Tim Burton & Johnny Depp Transform "Alice in Wonderland"

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Interviews

Published on Wednesday, 10 March 2010 14:24

Written by Brad Balfour

Visionary director Tim Burton and consummate actor Johnny Depp are almost the Tweedledee and Tweedledum of fantasy filmmaking: Depp brings to life the characters that emerge from Burton's magically twisted mind. But with this new film, based on the legendary novel by Lewis Carroll, Burton and his favorite cohort Depp fashion not quite an interpretation of the surreal tale so much as they're booting up a whole new fantasy franchise.

Depp, of course, is the movie star that won't get sucked into being a movie star, so he always refashions himself as much as he refashions characters to be an expression of his own convoluted psyche. And Burton is a master of rebooting a franchise — look at what he did to restart the Batman series in the 1990s. The former Disney animator has gone from being everybody's favorite eccentric to the ultimate mainstream player, transforming a literary classic into a high-concept, 3-D tent-pole success. And on the heels of what Avatar did in skewing audiences toward new digital technologies, Burton's Alice in Wonderland  helps confirm that 3-D is here to stay.

Q: Because it is such a massive project, what made you want to step into the world of Alice in Wonderland  in 3-D?

TB: It was [just] that — that Alice in Wonderland in 3-D seemed like the world that Lewis Carroll created, with the kind of trippiness, size and spatial elements. Then I started thinking about the world of Lewis Carroll, and not so much about the films and things, but I knew more about it from listening to music and bands and other illustrators and artists that would incorporate that imagery into their work. It made me realize how powerful the material was. If it were written today it would be mind blowing today, so the combination of the medium and the material just seemed really right.

Q: This is not the Alice in Wonderland that we're used to; you've put your own stamp on this.

TB: There have been so many versions and for me, I’ve never seen a version that I’ve really liked. I didn’t feel like there was a definitely version that we were fighting against. Also, I liked what Linda [Woolverton] did with the script; she almost treated this story as how the Alice material has affected us, at least for me.

It's the story of someone using this kind of imagery and this kind of world to figure out problems in and things in their own life. What’s fantasy and [what's] reality, and how they’re not separate things, they’re one thing, and it’s how we use those things to deal with our issues in life. I don't even know what I’m talking about.

Q: What was your reasoning for shooting this in 2-D and converting it?

TB: Because all the techniques we were using, there's no point in shooting it in 3-D when there's nothing to shoot. We were using so many different techniques; we had live action, we had animation, we had virtual sets.

When we did the [3-D] conversion from [The] Nightmare [Before Christmas] (1993), [production designer] Ken Ralston and I looked at things that were shot in 3-D and things that were shot in 2-D conversion and it’s like anything. With all of these tools you can see good 3-D, bad 3-D, good conversions, bad conversions. So we always do it was 3-D so we did all the proper planning so that when we got to that stage, when we got the elements finally together, then it was just another piece of the technology. In fact, that was probably some of the easier technology than the other elements that we were dealing with.

Q: Is this the seventh film you and Tim have done together?

JD: I think so, somewhere around there.

Q: When he came to you and said I want you to be the Mad Hatter, what was your reaction? Why did you want to play that character?

JD: To be honest, he could have said Alice and I would have said yes; I would have done whatever character Tim wanted. But certainly the fact that it was the Mad Hatter was a bonus, because it was a great challenge to try and find this guy and not just be a rubber ball that you heave into an empty room and watch it bounce all over the place. To find that part of the character but also a little bit more history or gravity to the guy.

Q: There’s a tragic nature to the Mad Hatter that you bring out in a way that's never seen before in Alice in Wonderland.

JD: There’s the whole Hatter’s dilemma really, which was where the term "mad as a hatter" came form. The amount of mercury that they used in the glue to make the hats and everything was damaging, so looking at it from that perspective of this guy, who is literally damaged goods, physically damaged, emotionally a little obtuse, and kind of taking that and deciding that he should be, as opposed to just this hyper, nutty guy, he should explore all sides of the personality at an extreme level. So he could go from one second being high falutin' and a lot of levity and then straight into some kind of dangerous rage. It was interesting trying to map it out.

