In part 2 of my interview with filmmaker John Hyams (Click here to read part 1), we discuss the current state action cinema, and the many influences behind 'Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning.'
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Scott Adkins (Left) and John Hyams (Right) on the set of Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning. |
John Hyams: Yeah,
well it was more like 8 million.
Scott Wilson:
That’s even lower than the reported budget.
Yet, it’s not only the best film in this particular franchise, but one
of the better action pictures released last year. Do you think you could have made an even
better film if the budget had been in the hundreds of millions?
John Hyams:
Sure. Money doesn’t always guarantee quality. Still, if you have more money and you use it
responsibly, you can work on a bigger canvas.
I’d certainly welcome the
opportunity to work on a bigger canvas if it came along. I’m sure Larnell and everyone else involved
would agree with me. When you have more
money, what you really have is more names.
More money buys you more toys, rigs, and visual FX. For me, it’s really about the shooting
schedule. We shot this movie in 29
days. Big movies usually take 60 to 100
days to shoot. I don’t think you need
100 million dollars, though. Both Looper and District 9 cost around 30 million dollars. That’s very efficient. You can do a Hell of a lot in that
range.
I think one of the problems with the business is that those
movies (Movies like District 9 and Looper) are getting engorged. Studios are either making 200 million dollar
movies or five million dollar movies.
The most creative movies exist between those two extremes, and they’re
getting lost in the mix. When you work
within that range (District 9 and Looper), there are still restrictions
involved. You can’t have everything with
30-50 million, but you have enough to execute some pretty spectacular
stuff. Day of Reckoning was designed around its budget. That’s usually my approach. I think movies really have to be reversed
engineered, where you have a controlled budget you and tailor the script accordingly.
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Scott Adkins (Left) with Jean Claude Van Damme (Right) during the climax of Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning. |
Day of Reckoning
is kind of a horror/thriller. It’s a
hallucinatory experience that crosses different genres, from action to film
noir and all these different things. We
had budget of 8 million dollars. That was
our “below the line” budget, meaning that after the producers and actors got
paid, our actual shooting budget was 3.5 million. We shot in 3D. When you’re dealing with 3D rigs and 3D
technology on a 3.5 million dollar budget, you have to scale everything down a
bit. We decided to focus on tension and
horror. We couldn’t do G.I. Joe style
action, so we intensified things for impact.
All of our creative decisions were really born out of the budgetary
limitations. That changes the scope of
what you can do. Having more money also
changes the scope of what you can do.
I’d certainly welcome that challenge.
Scott Wilson: Modern action directors have forgotten the
basic fundamentals of the form. I’m talking
specifically about guys like Michael Bay and his ilk. They’ve brought about an aesthetic now known
as “chaos cinema.” Why is it that so
many of the modern directors who work with large budgets seem to have forgotten
the fundamentals?
John Hyams: I
think it really depends on the aesthetics of the individual. Michael Bay comes from commercial filmmaking
and commercial music videos. Commercials
are essentially condensed. They exist in
a condensed time frame. In other words,
they don’t really exist in real time. They
often deal in montage, because they’re trying to make a point in 30-60
seconds. That sensibility informs
Michael Bay’s editorial style, which isn’t constrained by the rules of screen
direction. It uses lots of quick cuts to
keep things visceral. Everything keeps
moving. That’s Michael Bay’s style, and
it appeals to audiences in a big way. I
don’t think that he has any desire to abandon that style. It’s ultimately born out of his background in
commercials. Whether it’s writing,
theater, or independent cinema, your background informs your directorial
style. Paul Greengrass used to make
documentaries for the BBC. I think
that’s where his style really comes from.
I think directors who specialize in “chaos cinema” have a background in
commercials. My roots are not in
commercials, so I have a different aesthetic approach. It deals more with geography and screen direction
and wire lenses, so it has more of a real time feel.
Scott Wilson:
Throughout Universal Soldier: Day of
Reckoning, I could spot many references to other works, from Frankenstein to the The Manchurian Candidate to Apocalypse
Now to Dante’s Inferno. Tell me a bit about those influences.
John Hyams: I’m
not always aware of these references while I’m making the film. When I look at the film after its completed, I
can spot them. Personally, I see a lot
of David Cronenberg in it (Day of Reckoning). He’s always been someone who straddles
different genres. His movies can be
horror movies, thrillers, or dramas.
He’s worked in multiple genres at once.
We were aware of the Apocalypse
Now reference while we were making the film. It was born out of the narrative. For one, you have a story about a guy who
needs to find another guy and kill him. It’s
the journey of an assassin.
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Captain Benjamin L. Willard (Martin Sheen) in a haunting image from Apocalypse Now. |
A lot of ideas came straight out of Heart of Darkness (The novel which provided the basis for Apocalypse Now), where a character is
going on a journey of self-discovery.
