Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with a really really really short interview with George A. Romero. He was out and about promoting the LAND OF THE DEAD DVD and I was able to nab a quick chat with him. Unfortunately for me, our already short interview (was supposed to be 10 minutes) started 4 minutes late and ended on time... As a result the already super short interview is even shorter. Below you'll get 6 minutes worth of Romero. I wanted to go in-depth on all of his upcoming projects, but those were last on the list and so when I got the "last question" warning I had to wrap them all up in one all encompassing question.
There's the set-up! Enjoy the brief interview!
QUINT: I haven't seen the unrated DVD yet... I'm very much looking forward to it, but I thought I'd ask what your preferred cut of the film is? The theatrical or the unrated?
GEORGE A. ROMERO: You know, that's a hard question to answer because I don't think they're that different. The intention of the film is the same. The film on the unrated version is not that much longer. I mean, there's one scene that we shot, but it's a story point, not gore, which we just left out of the theatrical release because I didn't think it turned out as great as it could have.
Of course, there are two or three of Greg Nicotero's greatest hits. But mostly I think the most interesting thing about the DVD is the stuff that other people did, the extras. The SHAUN (OF THE DEAD) guys did a little piece. Leguizamo shot a little film... I hope the fans are going to check it out and dig it because I think they're really fun.
But as far as the film itself, I have to say that I think the intention of the film hasn't changed hardly at all.
I was very satisfied with the theatrical. I thought I got away with murder, man. Literally! I used a trick, I stole Kubrick's trick... You know, I shot some zombies against green screen, so I could lay 'em over the top of the gore stuff. You know, the MPAA will never say, "Cut a scene," because they don't want to be considered censors, but they will say, "Cut 8 frames out of that." So, my way of doing that was to shoot foreground to be able to lay over the top. So, a couple of those things came off on the DVD.
I don't think the intention, as a state, the intention of the film is pretty much the same. It's not a different movie.
QUINT: Well, just comparing this to the unrated cuts of your previous DEAD movies, you can see right away that it's much shorter than most of your previous unrated cuts.
GEORGE A. ROMERO: Yeah, I think it's only about 5 minutes longer. But you know, what's a director's cut anyway? I don't know, man. Let's be clear. A lot of this is just marketing. I don't know how many versions are out there of DAWN. They're different, they're worth seeing and if you're a real fan, it's wonderful to be able to pick.
QUINT: What's your favorite gag in LAND OF THE DEAD?
GEORGE A. ROMERO: That's hard to say. I love the guy who gets his head blown off in the beginning. The thing that (Greg Nicotero) did himself, the bridgekeeper that gets his head chopped off by the drawbridge.
QUINT: That's a great moment.
GEORGE A. ROMERO: It's hard to pick stuff out. I don't know this stuff well enough yet. You don't look at a movie... you can't look at a movie, or I can't as a filmmaker, until a couple of years after its done... to really look at it objectively. But the stuff that gets the biggest applause is the that, the bridge keeper. Then the headless guy, but Greg (Nicotero) didn't do that. We wound up having to do that in CG because we were able to make the puppet look real enough.
HERE WE GOT OUR "LAST QUESTION" WARNING
QUINT: What'd you have in the pipeline? Particularly DIAMOND DEAD and THE GIRL WHO LOVED TOM GORDON... I'm a big fan of King's book and am really curious to where the film adaptation is currently standing.
GEORGE A. ROMERO: THE GIRL WHO LOVED TOM GORDON is still in the works. It's very hard to get it financed because it's not hard horror. It's not what people want from Steve (King) or from me and we've had a hard time financing it, but it is still definitely in the pipeline.
I'm working on another of Stephen's projects right now called FROM A BUICK 8. You know. I don't know... ILL was never real. DIAMOND DEAD... I love DIAMOND DEAD, but nobody seems to get it. It's another one that's sort of hard to get the money in for.
Because of the reviews on this film I'm getting a lot of scripts and a lot of offers, but I'm peculiar. I don't take a job because it's a job. I'm hoping that something will come up that I can dig, that I want to do. I can't tell ya' right now what's gonna be next.
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And there is the shorty interview. I wish I could have gone in-depth about each of his upcoming projects, living, dying, dead or otherwise. I'm especially peeved at not being able to talk about the two video games he's been a part of. One being the LAND OF THE DEAD game, which follows a survivor through the zombie wastelands to the city of Fiddler's Green, and the other is an original story set in the Romero universe called CITY OF THE DEAD.
Oh, well. On the next go around, I suppose. In the very short time I had with him, I was surprised by his candor, specifically about the marketing aspect of releasing two different cuts of the film. Hope you guys enjoyed the quick read!
-Quint