TB: It being a Disney movie, we decided not to focus too much on the mercury poisoning aspect (laughs). It didn't translate well to 3D.

Q: In a way you could say your whole career of being Johnny Depp has been like being Johnny in Wonderland?

JD: My whole experience on the ride since day one has been pretty surreal in this business. I'm still completely shocked that I still get jobs and still am around. But I guess more than anything it has been a kind of Wonderland. I've been very lucky. Does that answer your question?

Q: Did you dream that it was going to be this way when you started?

JD: No, not at all. I had no idea where anything was going, but it’s almost impossible to predict anything like that. I had no idea. I felt like after I’d done Cry-Baby (1990) with John Waters and Edward Scissorhands (1990) with Tim that they were going to cut me off right then. I felt at that point that I was on solid ground and I knew where I was going and where I wanted to go, and I was sure that they would nix me out of the gig. But luckily I'm still here.

Q: You've collaborated before; how did you view how your your professional and personal relationship would be affected by sharing Alice in Wonderland?

TB: I don't know; I couldn't really look at him during the shooting because he looked like a scary clown. We didn’t make much eye contact during the shoot. I always love working with Johnny, from Scissorhands on, for many reasons. He likes to play characters and be different things, he doesn’t like watching himself, which I love because that makes it a lot easier for me. Each time we do something he’s always trying to do something different, and it’s great when you know somebody and they keep surprising you.

Q: Do you feel the same way?

JD: Yeah. Each time out of the gate with Tim the initial thing for me is to obviously come up with the character, but then you start thinking there's a certain amount of pressure where you go, "Jesus, will this be the one where I disappoint him?"

So I try really hard, especially early on, just to come up with something that's very different that he hasn’t experience before, that we haven't experienced together before, that would stimulate and inspire him to make choices based on that character. I try not to embarrass him, basically.

Q: You've created many wonderful characters; when you start developing something new, like the Mad Hatter, do you look back at your own work and make sure you don't repeat anything?

JD: Definitely at a certain point, especially because I've played English a number of times, I've used an English accent a number of times, so it becomes a little bit of an obstacle course to go, "Oh, that’s teetering into Captain Jackville."

So you've got to really pay attention to the places you've been. But that's the great challenge is that you may get it wrong, or there's a very good possibility that you could fall flat on your face. But I think that's a healthy thing for an actor.

Q: Was there anything in Alice that technologically you couldn't do yet?

TB: We were just using all different technologies, so they're all out there. People go purely motion-capture, purely animation. Everything's a new tool, you always have limitations, you can do more, it’s all great, and I never try to focus too much on the technology. The fun of it for us is the artistic thing of it and feeling like we're making a movie and not get too involved with technology.

Q: If the next project involves donning a suit with dots for the cameras like they did in Avatar would you do it?

JD: I don't know; what color is the suit? It's black? Well it matches my eyes. I don't care, I'll put anything on, it doesn't matter to me. Obviously. Look at me.

Q: Of all the characters and all the movies you have worked on which ones have been your children's favorites?

JD: My children's favorite, and it's funny because they've seen it but they have a difficult time watching it because it's their dad and they make that connection, but Edward Scissorhands is by far my kids' favorite. They connect with the character and also I think they see their dad feeling that isolation, feeling that loneliness. He's a tragic character so I think it's hard for them. They bawl.

TB: For me, my kids don't really like my movies. (reconsiders) I can't say that. [It's that] they're too young. My son's getting older but since I don't really know what I do I can't really describe to him what I do so he doesn't really know what I do and so, whatever.

Q: One of the great earmarks about a really great happy dance — which you did in the film — is that it's completely unique to the person. So is this one part of your own personal repertoire.

JD: No. The happy dance was something that Tim had a very curious vision for.

TB: Listen, he's injured himself, he cannot do it today. It has to be the right circumstance, the right music and everything else.

Q:  What were your personal preparation for that — a lot of mirrors?

JD: No.

TB: Smoke and mirrors, yeah.

JD: I tend to avoid mirrors at all costs. We had to treat that like a stunt.

