Sam Raimi Press Conference
Does it feel like you've come full circle with your career in a way, in that you started out with horror and now here you are promoting it?
“At the end of my career?”
No, but that you've just come back to where you started with a film that is quite similar in a way.
“I've always loved – actually, I didn't always love horror films. I started out and I only liked comedies and dramas. And then I had to learn how to make a horror film because my buddy Rob Tapert said, 'If we're going to break into the business, we need to make a low budget film that's a horror film because we can probably only raise a couple $100 thousand in Detroit and the only movies that are made and shown for that amount of money are horror films. So, can you make a horror film?'
So I had to learn how to make a horror film. He said, 'Do you like horror films?' I said, 'No. I don't actually like horror films. They scare me.' I didn't have fun being scared back then. It was just a scary experience. So I watched them to see if I could make them and then I grew to admire the craftsmanship that went into them. Then I grew to really love them after a time, watching the audience interact and react with them. Now this company Ghost House Pictures gives me a chance to dabble in horror films and not have to do the hard work of directing them, but more or less work with the great artists which is a lot of fun. Put a few cents in without actually taking the bruises myself, and so it's lovely being a producer. It's really a lot of fun.
I get to learn a lot, too. I get to see dailies of David Slade or I get to see dailies of Takashi Shimizu. I get to see them working with the actors and I think, 'Oh, that's a really smart idea, the way that they got that performance from that kid. I never would've thought of that.’ Or, 'How interesting that he put the camera there. How interesting that he doesn't play this as a scare, but he just lets that creature quietly move out of the darkness. That gives me a chill running up and down my spine. That's not how I would've thought of doing it.’ I'm so much louder and brasher and uglier in my approach. So I learn a lot also in watching these filmmakers work. But yes, I feel like I'm returning to horror as I started out in it and I feel like I'm going to school again.”
Everything seems to be about franchising right now. You seem to be at the lead of some of that. Do you have plans for this and what's going on with Grudge and Evil Dead?
“Well, I've always made sequels, even when I was making Super 8 movies - if the audience liked it. We made The Jimmy Hoffa Story back in 1976 in Detroit where Jimmy Hoffa disappeared. Because it got some laughs from the kids, even though Jimmy Hoffa died at the end of it, we made Jimmy Hoffa 2. It didn't make any sense, but we also made Jimmy Hoffa 3. We also made James Bombed, which was a James Bond spoof and James Bombed Again. And Uncivil War Birds and Civil War Part III. We've always made sequels, myself and my friends Scott Spiegel, Bruce Campbell, Rob Tapert. Making the sequels to the Evil Dead movies were nothing new. To me it's always just been a return to familiar sets and approaches and working within that known setup. It kind of saves time in storytelling. The stage is already set and the audience knows what type of thing to expect, and you can just go for the gags sometimes.
I'll probably always be making sequels and maybe that's why television seemed like a good fit for Rob and I when we did Hercules or Xena or American Gothic. Just a continuing story with the same characters is real natural for us. I've been raised on comics which has always been the same too, I guess.
We currently don't really have a plan for Evil Dead. I know I've talked about finding a young filmmaker to re-imagine that and remake it at some point. Rob said to me, 'Look, the movie came out in 16mm and was a blowup to 35mm. We only had 60 prints. No one ever really saw it in the theaters. Why don't we make a big screen movie of Evil Dead in 35mm with really great actors and a great director, real cameras, a great soundtrack?' I thought that was maybe a great idea because it was so crudely made that a new filmmaker could do a great job. But it's just that once we said that publicly, we haven't spent any time looking for people. It's all just been talk and it's still just talk right now because I've been so busy. But we would like to do that at some point.”
And Grudge 3, what's going on with that?
“There is a writer working on Grudge 3 right now. He's working on the screenplay. He's going to be getting notes to us in about a week and is going to go back to work on a second draft and try to finish it before the writer's strike.”
There was something in Variety about a month ago that they were looking, Sony, at their options for the future of the franchise and had opened the door to you. Do you have any comment on that or where things are at with that?
“Right now Sony is meeting with different writers to try to bring a fresh new story and approach to the Spider-Man franchise. So I've been in meetings with Avi Arad and Laura Ziskin, our producers and Amy Pascal. Different writers have been coming in and spinning different tales of where Spider-Man could go from here.”
You mentioned a fresh new approach to Spider-Man. Does that mean a reboot of the Spider-Man franchise or a direct sequel to Spider-Man 3?
“I haven't heard the reboot idea yet, but I think that Sony – I'm actually not writing it. Different writers are coming in and I have not heard a reboot idea yet.”
Page 3: Torture/Slasher Films, The Hobbit and More on Spider-Man 4
