Spike Lee’s remake of remake Chan-wook Park’s revenge thriller Oldboy is sure to entertain with its gory, bloody death scenes, fight scenes of dozens miraculously falling victim to the hands of just one extraordinary fighter, and a love interest that takes a surprising turn. Rolling out interviewed the legendary director to get a bit of insight on the “reinterpreted” Korean film and his upcoming project.
The film marks the first time that Lee has worked with the remarkable Samuel l. Jackson since 1991’s Jungle Fever. “It’s like we never left,” he stated during a recent press day in New York. “I see Sam all the time outside of our projects … our wives are close friends as are we, so we see each other all the time, we just haven’t worked together. It was like old times when we got on set.”
And it took just one phone call to get the old friends together.
“He called me up and said he was a huge fan of the film and how he would like to be a part of it. I told him any role he wanted besides Josh Brolin’s is his,” says Lee.
Audiences will find that Lee didn’t follow the original storyline. “They’re different stories and you gotta be versatile,” he says. “For me I don’t dictate my style on the subject matter. The story tells me what to do. There is nothing about filmmaking that’s easy … n-u-t-h-i-n.”
The other thing that was difficult was the preparation Josh Brolin underwent to play the lead character.
“He went through a great change. He put on 50 pounds,” says Lee. He had to gain weight fast and then lose it. I think in one week he lost like 30 pounds, and all the weight was water weight but he did it under the supervision of doctors and a nutritionist.”
Lee also briefly discussed his upcoming project, Da Blood of Jesus. The project stirred up a little bit of controversy when Lee decided to solicit donations for the film from the Kickstarter.com website, netting 1.4 million dollars.
“The film is about people addicted to blood but they’re not vampires … it’s bananas. There aren’t any well-known stars in the film, but they will be once you see this movie,” he says. –kimari clarke
