Kurtzman and Orci Talk ‘Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen’
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, Blu-ray and DVD Cover Art
With only five days to go before the release of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen on DVD/Blu-ray you can expect the rest of the week to be filled with Transformers buzz.
In the latest, writers Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci share their insight into what it’s like working with the Transformers cast (including Megan Fox), on the differences between working on Transformers and Star Trek, and on the issue of why some people hate the film whilst others love it.
On the polarized response to “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen,” with part of the audience loving it and part of the audience hating it:
Roberto Orci: Yeah, I expected it to be divisive. Sequels now are easy targets, number one; it was undertaken under the pressure of a writer’s strike, which makes us targets; it was longer, which was a debate. It was bigger, louder, and longer than the first one. There was controversy on the first one as well.
Alex Kurtzman: It’s very hard to gauge what is going to work for people, and what’s not going to work for people. Because what one person says is way too long, my 12-year-old cousin says “I wish it was longer.” That just totally confuses me. I think at the end of the day, Michael [Bay] has his rhythm and his pace, and he ends up determining how long he wants to make the movie.
On the advantages of writing for the “Transformers” pre-established cast:
Kurtzman: Knowing them and knowing their voices – It’s huge! It’s huge, and a great thing to have. We’ve made three movies with Shia, and he’s an incredibly fun actor to write for in that he can do dialogue at any pace. Not every actor can do that. He really can run through things. Shia has a really good… I’ll call it a “cheese alarm.” If he thinks something is cheesy – which I think really means inauthentic – he won’t want to do it. So when we are writing, we are often thinking of kind of knowing where his instincts tend to go, in terms of scene work and what he likes to do. For him, he cannot act a scene unless he feels the truth of it somehow. It has to be truthful. It can be funny, it can be broad, it can be lots of things – he can be talking to a giant robot, but there has to be some truth in it. If there isn’t then he can’t do it, so that’s very helpful in terms of knowing what he’s going to be looking for in a scene.
On the effects of economics on film content, and balancing studio requests and demands with storytelling needs:
Orci: I think it’s affected the content in a global way. The movies that are being selected to be made tend to be, right now, this very escapist, fun, big, forget-your-life, kind of stuff. We’re not seeing a lot of adult dramas. That’s why we’re writing these. The minute you are writing “Transformers” I think the economy comes in. But they want to be more conscientious budget-wise. Yeah, they do want more robots, but for a price. You have to make sure you do it at the right level.
Kurtzman: What that means is that your character story, hopefully, is strong enough to sustain the affordability factor. You won’t be able to have a robot in every shot.
Read the full interview at Superherohype.com.
Full Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen DVD/Blu-ray details here.
