Leigh Whannell and his partner James Wan hit the scene in a big way in 2004 with a film some of you may have heard of – Saw? Yeah, thought so. Anyway, since then their little horror film that could amassed $103 million worldwide from a production budget of $1.5 million. The franchise spawned two more films and has earned over $325.5 million in worldwide box-office receipts with a fourth film to be released this October.
This of course means more movies from the duo are sure to come and Dead Silence is the first to hit the screens. A film scripted by Leigh about Mary Shaw, a famous murdered ventriloquist whose presence still casts a pall over Ravens Fair. The creepy nature of ventriloquist dummies haunt the trailer and Whannell and Wan hope they will do the same to audiences when Dead Silence hits theaters this Friday.
I had a chance to talk to the screenwriter about Dead Silence, the Saw franchise, his small part in Wan’s next film Death Sentence and so much more from horror remakes, what scares him and even a little bit about the politics of the movie biz. The interview was a lot of fun and you should get a kick out of it. Leigh was really open with his opinion on several things, which made it far more interesting. Also, stay tuned for my interview with director James Wan tomorrow.
Leigh Whannell (LW): We are trying to be the greatest champions of puppets since Jim Henson. [laughing] The Puppet’s Union is extremely thankful for us since Jim Henson’s Company isn’t making as many films anymore. I think they really celebrated the fact that James and I are on the scene.
I am sure they like the new direction as well, the death and mayhem.
LW: [laughing] Exactly, but we do, I can’t really explain why we like these puppets so much. We’re kind of creeped out by the size of them and we just think they’re fun. It’s one of those things, a hangover from childhood basically. James was scarred for life by that scene in Poltergeist where the kid had the clown doll (link) and James used to make his own puppets for student films. Back in school he made a film and there were all these puppets in it and they looked like the Saw doll too, they had the little curly-Qs, very much James’ style.
I remember when I wrote the script for Saw I rang him one time and I breathlessly pitched the jaw trap scene to him. I was like, ‘There’s this girl, she wakes up, she’s got this big heavy contraption on her face and she’s got to get the key out of somebody’s stomach and she’s got to cut it out!’ I came to the end of the scene and I said, ‘What do you think?’
From the other end of the phone line this is what I heard, ‘That’s great, we’ll just put a creepy doll in there and it’s going to be perfect.’
I was like, ‘James, where are we going to put a creepy doll? That’s like trying to put a square peg in a round hole.’ But James found a way to shoehorn a puppet into Saw and so we did it and it turned out to be one of the most popular things in the film. I would say out of all the images and characters in Saw I would say the doll is the most iconic.
I was recently at a fan convention, Monster Mania in New Jersey, and all these kids were lined up in the doll makeup from Saw. We can’t believe how popular it was and so with Dead Silence, when we were in post editing the first Saw, I had all this free time because I was sitting back watching him edit and I was thinking: Well if the doll from Saw was so popular why not build a whole movie around it?
So we ended up discussing it and coming up with an idea around ventriloquist dummies, but we didn’t want to do a killer doll film, that’s an important distinction. I think what is most scary to us about dolls is the fact that they are inanimate. I think the minute you see them get up and start running around the room it becomes less scary and if you’re not careful it can become really comical. A doll running around the room is hard to pull off.
What we’re interested in is creeping people out with the possibility that the doll moved. It’s the thing that there is the ventriloquist dummy and its eyes are on the wall, you turn around to get a drink and turn back and the doll’s eyes have moved. You just catch yourself and say, ‘Hang on.’ We wanted to tap into that and we found that lots of other people have that same fear of ventriloquist dummies.
You touched upon this already, but are there and should there be any comparisons to Chucky and what are your thoughts of the Child’s Play films?
With the Chucky films they are out and out saying the doll is the villain, you see him running around and you know this guy is alive. Ours is more about the question of are these dolls possessed? Are they moving? There’s something about them and you don’t know what it is. So I would say the relationship to the Chucky films comes in with the dolls thing, but ours really revolves around ventriloquism, which is really our own thing. I guess what James and I are trying to do here is create the definitive ventriloquist dummy horror film. [laughing] I don’t know if that is something to aim for but we did, and hopefully we pulled it off.
