This is an old interview but still:
I think Star Wars kind of set the level of it, and that's just good comic-book romping. It's not the kind of fantasy that's awe-inspiring or terrifying, and that's where I'm interested in fantasy. Fantasy isn't just a jolly escape: It's an escape, but into something far more extreme than reality, or normality. It's where things are more beautiful and more wondrous and more terrifying. You move into a world of conflicting extremes. So much of the fantasy I see is just a sort of cartoon romp, a kind of wish-fulfillment. I remember, years ago, talking to George Lucas about evil. He thought Darth Vader was evil. And I said, "No, he's not evil. He's just the bad guy. You can see him coming a mile awayhe wears black. Evil is Mike Palin in Brazil, your best friend, the father of three, a good man, who just does what he does." [Palin's Brazil character was a nervous, mild-mannered government torturer. ed.] That's the difference. The big jolly escape... Filmmaking has become amazingly baroque now. The camera can go anywhere. We can do anything, and it's just "Wow!" And yet I find that most of the films I see are just rides, E-rides at Disneyland. They're nothing that tends to stay with me. They don't touch any core that is either worrisome or inspiring. They're good fun, but usually when you walk out of the cinema, they're gone. They don't leave bits of shrapnel in you.
More at :
http://www.theonionavclub.com/feature/index.php?issue=3904&f=1
I think Star Wars kind of set the level of it, and that's just good comic-book romping. It's not the kind of fantasy that's awe-inspiring or terrifying, and that's where I'm interested in fantasy. Fantasy isn't just a jolly escape: It's an escape, but into something far more extreme than reality, or normality. It's where things are more beautiful and more wondrous and more terrifying. You move into a world of conflicting extremes. So much of the fantasy I see is just a sort of cartoon romp, a kind of wish-fulfillment. I remember, years ago, talking to George Lucas about evil. He thought Darth Vader was evil. And I said, "No, he's not evil. He's just the bad guy. You can see him coming a mile awayhe wears black. Evil is Mike Palin in Brazil, your best friend, the father of three, a good man, who just does what he does." [Palin's Brazil character was a nervous, mild-mannered government torturer. ed.] That's the difference. The big jolly escape... Filmmaking has become amazingly baroque now. The camera can go anywhere. We can do anything, and it's just "Wow!" And yet I find that most of the films I see are just rides, E-rides at Disneyland. They're nothing that tends to stay with me. They don't touch any core that is either worrisome or inspiring. They're good fun, but usually when you walk out of the cinema, they're gone. They don't leave bits of shrapnel in you.
More at :
http://www.theonionavclub.com/feature/index.php?issue=3904&f=1