He’s going to find a man. In the
process, he’s descending. In the case of
our story, the main character is descending underground into the heart of
darkness. He’s discovering the violence
that exists within him. Right from the
beginning, the story takes the audience inside of our character, metaphorically
speaking. It starts from the
outside. By the end of it, we move
in. The whole thing is a descent.
We also tip our hat to other things. Our protagonist has created his own
underground militia. He also has a
shaved head. There’s also the journey up
the river. We realized that our creative
decisions led us down a certain path. As
far as the Universal Soldier films
go, Day of Reckoning strays pretty
far off of the reservation. We embraced
the references to Apocalypse Now. At this point, the film itself (Apocalypse Now) is almost a literary
reference. It’s a very iconic reference. A Kurtz-like figure is almost a part of pop
culture iconography.
There are many other cinematic influences as well. Filmmakers like Gaspar NoƩ, for instance. Again, a lot of them are just movies that
I’ve seen. Whether I’m copying them
intentionally or not, they’re all brilliant films by brilliant filmmakers. They’re all stories and ideas that create a certain
kind of mood and setting. Certain people
have mentioned mention David Lynch. He’s
always had an influence on me as a filmmaker.
The things he did in regards to sound design, creating a feeling or
tone. His movies often take place in
very mundane settings, but they emanate a sense of dread. That was something we wanted to inject into
this movie (Day of Reckoning).
Scott Wilson: The
film contains a cameo by Roy Jones Jr. His
ring persona has always been that of a showman.
He’s known for having a really big ego.
How did you get him to play that particular character, especially
considering (Spoiler Alert!) the fate that befalls character?
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Roy Jones Jr. (Left) with Jean Claude Van Damme (Middle) on the set of Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning. |
John Hyams: It’s
funny that you’d say that, because I’m a boxing fan. I’m also a Roy Jones Junior fan, but I didn’t
know anything about him personally. Our
production supervisor, Deidre LaCasse, lives down in Florida. She was friendly with Roy. When we were casting that role, we looked at
in many different ways. I initially
thought about going with a stunt guy, because it’s a very physical role. It’s not going to be easy for whoever does
it. It wasn’t important to the story, so
it probably wouldn’t work for an actor with a big ego. When
she (Deidre) brought up Roy’s name, I thought “Oh Boy, I don’t know. I don’t think he’s going to want to do
this.” Secondly, I didn’t think we could
afford him. He might have an
entourage. You never know, especially
with pro athletes. I didn’t know if he
could learn the choreography.
She told me to call him, so I had a brief phone conversation
with him. He seemed nice enough, but I
still wasn’t sure about him. On the day
of shooting, I made sure we had someone else waiting in the wings in case Roy
decided to pull a no-show. Well, the
reality is this: Roy does not have an
entourage. He drove down to Baton Rouge, LA by himself. He showed up and immediately got to work,
learning all of the choreography. He worked
really hard. He realized that you can’t
be too picky when you’re just starting out.
He also realizes that it’s a world away from the boxing ring. He’s already done The Matrix: Reloaded. He’s
really cool. He never left the set
between takes. He just hung out. I had
the pleasure of sitting down with him to eat lunch. We discussed boxing. He’s just a really good guy and pleasure to
work with. We got really lucky.
Scott Wilson:
There’s an online critic by the name of Outlaw Vern. He wrote a piece for the Village Voice where he named you and Isaac Florentine as two of the
best action directors working today. Now,
considering the source, I see that as a tremendous compliment. Does it gratify you when people react to your
work in that way?
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This image should be instantly familiar to anyone who knows of the great Outlaw Vern. |
John Hyams: It’s
very gratifying. Outlaw Vern in
particular has had a really positive effect on my career. He was
one of the first guys to get behind Universal
Soldier: Regeneration. When it was
pretty undiscovered, he wrote a really amazing review for it that was posted on
Ain’t It Cool News. People don’t
realize how important that is for a DTV movie.
When a site like Ain’t It Cool News runs a review like that, the people
at Sony take notice. That
was career defining moment for me. If I
go on to have a successful career in this business, I’ll owe a huge debt to
people like Vern. They’ve written about
me and my work on various websites and publications. These kinds of films don’t have big
advertising budgets. They live and die
by the reactions they elicit from critics and fans. That’s who’s keeping me afloat at this
moment. It’s because of those people why
I continue to have a career.
Scott Wilson: Do
you have any upcoming projects you want to mention?
John Hyams:
Nothing that I can officially announce right now. I’m still in the thick of development,
meaning I’ve got a few irons in the fire.
We’re trying to see which one will take hold. It’s a really difficult process right now. I’m trying to make sure that my next project
is a step in a positive direction. I may
have to turn down movies in the same budgetary range, because I’m trying to get
to the next level. It’s a more
competitive environment. It’s difficult
trying to convince people to give up more money. We’re in the process of developing a new Universal Soldier idea, something on a
much different scale. We’ll see if we
get the kind of money we need to execute this vision. I think it’ll take everything to a whole different
level. We will see.
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