Gavin Hood and Lauren Schuler Donner Talk Wolverine Blu-ray and Sequel
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By Jeff Otto on
September 10, 2009
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A special event was held on the Fox lot today in West Los Angeles to debut some footage from the forthcoming “X-Men Origins: Wolverine,” which hits DVD and Blu-ray in four different editions on September 15th. There will be the single disc DVD, the double-disc special edition DVD, the 2-disc Blu-ray special edition and the big blowout Wal-Mart exclusive 3-disc with the DVD, Blu-ray and a digital download copy.
Fox is touting “Wolverine” as being a particular standout of the Blu-ray format. It does appear to be packed with extras, including perhaps the most intriguing new feature called Blu-ray live, an IMDB-powered menu option that will allow users to pull up a menu at any time during viewing and take a look at the filmographies and upcoming project information of all the actors on screen.
The disc is also jam-packed with deleted scenes and behind-the-scenes info. During the event, Fox showed off a scene in which Logan elects to have William Stryker (Danny Huston) erase his memory and Victor Creed (Liev Schrieber) looks on with concern. They also showed a short documentary on Hugh Jackman’s intensive physical preparations for the role, including his restrictive diet that had him downing protein shakes in the middle of the night and taking set breaks to scarf down one of his seven daily meals.
Director Gavin Hood and Producer Lauren Schuler Donner took questions after in a brief Q & A session. They discussed the Blu-ray format, the process of selecting the proper source material for Wolverine’s first solo adventure and the inevitable “Wolverine 2,” which Chris McQuarrie is currently hard at work adapting from the early ‘80s Chris Claremont/Frank Miller series set in Japan.
Do you think the fans are starting to get more excited about adopting Blu-ray?
Gavin Hood: Certainly from my side, yes, but then we’re here in L.A. and we’re folks who love movies of a certain quality. I think it’s the same with all new stuff, whether it’s the iPhone or Blu-ray. The fact is, it’s not going to go away, it’s only going to replace. It’s a better technology, just as we lost VHS at a certain point. I think it’s a wonderful new medium and I was as surprised as anyone when they told me that it could actually do stuff like a live feed. That’s incredible. The next step is, what, I don’t know, if we decided we really want to add a deleted scene we could [upload] it to you on your Blu-ray. Is that possible?
[A member of the Fox marketing team says yes, it’s possible.]
Does the success of the first film give you greater liberty to take an original approach or does it put more pressure on you to maintain truth to the source material?
Lauren Schuler Donner: I think it’s our responsibility to remain true to the source material. There are other influences and other factors that make us deviate from it, the first of which being transcribing it to the screen. We certainly are fully aware of the fan base and try in every way possible to stay close to the source material. I think in ‘Wolverine’ it was a little bit different because there was a lot of different source material, a lot of different legends in Victor Creed’s relationship to Logan and Logan’s background. There were some choices we had to make. Certainly in ‘Wolverine 2,’ in the Japanese saga, we will stay very close to the source material. I think it’s just best that way.
Gavin Hood: The truth is, what freaked me out a little when I was doing my research was that I was looking for the definitive origin story of Wolverine. And, of course, any of you who know the comics know that doesn’t entirely exist because this guy’s been written about for 40 years by many different writers, different illustrators. Wolverine’s been drawn wearing a yellow spandex suit and he’s been drawn about wearing jeans and a jacket. The truth is, all of these versions are from source material. The origin story of him as a kid and the bone claws happening and the hint that Victor Creed may be his half brother. In the original draft, when we looked at it without him being a half brother, there wasn’t as much emotional connection between the hero and the villain. So we had to make the choices that were right for this movie. That doesn’t mean there aren’t other options that other writers have written. I just prefer to do a movie with him in jeans and a leather jacket rather than yellow spandex. (Laughs)
Do you also look to more recent Wolverine material for possibilities to draw from?
Lauren Schuler Donner: There are 40 years of material. Chris Claremont, they’re still writing. Chris is writing an amazing series right now where Wolverine’s killed, Storm is the villain. Sure, one day I’d love to that.
Gavin Hood: I think that’s the joy of this character. He isn’t just one thing. He’s this great icon that can be played by different people and different people get different [things] out of him in different ways. Everybody has their own interpretation.
There are similarities between Wolverine and the James Bond franchise. Do you see the strength of Logan’s character to be able to sustain such a long franchise?
Lauren Schuler Donner: Yes, that would be wonderful. There’s enough comic book material to support it. If we were to make up our own story, which we’ve never talked about, personally I would do it with Chris Claremont. I would stick with the creator.
One of the deleted scenes shows a young version of Storm. Did any other characters appear that got cut?
Gavin Hood: Other than Storm, I don’t think so. Storm’s the only one that didn’t make the movie because there’s only so many characters you can put in without it feeling a little cluttered. Lauren made the point, I think rightly, that none of the other movies have Storm giving any hint of having met Logan.
Given that this is part of a franchise and there are alternate endings where he’s drinking to remember, did you give thought to what a potential sequel might be?
Gavin Hood: I knew everyone was excited by the story in Japan, which I then read and I absolutely do think is a wonderful story and they should do it. But it didn’t effect 99 percent of the film we were making. He moves to another land, so no, I think we were focused on the film we were making because we didn’t know if there would or wouldn’t be a sequel.
Gavin, you’ve talked about pouring through the 40 years of material when you came into this. Aside from the Japan story-line, were there other stories besides what you used that you thought you might put aside for a sequel if you got that chance?
Gavin Hood: I just think that the Japanese story is so iconic and beautiful and could be so visual. That’s the one and I’m reluctant to talk about others because I know Len [Wein]’s writing others now. And honestly, here’s the truth: if the Japanese story works, there might be another sequel. And if it doesn’t, there won’t be. You can get ahead of yourselves by sort of stirring up rumors of what might be. I’m not going to even go there.
I don’t even know if I would be involved. Right now I’m not attached. Nobody’s attached. They’re developing a script and we’ll see where everybody is. I’m hoping to be shooting something next year and I don’t think that ‘Wolverine’ will be ready for next year. I haven’t been approached one way or another. The studio is obviously very cautious. They want to see how Wolverine does on DVD. Let them develop the script, let’s see what the script looks like, let’s see how the studio feels about the script, how Hugh feels about it and then we’ll take it from there.
X-Men Origins: Wolverine Ultimate Blu-ray Disc will be available September 15.
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Tags: 20th Century Fox, Hugh Jackman, Gavin Hood, Action, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, News |
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