Every time you dig deeper into a director or actor, whether the person is American or British, the probability of coming from a middle-class or above family is higher than 75%.
Doug Riemann (the director of [Chaos Walk], who is also the director of [Spy Heavy], [Mr. and Mrs. Smith]), does not trim the edges, and his hair always seems to have not been cut for months, whether on the set or in a formal occasion.
Even among the directors who do not pay attention to appearance and dress, he is also the most indigenous. However, he was the son of the famous American lawyer Arthur M. Riemann's son.
How good is his father?
Arthur served as a lawyer for Warner Bros. Pictures and was the lead counsel in the U.S. Senate during the Iran-Contra affair.
As a teenager, Doug had boarded Steven Spielberg. Spielberg's private jet, an up-close look at one of America's greatest directors, led to his dream of entering the film industry.
Arthur · Riemann
Doug's first big-screen debut, The Swinger, which cost $200,000 in all production costs, was done for him by Dad from a client.
Just when you think Doug will be the kind of rich second generation that depends on his father to feed, [the swingers] get back 35 times the cost.
One of the main characters of the movie is [Iron Man], the director of [The Lion King] (the real lion version) is also the familiar Iron Man driver Happi - Jon Feiru (left)
Since then, he has never used a penny of his father's money to make films. But Dad's money can be used elsewhere.
For example, in 2000, Doug bought a penthouse apartment in Tribeca, Manhattan, New York, with an area of nearly 350 square meters and worth $2.8 million, under the premise of making only two independent short films.
Under siege
After the success of [Swinger], Doug hit the iron while it was hot, and at a cost of more than 6 million, filmed the "Dog Man and Woman" who was finally shortlisted for the Sundance Film Festival.
The film has been compared to Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction, as both are multi-perspective non-linear crime films with a black comedy style.
Famous film critic Roger Ebert mentioned [Dog Men and Women], saying:
"Although the film does take place in Quentin's turf, there is no doubt that this is a very entertaining and very clever black comedy."
Two successful independent works in succession have successfully attracted the attention of Hollywood. Doug was able to work with Universal Pictures.
But before that, there was a little episode.
Doug, a die-hard fan of the original author Robert Rudrum, learned that the film adaptation rights to the original were about to expire.
He decided to personally visit Robert's residence near Montana's National Glacier Park.
Doug had just become a pilot at the time, and his first flight was from Los Angeles to Montana, where he encountered many problems and the National Guard once thought he was in a crash.
Fortunately, Robert was very appreciative of this rash visit, and not only sold him the adaptation rights, but also agreed to install a producer in the film.
With a budget of $55 million, [Spy] is Doug's first big hollywood production.
He tells the story according to the concept of "top killers, who don't remember anything but killing", there is no so-called big scene, Jason Bourne is not ostentatious, and always solves opponents in the most labor-saving and effective way.
Bourne moved his hands, no high-tech weapons, only books and oil pens around him.
Bourne threw himself into a car chase, never rampaged, first looked at the map, found a good route, and then started the engine. It is also this style that attracts Matt Damon, who is eager to transform.
Helplessly, Universal believed that the film lacked large scenes, intervened strongly, and made a lot of changes to the script.
The move plunged the film into chaos, and Damon threatened to quit the film because of the script's complete disfigurement. And Doug's shooting method has put Universal and the entire crew on the verge of collapse.
Due to the previous two small-budget films, Doug has developed a style of finding feelings while shooting, and his position and angle of the scenes, props, shots, including the actors' performances, will change many times in a day.
This is extremely rare for many crew members who are accustomed to following the steps and following the script.
The shooting plan set yesterday was suddenly overturned today, and it is difficult for anyone to accept it. Plus Doug and Damon temporarily convince Universal to shoot according to the original script. It is even more to let the shooting schedule change and change, and delay and delay.
As a result, [Spy Film] budgeted overspending $8 million, the schedule was postponed twice, and the negative news continued.
However, after the release of the film, the box office reputation was double, and it redefined the spy-themed thriller action film, and even the action style of the 007 series of turnarounds [007: Casino Royal] also referred to the action style of this film.
However, many head-to-head confrontations with the Global executives caused Doug to lose the opportunity to direct the subsequent films of the series, and he only retained the title of executive producer.
Fight the paparazzi
On the set of [Spy Movie], Doug read the script for the first time. Brad Pitt had personally selected him in the hope that he would direct the film.
But Doug didn't agree, and he didn't agree until he finished filming [Spy Movie] and met Pete in person.
At that time, the heroine of the film was Nicole Kidman, but unfortunately she quit the project because of the scheduling conflict due to the start of the filming of [Copy Wife].
[Copy Wife]
Without Nicole, Pete withdrew. Doug, who was reuniting with his family, received a call saying that the project was yellow.
A friend comforted him and said, "It's so normal to work with a big star like Pete." ”
In fact, this is not the first time Doug has dealt with Pete, who was once the male lead candidate of [Spy Movie], but in the end, Pete chose to star in the same type of [spy game]."
[Spy Game]
In 2003, the project circled around Hollywood and returned to Doug, and Pete decided to return to the project at this time, trying to choose Gwyneth Paltrow, who was killed by the producers (because she was Pete's predecessor); and took a fancy to Kate Blanchett, but unfortunately she went to shoot [The Aviator].
