John Woo at American Cinematheque (April 2002)
| A report by Cameron Brown
American Cinemateque
at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood has been featuring the work of John Woo this past week. Tonight they screened
Bullet in the Head. The man himself was present for a Q&A session after the film. |
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John Woo is a humble and unassuming figure. He looked like any mild-mannered Asian businessman in a grey suit. He's kinda short, with greying hair. But there's definitely something about him... you could tell this wasn't just any businessman when he came out to talk to us. Far from being a tough-guy character like one of his own movies, he was beaming from ear to ear and bowing politely as we applauded.
At first he stumbled over his words, explaining that he was overcome with emotion that we liked the film! Apparently
Bullet in the Head wasn't well received in Hong Kong. Since shooting it went way over time and budget this was a considerable embarrassment to him, and it cost Golden Princess (who published it) a lot of money. So he's pleased that American and European audiences like the film.
He said it's the work he's most proud of. You can see why... despite some clunky dialog (probably thanks mainly to the sub-titling) and questionable logic the movie is full of raw emotion. Tony Leung, Jacky Cheung and
Waise Lee all give incredible performances. Jacky Cheung as Frankie is particularly affecting in key scenes - when he's being forced to shoot American POWs in a VC camp, and later when he's reduced to a mindless junkie.
Woo described the first half as autobiographical. The first part of the film is all about three friends growing up poor in rough neighbourhoods in Hong Kong. Woo said he'd seen many people beaten and killed in riots and gang wars, not to mention mudslides, and that these experiences were formative for him. It sounded like the Tony Leung character was sort of him, and the other two were based on real friends of his (one of whom joined a gang and 'disappeared', the other became a drug addict).
I found this interesting because I've always wondered where his obsession with violence comes from.
The second part is 'all fiction'. Set in Vietnam but filmed in Thailand, it chronicles the friends (mis)adventures as they become embroiled in the moral void of Saigon in wartime. The film is a little patchy, but there's some great scenes. Woo told a lengthy anecdote of how he got Leung's reaction shots in the POW scene (Leung is watching Cheung's character shoot the POWs, and it's really an amazing performance). Woo wanted 'tears', and went to great lengths to get them!
First, he got dressed up in an American soldiers costume. Then he briefed one of his stunt guys to shoot him with an AK47 (loaded with blanks) when the camera started rolling. So that's what happened - surely the last thing Leung was expecting. Woo explained that even though the gun was shooting blanks, he was getting shot at close range and was in severe pain. His clothes were torn and he got burns on his body. He ended up rolling around in a puddle in front of Leung. He did this for *seven* takes (the first being unusable because, instead of tears, Leung registered total shock and astonishment!). Since Leung and Woo are close friends, the idea of Woo being gunned to death in front of him was enough to elicit the sought after tears.
After this Woo was open to questions from the audience. One woman asked if it was true that Woo's next project was going to be a period piece about the construction of railroads in America, starring Chow Yun Fat and Nicolas Cage. The answer was yes, and that the film was to be called
Man of Destiny. Woo said that Chow Yun Fat and Nicolas Cage have a real mutual appreciation thing going, and are excited to be working together.
Someone else asked about an alternate ending to Bullet in the Head. Woo confirmed that in Hong Kong the film was released without the final car-chase scene. The film ended in the boardroom when Leung plonks Frankie's skull on the table (this scene stretched my credibility to breaking point, but it does provided Tony with a heroic "I kept my promise!" line). Contrary to rumour there was no shoot out or any violence in the boardroom, it just ended there. Woo put the car chase back in for the international release. He went on to say that Hong Kong production houses almost never kept additional footage once a movie was cut - they just threw it out "like garbage!". He was aggrieved, and said a lot of Hong Kong studios just regarded movies as product, not as art like him.
Oh yeah, he said he "went crazy" and was "totally out of control" while filming
Bullet in the Head. He compared himself to Coppolla shooting Apocalypse
Now. From the AK47 story I kind of believed him. He's obviously capable of great passion and commitment.
Someone else asked when he was going to make another "Hong Kong" movie. His answer was interesting, I thought. He said he was interested in travel and experiencing other cultures, and that Hollywood facilitated that better than Hong Kong. He wanted to make movies in Australia, in Europe. He said he'd made enough in Hong Kong. I think he should make a movie about Chinese prospectors in the Northern Territory. That'd be cool! But I was too shy to call out and say that.
And that was about it. He re-iterated how grateful he was that people liked his movies and supported him. All in all, he seemed like a really nice guy, and it was certainly interesting to hear him speak. He's very passionate and involved, and not at all pretentious.
| Oh some other odd points - he said all his films (even the recent Hollywood ones) were about "friendship", and that all his favorite characters "are halfway between good and evil". Also he admitted to being heavily influenced by Scorcese
(Mean Streets) and Peckinpah (can't remember specific films), and mentioned a couple of scenes in
Bullet that were direct "quotes" from those movies. |
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CAMERON BROWN is a videogame designer, musician and Aussie who is
now living in Los Angeles. He'll kick yer ass on Virtua Fighter any
day of the week.