TB: You wouldn't question Fred Astaire like this would you? (laughs)

Q: You seem to be going through the entire canon of 19th-century fantasy literature.

JD: I’m hoping to do [Fitz Hugh Ludlow's autobiographical 1857 book] The Hasheesh Eater next.

Q: What's the attraction to that era's literature to you as an artist?

JD: I just adore it. From certainly J.M. Barrie, and the wonderful characters he created, to Lewis Carroll, and even French literature, or Edgar Allan Poe. Like Tim said about Lewis Carroll, you open those books, you open [Charles Baudelaire's 1857 book of poetry Les Fleurs du mal, a.k.a.] The Flowers of Evil, and begin to read; if it were written today you’d be absolutely stupefied by the works. So it’s this incredible period where the work is ageless so I love all those guys. It’s my deep passion, those great 19th-century writers.

Q: When did this book enter your life and was the proper English an influence to your understanding of it? And how did this book influence you?

TB: I’m from Burbank so we never heard about Alice in Wonderland except through Disney cartoons, the Tom Petty video [for "Don't Come Around Here No More," 1985), and the Jefferson Airplane [who recorded the 1967 Carroll-inspired hit "White Rabbit"]. It's interesting because that's what made me realize the power of it.

I got my introduction much more through other illustrators and music and culture and writers, and the imagery would come up in other work. And then soon you start to delve into it and realize just how powerful it is and that's why it remains that way.

Q: Can you want to add to this?

JD: I have a thing about long necks too. It's funny, even though you can't quite place when the book or the story came into your life, I do remember vaguely at roughly five years old reading versions of Alice in Wonderland. But the thing is the characters; everyone knows the characters, and they’re very well defined.

Most people haven’t read the book but they definitely know the characters and reference them. Ironically, it was maybe only a year prior to Tim calling that I had reread Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, and what I took away from it was all these very strange little cryptic nuggets that he’d thrown in there and I was really intrigued by them and fascinated by them because they were asking questions that couldn’t be answered almost, or making statements you couldn’t quite understand, like "I am investigating things that begin with the letter M."

That took me through a whole stratosphere of possibilities, and doing a little research and discovering that the M is mercury. And, "Why is a raven like a writing desk?" those things just became so, so important to the character. And if I read the book again today I’d find 100 other things that I missed last time, so it’s constantly changing.

Q: And what is happening with The Tourist? What have you enjoyed about working with Angelina Jolie?

JD: I haven’t done anything yet.

Q: When does that start shooting?

JD: I think Tuesday next week.

TB: But how do you think it's going to go?

JD: I think it'll be swell.

Q: What did you like about the part that made you want to sign on?

JD: I like the [original] French film a lot, and my friend played the part. I thought I might be interesting to explore this character. You never know what’s going to happen. I suspect there may be a few paparazzi in Venice.

Q: We heard there’s no Keira Knightly or Orlando Bloom in the next Pirates. Is it going to be more Jack Sparrow?

JD: Yeah, there's no Keira or Orlando in there. I don't know, I don't think we'd ever throw too much Jack Sparrow in there, I think there will be a little bit of everybody.

Q: You were wavering after Dick Cook left. What reassured you?

JD: One thing that I found very reassuring was a very good conversation with Dick Cook, who is someone I admire greatly. That helped a lot. And also knowing that we're coming at it from a different angle at this point; Rob Marshall totally knew to take a new story.

Q: What did Dick Cook say after he left?

JD: He was a perfect gentleman.

Q: Do you see Dark Shadows as going this year or is it still on the fence?

JD: No I see it going. I hope it does, I do. We worked like dogs to get that.

