Question's & Answers with director Paul W.S. Anderson from the “Summer of Sony” International Press Junket - Cancun, Mexico

Q. Resident Evil: Afterlife did huge box office around the world. What is it about this series that makes it resonate so strongly with global audiences?

A. It’s going to sound a little cheesy but [these movies] are really made with love and with a passion. The people in front of the camera and the people behind the camera are all there to make the best possible movie. In moviemaking, that doesn’t always happen. People are there for different reasons: they want to make money; they think it’s a good career movie; it’s the only movie they could get. These movies only get made because we really, really want to make them. I think that shows. I think they’re incredibly well made movies made with passion and energy. What’s happened slowly over time is that, as the movies have become more successful, I’ve had more resources to make them, so they’ve actually become slightly bigger movies as well, which I think has suited the way the franchise was built. I did a movie called Alien vs. Predator, which I’m happy about because Alien is one of my favorite franchises. The jump that happened between Alien and Aliens is an object lesson on how to develop a franchise. I think that when James Cameron looked at Ridley Scott’s movie, I imagine he went, “Fuck it. I can’t make a better movie than that. That’s as good as that movie could ever be. How am I going to make a movie that follows Ridley’s movie?” What he smartly decided to do was make a slightly different kind of movie. He didn’t make the monster/haunted house movie that Alien is at its heart. He made a combat action movie with aliens in it. That was the start of a very successful franchise and that’s what I’ve always tried to follow in my rationale for building the Resident Evil franchise: to make each movie slightly different so the audience gets a different experience. We never rest on our laurels and we never repeat what we’ve already done. 

Michelle, Paul & Milla

Q. If you and Milla had a martial arts fight, who would win?

A. I wouldn’t stand a chance. I’m beginning to think I wouldn’t stand a chance against my daughter, either. She’s only four and a half but she goes to Taekwondo class. “Tae-Kwon-Do! Yes I can!” She’s got the white outfit. It’s hysterical.  

Q. How powerful are you at home?

A. I have no power at home. That’s why I have to direct movies. It’s the only way I get any kind of power. It’s the only way I get any kind of respect.

Q. Do you think Milla could direct one of these movies herself at this point?

A. I don’t think she wants to direct.  

Q. But could she do it?

A. She’s very accomplished. She’s a very smart woman. She knows a lot about scripts and a lot about camera angels and a lot about lenses. On set, she said to the director of photography, “Move that light over there a little bit.” And she’ll be right because she’s spent so long in front of the camera. I think there’s nothing she can’t do. Being a director is a different kind of discipline. It’s a year and a half of your life. She’d be crazy to want to do my job. 

Q. Len Wiseman and Kate Beckinsale are another director/action heroine couple. Are you friendly with them?

A. I’ve known Len since he made Underworld. I went to his cutting room when he was cutting the first Underworld in London because he used Martin Hunter, who had cut Mortal Kombat and Event Horizon and Soldier for me. So I’ve known Len for years. I bump into him all the time. We’re both on the Sony lot right now cutting movies so I’ve been very friendly with him. Actually, Milla and Kate had never met until this year’s Vanity Fair [Oscar] party. I saw Len. He saw me. The girls were there. So they met and they got on like a house on fire. 

Q. Who would win in a martial arts fight between those two?

A. I think we’d probably have to make that movie. I don’t want to give it away. The big argument is, would it be Underworld vs. Resident Evil or Resident Evil vs. Underworld? 

Q. Are you planning to wrap this series up soon?

A. We made a trilogy of movies with the first three. You dream about making more than one movie. Although I may talk about making another movie, I never assume we’re going to. I think it’s incredible hubris to just assume you can make another one and another one and another one. If this movie doesn’t work, there won’t be another Resident Evil movie and I know that. That’s why every movie I make I put everything into it. For most movies I assume it’s going to be my last movie and I’ll get fanned out and no one will allow me to make another movie so I throw all the shit against the wall to try and make the best possible movie. But, you can’t help but kind of imagine it. What I would like to do is kind of bring the franchise full circle with the end of the second trilogy and literally come back to the very genesis of the franchise and the very first film. That’s why, in this movie, you’re starting to see characters return that you haven’t seen for ten years. It’s all headed back to that inception point. 

Q. How far along are you in writing the next one?

A. It’s all fleshed out in my mind. I know exactly what it is. This movie is a stand-alone movie. I’ve always felt that, with Resident Evil, you should be able to go see the film and have not seen any of the previous movies. I try and make it so it works for you. If you’ve never seen the first four, it doesn’t matter. You can still go and see this one. I think that worked with the last movie because we basically doubled the international audience for it. So there must have been a lot of people going to see it who had never seen the others and they enjoyed it. I want you to be able to watch each movie out of context and have it still work as a movie. But if you watch the whole thing then you get more out of it.