What’s the difference working with a major studio like Universal? It took a little while to get moving on Dead Silence.
LW: Yeah, it wasn’t so much to do with the studio it was more to do with… we did a few more drafts and the film got greenlit and we went out to Toronto and we had more days. I think it appeared to be a slower process because we released two more Saw films before Dead Silence has come out.
There have just been various little speed bumps along the way that have happened but the process was an enjoyable one. The people at Universal have been great and they really let us go and create our vision for this, sort of, fogged bound world. The town in this film is called Ravens Fair, we’re not even hiding, it’s an out-and-out Edgar Allen Poe reference, and the town really is like a town from an Edgar Allen Poe story. That’s something that studio could have easily balked at and thought that’s not right for a modern horror film, but they really let us go for it, and it was amazing to have the toys to play with as well. That’s one thing from the Saw film – let’s just say the car chase in the first Saw was by parking the car in a dark garage and having a couple of grips shake it. To go from that to a big studio film… I have been a fan of so many Universal films; I grew up watching Jaws and all these films. To be on the set and to be playing with their toys, to be able to create these locations… there is a theater out in the middle of a lake, it’s a preposterous idea, but when you are working with a studio and you have access to all this equipment and resources and great technical artists you can actually pull this stuff off.
Also up next for you is Death Sentence in which you are an actor not a writer. James directed that one, what’s the status there?
LW: Yeah, that’s actually, and that’s like more of a little cameo. James was doing Death Sentence in South Carolina and he called me up, ‘Do you want to come down to South Carolina and play a small role?’ I remember the moment, I was sitting out on my balcony reading the newspaper and the phone rings and James is like, ‘Do you want to come down and do a cameo in Death Sentence? Hang out for a while?’ I was like, ‘Sure, why not? I’m not doing much.’
So I packed up and went to South Carolina for a couple of weeks and did a little one scene cameo in the film. I would say that even being there for that short amount of time, going into the makeup trailer and sitting on the set and being in front of the camera, it really wet my appetite, I really missed acting. I realized that over the past few years, since Saw, I’ve concentrated on writing. I’ve gone off and written four films since then. For me now, after that little drop of water on my parched tongue, I’ve suddenly realized how much I’ve wanted to act. Hopefully this year and next year I am going to focus on that again and be acting more.
I read (link) that you were writing a kid’s film and you and James are going to be working together on something of a sci-fi horror?
LW: Those two are the two I am working on. I’m working on a children’s story – I wouldn’t say children’s, but it is certainly a departure from the horror films that I have written so far. It’s more of a children’s adventure/fantasy story. The other one is this ever evolving sort of thriller I am working on with James so we’ll see where that one goes. I’m not too sure yet, but it is certainly going to be interesting, I know that much.
How involved with Saw IV are you going to be, because you have had pen to paper with Saw II and III?
LW: Yeah, with Saw IV I will definitely be overseeing it. I’m going to be filling in an executive producer position, whatever that means. [laughing] I guess that means I show up and have a look around. I’m definitely going to be watching over it. James and I consider Saw our baby and we still love it and we’re letting other parents take care of it now, but we still want to drop in and make sure they are being good parents.
We’re definitely going to check up on it and I’ve read the script they have for Saw IV and it’s great, it’s actually managed to pull the rug out once again. I am very happy with that because I didn’t think it could be done, but we all sat around and came up with something that pulled the rug out from the audience one more time.
What are some films that actually scare the shit out of you? We have these puppet horrors and something has to be behind them, what is it?
Those films would probably be, The Shining. The Shining is just masterful; it’s the only film that, even at my age, I still can’t watch it alone at night. About three or four months ago I lost my Shining DVD so I went and bought it and I was sitting at home watching that film, by myself at about midnight. I swear to you I could not get through it. I had to turn it off and it took me about 20 minutes to creep up my stairs because I was waiting for the two little pony-tailed girls to come out and go, ‘Hello Leigh.’
Have you read the book? The book freaked me out more than the movie.