For more by Brad Balfour: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brad-balfour

Actor David Rasche Stays "In the (Oscar-Nominated) Loop"

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Interviews

Published on Saturday, 06 March 2010 05:00

Written by Brad Balfour

When actor David Rasche came into the room, I knew this was going to be a different kind of interview, just as In The Loop is a different kind of political comedy. The 65-year-old Rasche was supposed to be joined by director Armando Iannucci and fellow actor Zach Woods to conduct an intimate roundtable interview session. But because Rasche was early, our conversation was transformed — much like the shambolic, supposedly "secret" committee meeting organized by Rasche's character, the gung-ho American warmonger Linton Barwick (a cross between Dick Cheney and Don Rumsfeld) got transformed and provided a pivotal moment to the film. In a similarly chaotic fashion, Rasche spoke solo with a couple of us and provided some pivotal moments of his own before settling down with his fellow Loop-ers.

The British-produced film debuted at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival and at the 2009 Tribeca Film Festival. Taking its cue from Iannucci's smart and snarky look at the inner workings of British politics, the TV series The Thick of It (kind of The Office for politicos), In The Loop follows Cabinet minister Simon Foster (Tom Hollander) through a series of slip-ups that gets him involved in an ever-twisting gyre of intrigue that leads to starting a war in the Middle East. Sounds familiar...

The film stars such series' regulars as Peter Capaldi (reprising his foul-mouthed communication chief, Malcolm Tucker) and American additions such as former The Sopranos star James Gandolfini as the war-reticent General Miller. Within this context, bumbling assistants and loose-tongued associates screw up and screw each other to a dry, droll, parodic effect. The film certainly doesn't view previous British and American administrations as the pinnacle of political achievement.

In light of the health care debate, with the Right stirring the pot, the film serves as a reminder that the politics of diversion, derision and destruction as expressed by the opposition party goes on. So when a film like In The Loop offers this refreshing and engaging alternative take on the inner workings of the political universe, it becomes a must-see to add perspective. Certainly, it hit some resonant note; the film garnered an Adapted Screenplay Academy Award nomination for writers Iannucci, Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell and Tony Roche.

Though Iannucci, who also produced the film, and Woods, who plays Chad, a very funny American adjunct, finally arrived, what was supposed to be a simple roundtable turned into a unusual and enlightening back-and-forth banter.

Q: Was that just the roll of the dice that you ended up playing the bad guy warmonger Barwick?

DR: Well, they made it a little bit harder in this movie [from the television show]. But that's for Armando [to explain].

Q: How did you see it?

DR: I had a few rejoinders that were excised.

Q: You did it so well. You have this way of doing it so that you don't come off as just mean.

DR: That sinister thing is there [though].

Q: Is that you or in the script? I can't believe all the things that Armando threw in there.

DR: It's terrific eh? Funny as hell. The timing was great; it's global politics. As a matter of fact, I had a friend, Mike Reiss, who was one of the producers of The Simpsons, who said that he thought there are arguably more funny lines in this movie than in any movie he can remember.

Q: But is it too complicated for Americans to get?

DR: I've been in tons of audiences like in Seattle [at the film festival]; there were 3,000 people, all Americans, and they just were howling with laughter.

Q: I saw it with critics and they didn't laugh as much as I imagine an audience would. I was angry at them in a way but I thought it was astounding.

DR: Really? I'm surprised because I have not seen that audience. The only audiences I've seen, big or small, have [been with the public].

Q: You don't even realize some of the lines are really funny until it hits you later; it's so deadpan, and you're so perfectly deadpan.

DR: It's really funny, I have to tell you, I've been involved in two international projects in the last little bit and it's absolutely remarkable what we bring to it. Like I did this Brazilian film and people are all saying "Oh, we don't like you because you did so and so and so and so," and I said, "What are you talking about?" And the same thing with this; with the British press, the Americans were almost completely ignored and all they could see is the Brits, and now here you're asking me [about my character]; we see the Americans. It's funny, what we bring.

Q: Who were you a blend of?

DR: I was going for was a combination of John Bolton and Donald Rumsfeld and Karl Rove and Condoleezza Rice. All those imperious, belittling, condescending, right? Remember all those press conferences? It was like, "Do you really have to act like that? Do you really have to be so belittling and condescending?"

Q: You added the imperiousness brilliantly.

DR: I mean all of them, like David Addington [then-vice president Dick Cheney's legal counsel and chief of staff] — do you remember him? — they were all so unpleasant.

Q: Evil, evil people.

