With THE WOLVERINE slashing his way back into cinemas this weekend, THN met up with director James Mangold, the man behind WALK THE LINE, COP LAND and GIRL, INTERRUPTED to name but a few. In the concluding half of our interview (Click here for Part One), Mangold talks about his experience shooting in Japan.
Did you have any worries, joining such a colossal franchise?
James Mangold: That anxiety was relieved by A, there was widespread disappointment in the first element of that franchise and B, there was a sense, whenever you’re following an act on stage that might have tripped or fallen, you’re feeling a little more optimistic about your own chances. There’s also the fact that Chris Claremont and Frank Miller’s saga took place in Japan, which I felt gave me this odd permission to change up things; to change the tone a bit. And his hair, we wanted to drop the ‘Flock of Seagulls’ thing he’s had for the last decade and give him something a little more… like a haircut someone might actually have.
So was the allure of filming in Japan too strong to resist?
James Mangold: I’ve been quoted plenty about lots of movies. Like my first movie, HEAVY, is hugely influenced by the work of (Yasujiro) Ozu, so I’ve been kind of a Japanese film fan all my life. Certainly as a Western director, the idea that a major movie would let me shoot in Japan with a Japanese cast was a huge draw for me, in the sense that it’s not very often that you’re going to get that, at least not in this environment.
What was the main difference between shooting in Tokyo and, say, Los Angeles?
James Mangold: It’s actually not a country that’s well-practiced anymore in location shooting, shutting down streets, you know? Part of it is boring stuff, like, there is no Japanese film commission, so if you’re coming into Tokyo and saying, “How do I do this sequence at a train station?” You’re basically on your own to cobble together permission from the different corporations that run the train line, the station, and a lot of it is private, it’s not like it’s publicly owned. Even on the streets, what translates into something I thought was exciting for the film came about because it was so hard to shut things down in Tokyo in any effective way. I’d have these places picked out earlier in the day and we literally just started loading Hugh, Tao (Okamato, who plays Logan’s love interest Mariko), a camera and me into a van, and we’d just jump out and run them down the street! There are shots in the movie that are just Hugh Jackman and Tao running for their lives down a crowded street in Tokyo, and we’re just chasing them, guerilla style, seriously.
That guerilla way of shooting creates an aesthetic very different to previous X-MEN films. Was that something you wanted from the beginning?
James Mangold: On one side it was interesting for me because it was something we decided in prep, that we wanted to try and fight the CGI-tis of these films a little bit with a more naturalistic shooting style. But then things took on a life of their own and we found ourselves shooting in that manner just through physical necessity. But it’s an odd feeling, having come up in the New York independent scene to suddenly find yourself chasing a movie star down the street with a handheld camera, making a movie in excess of a hundred million dollars and saying, “Well, things haven’t really changed all that bloody much.”
Presumably, though, there were aspects that could only have been worked out in pre-production?
James Mangold: Well there was real careful planning between the Japan shoot and the Australian shoot, because we wanted to coordinate the integration between different locales. I’m pretty proud of the way we did it. So the sequence where they’re going up the steps for the funeral entering the temple, encountering the monks with the drums, that’s all Tokyo. But as they come out the other side into the garden, that’s Sydney, as is the entire fight inside. All the shots of Harada (Will Yun Lee) looking down from the roof, that’s Tokyo. When they bust out, we’re back in Tokyo, but on the streets – it’s a combination of Sydney and those shots of Harada jumping between buildings, some of it’s Tokyo and some of it’s Sydney. In order to make that stuff cut so smoothly, it’s a lot of coordination, planning, screen direction, shot sizes, direction of light to make stuff cut and match so the audience don’t think about it. It’s incredible how checkerboard it is sometimes.
Rila Fukushima is just one of many Japanese stars featured that may have Hollywood knocking their door down. How did you find working with a predominately Japanese cast?
