Red Cliff director John Woo reckons making his epic was like going to war.
Red Cliff is a massive production. How do you even start something that big?
We had to get the finance first – so we got enough money from
Japan, Korea, China, Hong Kong, Taiwan. And then we got into the script. I used eight writers to work on the script. We spent about a year, then spent another year and a half on pre-production. The visual effects part was the hardest. We bought in a visual effects team from the United States, and some special effects people from Korea. We spent months and months designing all the action sequences and the CGI.
Sounds like it would have been easier actually going to war.
Yes. When we finished, the whole crew felt like we had gone through a war. We felt happy for what we’d done, we felt sorrow that somebody got injured, somebody got hurt, somebody got sick. It’s just like in a war. And on the set, I felt like a general, working with thousands of
soldiers.
How was going through all that to make a 280-minute epic, then having to cut it to two hours for Western audiences?
It was quite painful. I had to lose some scenes I really love. I had to trim down some of the side characters’ roles. But we edited very carefully, because we wanted to keep the same spirit.
What can the Western audience get out of Red Cliff?
We want the Western audience to see more about our culture. Besides all the strategy of war and that kind of thing, it also has things that are good from our culture – the music, the soccer.
Soccer started in China, so it’s nice to let people know about it. They also used it for training soldiers about 3000 years ago. For the Western audience, they are so familiar with martial arts movies,
kung-fu action, but that’s not the only part of our culture.
Are there any scenes that really stand out for you?
The final battle scenes – the 2000 battle ships being burned. I think it’s the longest battle scene in Chinese film history. It’s about 45 minutes long. But there is a lot of the human touch, the human story, in the action scenes. The audience get involved with the action – you can feel it.
When your film The Killer was released here, it was plugged as having the highest body count in any movie ever.
Yes, but
Red Cliff is more.
Any idea how many people are killed in it?
No, I’ve never counted. I just did whatever I feel.
We heard a stuntman died while filming.
I feel very, very sad. I think I will carry that pain for the rest of my life. I’m so concerned about safety. I’ve never let anyone get hurt – seriously hurt. It was the second unit doing that job, but no matter what, I still feel I should take the responsibility.
What actually happened?
It was so unfortunate, because everyone was so well prepared and they had rehearsed it several times, and they had done a lot of good calculations. And then when the scene started, all of a sudden there was a strong wind that came from the other side, so the explosion was against the wind, and it blew the flame into the stunt guy. It was purely an accident. We had plenty of unpredictable weather – nobody could control it.
What was the reaction?
Everyone was feeling pain. The whole crew – some people even had a nervous breakdown. Everybody felt guilty about it, but everybody learned a lesson – it’s only a movie. A life is more important.
Luke Anisimoff
What's your favourite epic war film? Leave your comments below.
Related link
Win a double pass to Red Cliff
Super hot slideshows
Bad girls
Tennis babes