DR: No, but as unpleasant as a person [can be]. In the hearings, talking over you, not listening, belittling your point of view, remember Condoleezza Rice? "Uh, Senator." Relax, Condi. Anyway.

Q: I was at a Times Square New Year's Eve event with a press pass and John Bolton came. No one else had a problem talking to me — Regis, Chris Rock...  But Bolton had a phalanx of security; you couldn't even get 20 feet near him, and it was like, "What the fuck?" And he did not crack a smile the whole time.

DR: They're so self-important. Same thing with Cheney; he's doing something that no American politician in the history of the union has ever done, which is breaking the silence [after a new administration has taken over] and starts screaming about, you know... And the reason is, "Oh, well, what's happening is so important, and I'm so important, I just have to." Well, you know, Dick, I don't know if you're that important.

Q: It's interesting seeing us filtered through a British cultural lens so that you see Americans in a whole different light.

DR: Oh, yes, you do. It's a British film, from a British point of view. Don't tell Armando I said that. But I think clearly it swung that way... I don't think he knows it, maybe he does or not.

Q: The most disappointing thing for you about it was that you didn't get to be in every scene with everybody else, because there are so many good people there.

DR: They had to cut a lot. I used to be but... You'll have to ask Armando, and I don't mean to misquote him, but I think he said that he got to the end of editing and knew stuff had to go, so he cut his four favorite scenes and then all of a sudden the movie worked. I'm afraid I was in a couple of those scenes. His first cut was four hours.

Q: Without all the locations, it would have been interesting to see it with everything else taken away, and on a stage. Because there's such smart, snappy dialogue, it reminds me of a lot of those British playwrights, you know, like Alan Ayckbourn or somebody like that. It does kind of have this beautifully fluid language...

DR: Well, the story goes, as Armando will tell you, there was a special guy. No, not Tony [Roche, one of the screenwriters]. I'm pretty sure the guy was Ian Martin, who provided, oh, additional dialogue. He specialized in swearing; you know all the crazy [British] swearing? I'm serious, they call this guy up; that was his specialty. When he would say "I'm going to rake your bone and I'm going to stab you in the heart" and all that stuff. "I will hound you to an assisted suicide," I mean I don't know which ones. "What are you in a Jane Austen novel?" and all that, a lot of that stuff, specifically, that was what he was good at.

Q: Do you see a difference between British and American humor? Is there something that doesn't translate well?

DR: Except for people like [play/film writer-director-producer] David Mamet, who I think is the exception that covers both bases, Armando is funny as hell but a lot of his humor is really verbal. It's in the words, really; it's not that it's a joke but it's the combination of words. They're a little more verbal than us, don't you think? We're more situations, sight gags, stuff like that. Well, the nice thing about this, too, is there really aren't any jokes. There are no, like, jokes.

It's behavior and situation. Although I don't want to misquote Armando, but I think he said that when he went through the film while was editing and any line, no matter how good it was, if it sounded written, he cut it, because he wanted it to sound like you really were overhearing [them talking].

Q: You can't lay it on the director, it's all your fault. There are so many places where you are silent, so it's all in your look, gesture, the walk forward, or walk over here, or look at this.

DR: Tell him about how wonderful that is.

Q: You got it down with just enough of the restraint, as everybody did in this film.

DR: I've been watching those [Bush administration] guys on television for eight years. I mean, just it's appalling, appalling, appalling behavior. And it's obvious that now that we've had six months where we've learned you don't have to do that. We have Joe Biden, we have Barack Obama, and I don't see it. We have all the cabinet officers, you know, like [CIA Director] Leon Panetta —  they're not insulting.

Q: The Republicans seem like whiny children now...

DR: Absolutely. I think it was the fact that we ended up with the opposite of what they claimed. It seems to me that what we're learning is that rather than strong men, they were very weak, and when 9/11 happened they all went [weird noise] and they started doing all this kind of extreme stuff because, unlike Roosevelt and those guys who said... "Hi."

They were really weak little boys and they did all kinds of bad things. It didn't help anything, right? We're finding out about all this eavesdropping, the effect of this was like, not much.

