Sam Raimi Press Conference
Can you talk about the pressure of doing blockbuster movies in comparison to the projects at Ghost House? Do they even compare? Is it easier to do a lower budget horror film compared to the massive blockbuster spectacles?
“Yes. It's much more fun and relaxing making the pictures at Ghost House because, really, that's about just working on a limited budget and relying on the smarts of the filmmaker and the craft of building suspense and scares. It's back to pretty much the old-fashioned formula of making a horror movie. Sometimes we fail and sometimes we succeed, but I really like that back to the basics approach without the big budget. Although, I'm not the directors on those and the work is usually put upon the directors. I enjoy watching them work in the genre, though. I like the reactions the audience gives us when we're successful.”
Do you see yourself personally directing a smaller independent project again or are you now contracted to do Spider-Man 4? Is that your next project?
“No, I'm not contracted to do Spider-Man 4 and I think that'll depend on a lot of things. Sony would have to ask me to do it and the story would have to work. I don't think I know the answer to that right [now], except that it would be great because I love Spider-Man when we can find the right story. Whatever it is, I'm sure that it'll be a great story. A lot of people are working really hard on a great story right now. It is a lot more fun though to work in a much more free atmosphere where there are pure expectations. It's kind of a dastardly fun thing to do, like being in a spook house.”
In the decades since Evil Dead there's been what you might call an evolution or de-volution in the horror genre to things like torture porn and the slasher films. Using the technology we have now you can show things that you could only hope that the audience’s imagination could go to in the earlier days of horror films. What do you think about that? How graphic do you feel comfortable going? Is that the direction that horror is going now?
“Well, it's always been an element of the horror film to show us the gross out. I mean, that's one option for all filmmakers making a horror film. It's not something that I've found myself above either, so I don't want to speak like I'm some big shot. I definitely want to get the, 'Ew! Oh, gross!' reaction to some crowds at the drive-in. That's an element.
Really, I want to do a lot of things like build suspense, build scares, do laughs, create some really scary sound moments where the audiences uses their own imagination. But a gross out is not beneath me or a lot of filmmakers for a horror film. That's one tool in the arsenal. I don't know that it's new thing either. Way back when, by showing the Wolfman change, Lon Chaney, his hair dissolving and the makeup effect of the Wolfman back then, just like Night of the Living Dead back in the '60s by George Romero showed a lot and it freaked me out as a kid. Cannibal Holocaust showed some intense sights. So when I think about the new ones it's just the latest incarnation with probably better technology, like you're suggesting – better CGI. I don't know if they use CGI or not and better makeup FX and maybe showing more and more horrible stuff, but once we've seen the last stuff, these filmmakers have no option if they're going for the gross stuff but to push the next thing we haven't seen. So I think it's natural.”
What about the sub-genre of the comedy horror film? That's become really popular. Does it make you think about how to do an Evil Dead differently at all?
“I don't think about the other pictures when I make Evil Dead. I just think about the character of Ash and how dumb he is and how low and cowardly he is, and what dumb things he wants to do when he should be thinking of more noble things and what misinterpretations he has. I'm just thinking about him and feeling bad for him and disliking him and wondering how we can punish him a little bit more in the future.”
Can you speak to some of the films that scared you or amazed you?
“Sure. I think the film that scared me the most was Night of the Living Dead, George Romero's classic zombie movie. I was brought to the theater underage. I was 10-years-old. My sister, damn her (laughing), brought me to that thing, snuck me under her coat or something. I was never so scared in my life. I thought that a crime was being committed against me as I was watching that film. It was so awful and terrifying. It was a nightmare come to life.”
Your name may have been brought up in connection to possibly directing The Hobbit. Now it seems like maybe Peter Jackson and New Line might be getting somewhere with that. Can you update us on your feelings about that project?
“I think there's no better choice to direct The Hobbit than Peter Jackson. I'm a giant fan of The Lord of the Rings trilogy and Peter Jackson is a brilliant filmmaker. He would be the guy, I think, everybody would like to see direct it. I hear that they're talking too, from reading the trade magazines, and I don't really know first hand, but that's good. Hopefully he will direct it and give us his great version of it.”
And if he doesn't direct it, is that something you'd like to do?
“If he doesn't direct it and decides just then to produce it, I'd love to be considered as the director.”
Isn't that what's being talked about now, that he's coming back to produce and not direct and that you would direct the film?
“I don't know if that's being talked about. I don't presume to know what's happening in those rooms. I mean, I know that Peter Jackson always loved The Hobbit. I'm assuming that he would want to direct it, but I wouldn't want to make any claims that I don't have any knowledge of.”
Page 4: Possible Future Projects