In the end, the heroine fell into the hands of Angelina Jolie. Many people commented that [Smith] was the casting of the century, but in fact, Julie was not the first choice at all.
The film will always be associated with Pete, Jolie, and Jennifer Aniston, after all, the whole thing happened during the filming and reshoot.
Doug has revealed on multiple occasions that it was a crazy shooting experience.
In order to get a photo of Pete and Jolie together in private, the paparazzi almost surrounded the crew, and they even thought of ways to monitor the crew's walkie-talkie.
A large number of paparazzi surrounded the location, and even if the crew came up with a variety of ways to deal with it, there were still many paparazzi in the camera.
In the end, the film had to remove the paparazzi and the obstructions that blocked the paparazzi's view for $1,000 per frame.
Part of the responsibility for this budget overrun really isn't on Doug. Of course, the film was overspended at the end, and there was a scene where Doug had to pay for it himself and transform his mother's garage into a set, and after filming, he lost a grenade and blew up the garage.
This behavior is very rich for the second generation.
There is already a spark between the two protagonists, and Doug is mainly trying to release the elements of action and comedy, which is not difficult for him.
The action route he chose for the film is just the opposite of [spy movie], how cool how to shoot, the car chase scene engages in a 180-degree turn and shoots at the rear car tire, and the high-tech variety of the bazooka small flying knife can not be less.
Instead, talking to two big guys who each got $20 million in film salaries, Doug learned a lot of compromises and concessions, of course, when it comes to whether the film is good or bad, he still dares to fight with the two. It's just that the majesty of being a director was accidentally lost.
Because in the process of telling Julie and Pete about the bed scene, Doug revealed that his ex-girlfriend called himself "Bunny Bunny", and since then, Julie has only used the three words "Bunny Bunny" when calling him.
Global pulling
With the blessing of [Spy] and [Smith], Doug's boldness and ambition have also grown, so there is [Teleporter], an action movie about teleportation.
The film was shot in 20 cities in 14 countries, a large part of which was shot on location, including the Colosseum in Rome, Italy, the pyramids in Cairo, Egypt, and the main street of Tokyo, Japan.
The shooting requirements for these three locations were initially rejected.
Doug and his team grind hard to get permission.
For example, in the filming of the Colosseum, because the crew could not hinder the tourists, Doug wanted to shoot the daytime scenes, so the crew had to use the only 45 minutes from dawn to the admission of tourists every day in three days, and the 45 minutes after the venue was closed until dark, to complete these scenes.
Doug, who has always been poorly disciplined in his organization, has shown remarkable concentration and successfully achieved "impossible tasks."
In addition, at that time, the film's large number of instantaneous transfer special effects also put forward high requirements for shooting.
The scenes in the Colosseum, divided into three different types, were filmed in order to give the special effects team enough production space in the later stage. However, Doug still insists that as long as he can shoot live, he will shoot live.
Jamie Bell's character throws a London bus at Samuel Jackson, which is actually filmed with Via, and of course, the bus hit not Samuel but a stand-in.
In addition, Doug also admitted in a follow-up interview that [Smith] and [Mind] are his least deceptive films.
The so-called "deception" means that his actors do not need to step on the point in the previous films, he emphasizes the nature of shooting, and many times he will carry the camera on his shoulder and use the handheld way to deal with some performance flaws.
But since [Smith], he has chosen to change this habit of his own and follow the tradition completely, on the one hand, to facilitate special effects, on the other hand, to better adjust the two new actors.
a soup
If measured by Hollywood standards, [Edge of Tomorrow] is a money-losing commodity. But in Doug's eyes, this is his proudest work.
Interestingly, critics and audiences who have seen the film agree with this statement.
This film is probably the least hit by Doug in his work with blockbuster studios. The biggest disagreement stems from the title of the film.
Warner Pictures and Doug agree that the original title, "Killing Reincarnation", is not appropriate, the former does not want to "kill", and the latter believes that this name does not reflect the sense of humor in the film.
As a result, Doug chose "Live Die Repeat" and Warner chose "Edge of Tomorrow." Whoever wins in the end must be known.
In this film, Doug continues to insist that there is absolutely no CG to be used in real filming, so the mech worn by the actors directly makes the heroine Emily Blunt cry.
In fact, doug also regretted this choice a little when filming, because the mecha was too heavy, and each scene required a lot of Wia and rope cooperation to shoot smoothly.
But later on, Doug was very glad that the film was finally presented in this form, because its realism was incomparable to CG.
Through this film, Tom Cruise has captured Doug's talent.
Doug also saw the dedication and hard work of Brother Atang, he watched Brother Tang's stunt performance in this film, and even said that the latter is absolutely top if he is in the stunt actor industry.
The two also collaborated on [Made in the USA]. Not only that, but [Edge of Tomorrow 2] is also being developed step by step.
[Made in the USA]
But the most amazing thing is that Atango is about to go to space to make a movie, and it is Doug Reeman who accompanies him in his birth and death. This time, the two played too big, and the results are likely to explode.
So forget about the bad [Chaos Walk], after all, the director wants to fly.