Q: To what degree do you think we're living in a democracy?

DR: It's pretty hard to say that we are anymore. It's not that, it's when we find out the influence of the banks and corporate America; we see now that when the banks can throw $25 billion in propaganda you can't fight it. I was reading there's a new organization that's trying to counteract it, but it's really hard. When they have everybody on TV, the only news stations, it's like how can you fight it?

It's the same thing with the government; how can government regulators, when Goldman Sachs and all these people hire hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of the finest MBAs from Harvard, Princeton, and Yale to find out how to get around the laws, we don't have the money to hire people who are smarter than them to keep them from screwing us.

Q: Did you need to read a lot of stuff?

DR: I told you already: I've been watching these bastards for eight years on television, shaking my head, thinking, "Oh my god. Despicable."

Q: Whenever you see politicians they always seem so dry and boring.

DR: Well, they all aren't. Rumsfeld wasn't; he was a performer, the ultimate performer, who really enjoyed getting up there in front of people. Which was part of his problem that he got carried away and was under the mistaken impression that everything that came out of his mouth was a gold nugget and in fact, I think that was not the case.

Q: I've heard of the analogy of politics to wrestling. When you watch wrestling on TV there's so much tension and conflict but outside of that...

DR: That's why President Obama, when he frames the argument of abortion as to let us respect each other's opinions and then go from there, then the whole thing starts from a new spot. It doesn't start from I hate you and you hate me.

Q: You grew up in Chicago, right?

DR: Well, I never really grew up; I "enlarged" in Chicago.

Q: Where are you from originally?

DR: It was a joke; you didn't get it. I said I never really grew up but I enlarged. I was in Belleville, Illinois, which is downstate, but I spent a lot of time in Chicago.

Q: You've got roots on the Obama side, but there's also classic Chicago politics.

DR: Not only that but Rumsfeld is from Chicago. Oh, yeah. I know this personality type. My father was a little like that. Seriously. There's this kind of stubborn, like that last line where he says, "Well there were some pretty scary moments at some point, right?" and I said "No, there weren't." remember that? That could be my father: "No. No. No."

Q: How would you describe or define patriotism at its core?

DR: The last refuge of scoundrels. Who said that?J efferson or... I can't remember. Benjamin Franklin? [Samuel Johnson: "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel"]

For more by Brad Balfour: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brad-balfour

Director Anders Østergaard on His Oscar-Nominated "Burma VJ"

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Interviews

Published on Friday, 05 March 2010 05:00

Written by Brad Balfour

When Danish documentarian Anders Østergaard took on the challenge to make Burma VJ, he had no idea how much he would advance the cause of citizen journalism. The Democratic Voice of Burma, a  collective of 30 anonymous and underground video journalists (VJs), recorded the 100,000+ demonstrators (including thousands of Buddhist monks) who took to the streets in 2007 to protest the repressive junta that for over 40 years has controlled Burma — a.k.a. Mynamar, as the regime renamed it. 

Since foreign news crews were barred, the Internet was shut down and domestic reporters were banned unless employed by the state, the VJs used Handycams and cellphones to document these historic and dramatic events; they then smuggled this samizdat footage out of the country for broadcast worldwide via satellite. These VJs risked torture and imprisonment to show the brutal clashes with undercover police and the military — even after they themselves became targets of the authorities.

Using this smuggled footage, offered for free usage to the international media, the 40-something filmmaker tells the dramatic story of those protests and briskly shows how the Burma VJs stopped at nothing to make their reports. This raw footage, sent through clandestine electronic channels, marked  a new step in freedom of expression, and Østergaard's film has stirred a media pot now percolating in other global trouble spots, such as Iran. The protesters there have also now captured unvarnished images, and send reports through digital channels of their actions and of their government's violent reaction.

Østergaard has previously helmed films about pop culture, covering such subjects as the Scandinavian rock band Gasolin' and the Belgian comic-strip classic Tin Tin. Ironically, with Burma VJ  he covered another aspect of popular culture — the use of digital technology to create user-generated content — to document a major political act of defiance. The results have paid off in various accolades, from a 2009 Sundance Film Festival Grand Jury prize to an Academy Award nomination for Best Feature Documentary.

