anything. this is how I usually see movies. I agree with his take on cg, and how it's just another element to effects in film. And it also irks me when the cg is just lame. I'm digging the "worst cgi in movie" thing you guys got going here.
Sorry Rick, you're a legend and all, but I thought the makeup design of The Wolfman was pretty poor. It looked silly and not very scary. Just my $0.02.
For whoever asked it, yes the director's cut is an improvement but only slightly. There's more character development early on, especially for Del Toro and Blunt, but the parts of the movie that were ass-tastic before are still just as bad.
Will someone please give Rick Baker a few million and let him direct his own monster movie like Stan Winston did with Pumpkinhead! I would love to see what he could do with full control over a monster movie.
Rick Baker pretty much summed up my feelings on CGI. I'm with Ryan, give the man a blank check and freedom to let loose. Some experienced hands present for him to bounce ideas off off couldn't hurt either.
It's time for a full-blown, brightly lit, single-shot, full-body transformation. And stop trying to make the protagonist in wolf-form some kind of "hero". The End of Wolfman was exactly like the execrable Wolf.
Best thing about the Wolfman was the fact it was bipedal wolf MAN and not a crappy CGI full wolf. The story was choppy and film needed to be darker in content, plus the "other" werewolf looked crap
I wonder why they don't release horror flicks on Halloween anymore. Hell even Trick and Treat was not on Halloween. What's wrong with them.
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