[continued from previous page]
EX: You recently finished working on
AVALON, and I understand you did a lot of location
work for the film in Poland.
Oshii Mamoru: Yes, that's right.
EX: What was the most interesting thing
that happened during the filming there?
OM: I think probably the most exciting
thing was being able to roll an actual tank down the main street of the town.
EX: Sort of like PATLABOR
come to life? (laughs)
OM: (laughs) Yes, it was...
EX: What was the most difficult part of being on location?
OM: That I couldn't go home. At one point,
I got very homesick and I really missed my dog. The dog we had on the set wasn't
good enough. But there were a lot of dogs in Warsaw.
EX: Well, you could adopt them all.
OM: Sure, they were really cute... But they weren't mine.
EX: You said before that you come up with the concept
and the story, and then, as the last step, you decide what medium to do the film in.
Why did you decide to do AVALON as a live-action film?
OM: The concept was to take the good parts of both
animation and live action and make a film with both. So we had various techniques we
used to shoot the film. Basically I decided to use a variety of concepts and methods
that would best express the film.
It was interesting, because there was talk of a live-action
PATLABOR film and I was certain that that would go
through before AVALON would. But, to my surprise,
AVALON went through first.
EX: A live-action PATLABOR?
Is this something you still intend to do?
OM: If they allow me to do it and I come up with a good plan.
EX: Would you involve the rest of HEADGEAR
(the creative team who conceived PATLABOR) in it?
OM: Probably not. If I do it, I'll do it myself.
We've done a couple of test shots... But it's probably never going to happen. |