In fact, this exclusive interview itself was done through the cutting-edge technology of the videophone-like Skype — so once again, the digital domain advances journalistic expression.

Q: The human rights abuses in Burma don't seem to be on the radar like some other issues. Are you a little surprised that the film has garnered this support? What do you think made it click?

AO: I think [it's] the uniqueness of the material that these reporters gathered — this unique access and this very dramatic portrait of an uprising, which they’ve managed to pass on to the world. I also think some of our own decisions play a role: our deliberate decision to tell this story as a suspense story, using all the cinematic tools needed for that, which I think was a good choice for the film.

Q: How did you contact the Burmese people? Was there someone who was your liaison, or was it someone you knew from Denmark? What was the connection?

AO: It was pretty straightforward. Once we decided that we wanted to work with this we got in touch with the Democratic Voice of Burma in Oslo, [Norway], which is basically a satellite-TV and radio station, and explained our interest, and they were very forthcoming. They needed the attention — I guess they trusted us — so they sent us to Bangkok to meet 12 of those reporters who were coming out of training.

Q: Are they paranoid that someone might be an agent of the government?

AO: They're used to this. I think their biggest worry is that one of their recruits would be an agent. They deal with this all the time and I'm sure they made their investigations.

Q: When you made this film what was your hope or your original expectations for it? Do you think you can change society with it?

AO: Oh, absolutely not. I wasn't too focused on purpose as such. I tend to go so deep into the storytelling in itself — that that’s what really drives me and I don’t think too much about the function afterward.

Of course, I can see from the old pictures that I tried to say that I wanted to make the Burmese condition tangible, so that you could feel it and smell it, and I guess that was my ambition, to take it beyond the abstract interest in some other country and just be there. And that was what I was totally committed to when I put the film together; I didn't speculate too much on the aftermath of what might come out of this politically.

Q: You had so many different people involved; who did you consider your critical liaison? Who was the one gentleman that you had with you in the States that was working with you from Burma?

AO: That was very obvious to me when I met [the VJs' tactical leader, code-named] Joshua, because, first of all, he wasn’t scared. Understandably, most of these guys would be already very paranoid about what they were doing, so having a foreign film crew on top of that was just too much, obviously. Joshua had this kind of fearless attitude to everything, and he also had an intuitive understanding of how to explain Burma; he’s an excellent communicator.

And he has also a mix of qualities that intrigued me. He was on the one hand this cheeky young guy looking for challenges and really enjoying his cat-and-mouse game with the police sometimes. And, on the other hand, kind of a reflective, philosophical guy, who could also look back and explain the Burmese condition in a very deep way. So I was just intrigued by his qualities as a storyteller.

Q: How did you and producer Lise Lense-Møller define your roles? You obviously have the directing experience, so how did she come in as producer?

AO: Very much in the European tradition, I would say, in pretty much keeping hands off the creative business but making sure to give solid financial support. For instance, we needed some extra time, and she had the guts to let that happen even though she was under considerable economic pressure. So her contribution is mainly securing the financial circumstances. Creatively, she would be less involved than some other people.

Q: Were there moments when you were worried that this wouldn't happen? It must have been touch-and-go as to whether you had enough stuff that would make a film, and whether it would look right. Was there a point where anybody was in danger?

AO: Security, of course, was a big issue all the time and made some restrictions to what we could do. We tried to work creatively with that; we tried to make a virtue out of necessity. How can we work with people when we can't see their faces? That led us to phone conversations as a leading tool for the film. Otherwise, just sorting out the chaos; the material came in a pretty confused way where we wouldn't know who'd shot what and when, so we had to piece all that together first before we could start telling the story.

Q: When did you know you had a movie that would work?

AO: I think I was struck quite early on by the uniqueness of the material, the very straightforward demonstration of the regime's brutality. But also the happy moments, the optimism of the early days of the uprising, when everybody was coming out in the streets. I think they managed to capture that beautifully, if you consider the circumstances. These were guys who could barely pay for the bus ticket.