LW: I have yeah and a lot of people have said that, but I do love the book, but I think Kubrick’s The Shining, in terms of horror films, is masterful.
Other films on that list that scared me, I would have to give a shout out to Jaws, even though today – it’s still my favorite film pretty much – it doesn’t scare me as much today, but when I was a kid it had a huge psychological effect on me. If you can believe this, I actually couldn’t sleep with my legs under my blanket when I was a kid because I thought the blanket was water and Jaws was underneath there.
Well that’s a writer’s imagination for you.
LW: Exactly, for a film to do that to a kid is huge. Other films, I would say, anything by David Lynch generally has one or two scenes that creep the shit out of me. I think the first half of Lost Highway is one of the scariest things I have ever seen, and a lot of people have screwed their face up at that and though huh? I don’t know what it is, but I really find Lynch really scary.
Well I thought I read that the sci-fi film you were doing with James was supposed to be a little Lynch-ian in style?
LW: Yeah, definitely, but the funny thing about that, it’s interesting when you talk about something before it’s finished because when James and I work on something it is ever evolving so I don’t know how sci-fi it’s going to be. I wonder if there are any fans out there waiting for this sci-fi horror film to come out…
You’re next Event Horizon…
LW: [laughing] Exactly, I would almost retract that comment on that website, it’s not really a sci-fi, it’s really just… I don’t know what it is. It’s just James and I trying to find the deepest, darkest stuff that creeps it out and try to put it on screen. I guess I will have to let you know when I finish that one, but definitely Lynch influences us in a big way. He is a master of creating tension out of nothing. He could have a shot of a coffee table and he would find a way to make it creepy and that is an amazing skill to have.
With all these favorite films and perhaps some of those out there that you didn’t think were all that great but had great potential, would you ever consider a remake?
Say what you will about Saw, and I know that film really polarizes people, but I know James and I put things in there that people hadn’t seen for a while, some pretty bizarre elements. That is what we are trying to do and I think remakes rob you of the opportunities to do that, because somebody has done it before.
You talked about your aspirations to get back into acting, what about directing or are you going to leave that to James?
LW: No, I think I do, yeah. It’s interesting, people always ask me, what do you prefer, writing or acting? My answer is, ‘Well, I see them as the flip sides of the same coin.’ Really, it’s all just creating, whether you are writing, acting or directing you’re just one branch and film is such a collaborative medium at the end of the day. In some ways I think film has kind of been hijacked by this sort of auteur theory that has been going on, this whole thing of a film by so-and-so. Film is still a collaborative medium, that’s what I love about it. I love the fact that a composer plays a huge part. I love the fact that the director of photography gets in there and does their part. You’re a team and you’re working together to create something. I could write, direct or act and be just as happy with any one of them. I guess that is a long way of saying, yeah, I do want to direct one day and try that out.
So you have gone from this little film called Saw, which as a franchise has now grossed $325.5 million in worldwide box-office receipts, what are your overall thoughts on your career from where it started to where it is today?
LW: I wish I had thought it out that much. I am amazed at where I am today. I am constantly stunned by it and I don’t want to over think it in case I uncover some formula that unlocks it all and sends me tumbling down some wormhole back to 1995. I don’t know how this happened, it really is an example of how sometimes the cosmos does what it wants and we’re just a passenger on this train. We wrote this film, but we didn’t intend for it to be anything. If we had been aiming for Saw to be made in Hollywood and make all these waves then the end result would have been like wish fulfillment. It’s like training to win a NASCAR race. You train, you train, you’re driving and then you win and you’re like, ‘Oh my god, all my hard work…’ That’s not really what James and I did, because we weren’t aiming for this. Our big goal for Saw was to release it at our local film festival, the Melbourne Film Festival, that was the peak of our goals. We used to sit around about how great it would be to go to our film if we could just get it into the program at Melbourne Film Festival. What’s happened has just been this total bonus, it’s like someone else did it.
In terms of thinking about where I am and how far I’ve come, I can’t even place it, all I can do is keep writing films and keep creating.
Dead Silence hits theaters Friday, March 16. For more info and our galley of pics click here.
