Producer Jim Lemly said, Were making a movie, not a historical record and arts a metaphor. I think any way you can explore metaphor to make it relevant or expose it to a bigger audience or tell a story in a way it hasnt been told I think thats the what were attempting to do. We feel we remain very truthful to the essence of Abraham Lincoln, because its very important to us. Hes doing these ridiculous, insane things, but his character is the Abraham Lincoln that you know. Hes a moral man who represents the best of humanity. I think what is a noble ideal for all people, to try and obtain and achieve.
Bekmambetov told us, “I think the most important technique is to ground everything, to make the fantasy world grounded and relatable. Just great characters you will follow, you will understand, you will fall in love with. To move them through the action scenes, through the adventures and to develop, to open with them with the new world with new rules, with new ideas and its what we do. To find the character, to fall in love with and to go with him through this adventure, its like in any movie.”
That said, the vampires are not your run-of-the-mill, shiny pretty people. These guys are mean. We accidentally saw someone in vampire makeup as we were leaving the building after the interviews. We won’t spoil the look for you, but these guys look mean. Bekmambatov says, “Vampires in our movie they are very violent. They are mean and violent, but as human beings, because we are not good either, they represent us. Its not differentits not a creature. They have human qualities. They have tragic back stories. Vampirism is just a physical manifestation of our problems or our class.”
Deep. The film has a message. Bekmambetov said, “This movie is about freedom and Lincoln gave us freedom. He held us to be free and the vampires, they have their own understanding what freedom is because they just live much longer and they feel they are a superior race and they have their own understandingwho has the power of course has to rule the world.”
Benjamin Walker who stars as Lincoln started out in theater. He received rave reviews for his work in “Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson.” This seemed like the perfect fit, though he wasn’t the first choice for the role. He laughed, “Theyd already kind of offered it to somebody else a big-name movie star. And the fact that they were courting me just seemed like a long shot in my mind. So there wasnt much pressure. I was mostly fascinated to meet Timur. I had loved his movies. Night Watch and Day Watch had kind of blown my mind. So I was excited to meet him and hoped hed liked my work. But, eh, fear is for pansies.”
New Orleans is the place to be for filming these days, but even more so in this case. Production designer Fancois Audouy told us, “You can find a 150 year old mansion in the Garden District. The Old Governors Mansion is still in terrific shape. We found these terrific streets called Joliet St., in downtown, and we turned them into Springfield, Illinois, which is very important to the Abraham Lincoln mythology. He met his future wife there. He had his first job. He learned how to become an attorney there.
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter opens in theaters on June 22nd.