Q.  When you’re writing these films, do you have total creative freedom or do you have to work with Capcom, creators of the game series?

A. I have great respect for Capcom and the creators of the game. The very first thing I did before I shot a frame on film on the first movie was I got on a plane and went to Osaka and I spent two days in a window-less room with terrible jetlag pitching how I saw the movie and the franchise. I heard what their opinions were and I listened to them. Of course, I changed some things. That’s been our relationship ever since. I have tremendous respect for them because I’ve been involved in Resident Evil for a decade. They’re the people who created the whole world in the first place so you have to have respect for them. But I also think they’re smart enough to understand that a successful movie adaptation cannot just be a slavish adaptation of the video game, frame by frame. One of the things that has led to some of these video game adaptations not working is that sometimes they take too many liberties and sometimes they don’t take enough. It’s a fine balancing act between the two. The creators of the game at Capcom trust me enough as a filmmaker to know that they’re in good hands and that I’m not going to do anything that’s disrespectful to their franchise. I’m going to do different things in the world of the movie but I’m never going to contradict anything they do. I’m not going to go kill a character that they’re like, “Don’t kill him! He’s in the next video game.” They’re on parallel paths, the video game franchise and the movie franchise, but they’re not contradictory. 

Q. At what point did the movies start to make more than the video games?

A. I have no idea. I don’t get any money out of the games. Maybe the games make more money. 

Q. How do you come up with the monsters for each film?

A. That’s easy. I just look at the video games. One of the things that’s incredibly strong in the games are the creatures, the zombies, the monsters. So I just take them straight from the game. We have a very open conversation with fans and we find out which are the most popular creatures. That also has an effect on what we put in the films. 

Q. Who’s a better gamer, you or Milla?

A. Me. I came to the franchise because I lost a month of my life. I was locked in a room at home just playing the first three games back to back, whereas Milla would watch over the shoulder of her little brother as he played. So I know that if it came down to a battle on the video game consul, that’s at least one battle I could win. I could win the virtual battle.

Q. So at this moment, do you think there’s one more film in the franchise?

A. At this moment, I think it’s this film. For me, it’s all about this movie and if this movie does well, I would love to make another movie to round everything off. 

Q. Did the 3-D technology change a lot between shooting Afterlife and this film?

A. Yes. We’re kind of on the bleeding edge of technology because it’s a relatively new technology and the cameras kind of reinvented it with Avatar. So the rigs and the cameras change every time I make a movie and I’m making a movie every twelve months. The unique thing for this film is I got the opportunity to have cameras built for the way I shoot by the director of photography that I use, whom I’ve used on my last few films. On this one, he said, “Look, Paul, I’m tired of hearing you complain that you can’t do things. So I’m going to build you a rig where you can do everything you want to do.” I think the 3-D on this film is going to be pretty spectacular. I think it’s going to take 3-D to the next level because it’s custom-built rigs that are doing things I don’t think any filmmaker has done before with a 3-D rig.   

Q. Event Horizon is turning fifteen. Is this movie still special for you?

A. I love it. We did some of the photography for this movie in Toronto and while we were there, a cinema there showed Event Horizon on the big screen and I did a Q & A before it. It was on a work night so I turned up for the Q & A and then I was going to watch the first two minutes of the movie then go to bed because I was sort of tired. I started watching it and I just hadn’t seen it on the big screen in ten years. It looked so cool. So I ended up staying for the entire movie. So I love that film. It was a pretty unique time in my career. I had just come off a huge hit [Mortal Kombat] and when you have a huge hit, the studio trusts you. And they had Titanic, which they were obsessed with. So all of their effort was going to Mexico to get shouted at by James Cameron so no one came to London to visit me so I just kind of made this movie and I made it exactly how I wanted to. Then they saw it and were just horrified by it. “What were you doing?” I’m like, “Did you watch the dailies?” It became obvious that they didn’t because they were just concerned with Cameron. So it was a rare opportunity to make a studio movie where I had total creative control to make something that was truly so much more horrific and dark and edgy than they ever would have wanted. 

Q. Maybe you could convert it into 3-D…

A. It would be pretty horrible, all that stuff coming out at you. 

Q. You mentioned that you are an Aliens fan. Are you excited for Prometheus?

A. Absolutely. Unless I’m working, I’m going to be the first in line.