Fant4stic (2015) *ahem* “successfully” flops at the box office and its director, Josh Trank, is likely going to the director’s jail for a quite long time. Sitting lower than the god-awful Batman & Robin (1997) on Rotten Tomatoes, this makes me wonders, how the hell this could happen...? I’m intrigued to know what causes this mess since I personally think Josh Trank isn’t that bad as a filmmaker. Trank, who previously helmed a unique kind of sci-fi movie, Chronicle (2012), instantly grabbed public attentions for his first feature film.
Thanks to his groundbreaking debut, he was originally set to helm only-God-knows Star Wars spinoff; one of which could be Rouge One (2016) or Solo (2018). Trank was one of Hollywood’s hottest properties at that time until the news about his erratic and destructive behaviour on the set of Fant4stic have surfaced on the media. It was reported that Trank isolated himself from the crew and prefered to work alone. He even clashed not only with his actors but also producers (Simon Kinberg and Hutch Parker) which one may suggest his incapability to work under a big studio system. The aftermath? Well, it didn’t go well since both Kinberg and Parker are the ones who did their best to reshoots and edit the film under tight schedule; changing almost all Trank’s concepts for the film.
The way I see it, this so-called “symptom” is exactly what happened previously with Edgar Wright and Marvel Studio. Marvel, as some of you might know already, is a blockbuster studio that constantly changes / replaces their directors from one project to another. Most of the filmmakers they fired, are visionaries and could hardly compromise to what studio execs wish (yeah, I’m looking at you, Disney) since they already have their own vision on what to do to the property they helmed. Based on this fact alone, we can learn that Marvel’s studio-driven tendency (as so does the other big studio) rules all general aspects of their films: the plot, storyline, etc.
Back in 2007, when I wasfalling in love with my high school crush *ahem*, I mean, in my senior high school, my friends and I were so hype with the upcoming Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man 3 (2007). Although the reception is kinda okay at the time, it’s still far from good as the previous two films. There are rumors that Raimi only wanted to use Sandman as the major villain for the movie while Sony wanted Venom to be put together on screen. Putting Venom paired for no reason with Sandman while the latter was originally plotted to give a more emotional effect for Peter’s fundamental reason at the first place to be the Spider-Man, seems like a no brainer move from Sony. In the end, Raimi dropped out from Spider-Man 4 due to creative differences (the studio didn’t want to put Dylan Baker’s The Lizard on screen).
As for the case of Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), several directors have said that their final product, especially the post-credit and end-credit scenes, are not exactly theirs. Some of those are directed and shot by different directors, and rammed into the film as final stingers. These additional scenes are actually the”secret recipe” that makes MCU films are so in line with their vision. They tried to course-correct what just happened in the movie while making people invested with a more bigger things to come (aka their grand vision for the franchise) by teasing them only in normally 5 mins. Take example with Thor (2011) where the end-credit scene shows that Loki is still alive; was actually directed by Avengers (2012) helmer, Joss Whedon. Or take another example with Thor: The Dark Wolrd (2013), where its mid-credit scene was directed by Guardians of the Galaxy (2014) director, James Gunn.
A strong-willed and visionary director definitely doesn’t want his masterpiece to be touched, edited or polished by another party, even if that means not within the guidelines the studio has planned. This so-called clash of the titans (director v studio), is probably one of the cause why Edgar Wright left Ant-Man. And maybe probably Josh Trank, too. Originally, Trank envisioned Fant4stic to be a David Cronenberg’s body-horror / superhero film hybrid that totally would differentiate itself boldly from the other mainstream comic book movies. Personally, I think it makes sense if Trank wanted to put a body-horror element to it and could have been worked well. But shame, the studio (20th Century Fox) rejected the idea and even call for reshoots for its first cut of the movie thus burying Trank’s original vision for the film. Fox’s strict Ten Commandments and Josh Trank’s lack of experience in working with big budgeted studio bloom its poison petals where it turned out to be a box office bomb and franchise killer at the same time.
Every movie directors have a kind of message that they want to communicate to their audiences either explicitly or right-to-your-face-kinda-style. On the other hand, a big budgeted studio tries to control and limit their creativity freedom for the sake of the franchise’s “ship wheel”. A slight change in the degree of the wheel could mean profit loss, or worse. So that’s why in my opinion this kind of trend is hard to avoid, and would still happen for years to come especially in comic book movie production.
Thanks to his groundbreaking debut, he was originally set to helm only-God-knows Star Wars spinoff; one of which could be Rouge One (2016) or Solo (2018). Trank was one of Hollywood’s hottest properties at that time until the news about his erratic and destructive behaviour on the set of Fant4stic have surfaced on the media. It was reported that Trank isolated himself from the crew and prefered to work alone. He even clashed not only with his actors but also producers (Simon Kinberg and Hutch Parker) which one may suggest his incapability to work under a big studio system. The aftermath? Well, it didn’t go well since both Kinberg and Parker are the ones who did their best to reshoots and edit the film under tight schedule; changing almost all Trank’s concepts for the film.
The way I see it, this so-called “symptom” is exactly what happened previously with Edgar Wright and Marvel Studio. Marvel, as some of you might know already, is a blockbuster studio that constantly changes / replaces their directors from one project to another. Most of the filmmakers they fired, are visionaries and could hardly compromise to what studio execs wish (yeah, I’m looking at you, Disney) since they already have their own vision on what to do to the property they helmed. Based on this fact alone, we can learn that Marvel’s studio-driven tendency (as so does the other big studio) rules all general aspects of their films: the plot, storyline, etc.
Back in 2007, when I was
As for the case of Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), several directors have said that their final product, especially the post-credit and end-credit scenes, are not exactly theirs. Some of those are directed and shot by different directors, and rammed into the film as final stingers. These additional scenes are actually the”secret recipe” that makes MCU films are so in line with their vision. They tried to course-correct what just happened in the movie while making people invested with a more bigger things to come (aka their grand vision for the franchise) by teasing them only in normally 5 mins. Take example with Thor (2011) where the end-credit scene shows that Loki is still alive; was actually directed by Avengers (2012) helmer, Joss Whedon. Or take another example with Thor: The Dark Wolrd (2013), where its mid-credit scene was directed by Guardians of the Galaxy (2014) director, James Gunn.
A strong-willed and visionary director definitely doesn’t want his masterpiece to be touched, edited or polished by another party, even if that means not within the guidelines the studio has planned. This so-called clash of the titans (director v studio), is probably one of the cause why Edgar Wright left Ant-Man. And maybe probably Josh Trank, too. Originally, Trank envisioned Fant4stic to be a David Cronenberg’s body-horror / superhero film hybrid that totally would differentiate itself boldly from the other mainstream comic book movies. Personally, I think it makes sense if Trank wanted to put a body-horror element to it and could have been worked well. But shame, the studio (20th Century Fox) rejected the idea and even call for reshoots for its first cut of the movie thus burying Trank’s original vision for the film. Fox’s strict Ten Commandments and Josh Trank’s lack of experience in working with big budgeted studio bloom its poison petals where it turned out to be a box office bomb and franchise killer at the same time.
Every movie directors have a kind of message that they want to communicate to their audiences either explicitly or right-to-your-face-kinda-style. On the other hand, a big budgeted studio tries to control and limit their creativity freedom for the sake of the franchise’s “ship wheel”. A slight change in the degree of the wheel could mean profit loss, or worse. So that’s why in my opinion this kind of trend is hard to avoid, and would still happen for years to come especially in comic book movie production.
 Image source: slashfilm.com Fant4stic (2015) *ahem* “successfully” flops at the box office and its director, Josh Trank, is likely...){kind=link}
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