James Mangold: They brought a grace and an incredible infusion of energy. Japanese actors aren’t hams in-between when they’re acting. There’s an incredible sense of reserve, which is beautiful. I felt like I had this incredible, dedicated troupe and I felt very dependent on them. We spent six months together. Hiroyuki Sanada (who plays Shingen Yashida) basically ran a training camp in Sydney where all the actors were working out every day and rehearsing moves and choreography. It was a real family affair. Tao, Rila and Hiro were so helpful with translation and helping me get the best performance. I didn’t want to make this Tora! Tora! Tora! film where all the Japanese people were speaking English. It happens in American movies where suddenly all the Nazis are speaking English, where some have English accents and some have American accents. Maybe I’m not liberal enough, but I felt like language is a part of the culture and it makes movies more cinematic. If you have a character who can’t understand what everyone’s saying, you’re automatically pushed into watching the film, watching their movements and eyes. It’s the presence of language but the absence of it at the same time. It was an interesting strategy we had, and I wasn’t sure if Fox would let me get away with it. The rule would be Japanese people would speak Japanese when they’re speaking to each other, or when they don’t want English people to understand them. But that’s a lot! So I was a little nervous that when we started shooting, someone at Fox would start freaking out. So I shot every scene in English, printed it and sent it back for dailies. I then shot every angle in Japanese as well and it really occurred to me how much better everyone was in their native language. So I showed Fox the Japanese version and never heard a peep out of them. To their credit, it’s not like they were fooled, I think they really enjoyed it and, in this new market place, were perhaps excited by the film being multilingual.
I think many will be surprised at the levity in the film, as it certainly appears far more serious than its predecessor in the marketing. Do you think comic book movies have become too serious?
James Mangold: I think you could say, without naming films, there are movies that seem to have an absence of humour, but I don’t necessarily think that self-seriousness is a bad thing, when it works. But I also think that there are other films in which the presence of humour is annoying to me… The omnipresence of humour. Sometimes it feels like an episode of FRIENDS with action. When I read comic books, I didn’t feel like there was a quip every three seconds. I felt they had a wry kind of humour, like a Clint Eastwood movie. I think that is what separates me from some of the very successful films; I find them too glib. Some of them remind me of the sixties Batman series, and that may be very cool for some. But for me, when I started reading comics, and still now, it’s not the way I read them. I’ve never seen them as being these tongue-in-cheek, wink-wink adventures. Absolutely the opposite – if I wanted that I would have read Mad magazine when I was thirteen. I wanted my comics to be an absolutely committed morality tale with more adult themes, like men and women and revenge and jealousy and bitterness and parents screwing up superheroes’ childhoods and all sorts of things that were very grown up. It’s a trick because the word ‘comic’ derives from the word comedic, so people expect them to be funny. My Grandmother used to call my comics ‘joke books’. I used to yell, “IT’S NOT A JOKE BOOK, GRANDMA!” and I still feel a little that way. I’d say I fall in-between, the tone I like is the tone I chose – allowing the actors the space to be real. I think, in compared to the slightly more ponderous films, my style is a little more naturalistic and a little more emotional. I wouldn’t say it is necessarily about being funny but I like to feel intimate with the characters. There are a lot of superhero films that are trying to be funny all the time, and that’s definitely not my gig either.
Do you think we have just too many comic book films now?
James Mangold: It’s kind of an old man’s game, to be kvetching about that kind of stuff. It’s like saying, “There’s too many Westerns!” because nature takes care of it, just like a herd of buffalo. Y’know, several will lose money and then nobody’ll be interested and something else will be in for five years. Either that or we are in a never-ending spiral of comic book films. What I’m tired of is comic book films all in the same mould, all trying to do the same thing. Superhero films are essentially myths and Gods films, and I don’t have any issue with people making myths and Gods and legends movies, that’s always been happening. It’s just the repetitive nature of people trying to emulate other peoples’ success that produces a glut of the same style, and I do think there is a lot of the same style going on right now.
THE WOLVERINE is directed by James Mangold and stars Hugh Jackman, Rila Fukushima, Tao Okamoto, Hiroyuki Sanada, Svetlana Khodchenkova, Hal Yamanouchi and Famke Janssen. It hits cinemas on 25th/26th July in the UK and US respectively.
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