Q: How much information did you decide to put in or not put in? How much do you reveal or not reveal about the regime and Burma's history? How much do you assume that people know, understand or are passionate about?

AO: Much of these decisions are made by instinct, by the kind of director you are, the kind of storyteller you are. And as I said before, the number one thing for me was to make people experience the Burmese condition, to feel it, to sense it, the whole visceral thing about it. So that led obviously to me being very, very restrictive about me spending time on history, on more than just the absolutely necessary information.

Q: Do you hope some day you’ll be able to go to Burma without having to be under scrutiny?

AO: That would be the greatest strength.

Q: Of the many people you’ve talked to, what are their expectations?

AO: Well interestingly, in my experience the most optimistic people are the Burmese, and that’s a curious thing. I don’t know if it’s because of their Buddhist education, but they seem to be the most patient and the most convinced that some day that this regime will fall. The uprising of 2007 was a tragedy, but it was also a reminder of what people are actually able to do and how they’re able to battle their own fears.

Q: Was there any one person in the film that you consider the key to getting the film?

AO: Joshua, meeting Joshua. That was a critical thing, to have somebody who was able to give his voice to this, and to bridge any cultural gaps and make it such a smooth and happy collaboration, to me that’s a crucial thing. And also, some of the other guys also had these qualities actually. So basically the VJs.

Q: Do you know of anybody that had a chance to speak to Aung San Suu Kyi?

AO: We’ll see; there are some complications to that.

Q: How did making this film affect you personally?

AO: Well it made me very busy. Putting a film together like this, first of all is hard work, and you’re so focused on doing it right that you really don’t spend much time feeling a lot of stuff. Just dealing with this huge responsibility really takes up most of your energy. But of course, I think what made the biggest impression on  me was to watch the uplifting footage, the hopeful early days, this moves me just as much as it seems to have moved the audience.

Q: In your one week in Burma what did you see there that you hope tourists will one day be able to see?

AO: It’s a gem; it’s one of the most beautiful countries in the East. Also actually, ironically, because of the regime things have been preserved in a way quite different from, for instance, Thailand. It also is in terrible decay, but the millions of pagodas, the lush green trees of Rangoon. First of all the people are very mild mannered and gentle and they’re wonderful people.

Q: Have you had an interest in other countries in South East Asia?

AO: Not too much. I’m not an expert on Burma or on Asia as such. I’ve done a little bit of traveling in Indonesia, but nothing that would really put me in a special position. I came to this as a filmmaker more than anything else.

Q: I’ve met a number of the Burma refugees here in the States. It’s a tough struggle. I don’t know who has it worse; the Tibetans or them.

AO: It’s pretty bleak for both of these peoples. It’s a good fortune that they’re both Buddhists because it helps them a lot, clearly.

BB: One other really fascinating aspect to the film is your exploitation of the contemporary technology. Your movie couldn’t have existed a few years ago. When you step back and think abut the implications of that, that must have interesting ramifications in your head.

AO: Sure.

Q: What are your thoughts on this.

AO: Of course a film is not just about Burma, it’s also a celebration of citizen journalism as such. And telling people that technology is not always a bad thing; there’s a tendency to think that cameras or something that’s going to watch you, that Big Brother is going to watch you. But it actually can also be Little Brother watching the tyrants, which I think is a positive note. Basically, I’m every optimistic about technology, I believe in that kind of thing, I believe in progress through technology, so I’m happy it’s a celebration of that too.

Q: You obviously have to be emotionally committed when you make a movie like this but at the same time where do you draw the line as to how you continue to be committed or not. Obviously, you’re going to go on to do other things after the Oscars, but then you say to yourself, “Well, do I need to come back to it, to continue to worry about what’s going on in Burma?” Where do you draw the line?

AO: Well I draw it just around the Oscar, actually. I hope this will be the end of my story with this at least. Of course personally I will always be attached to the issue on some level; you don’t just quit that. I made a lot of friends in Burmese circles and so on. But professionally, I expect this to be the finale of almost one and a half years of touring with this film.

Q: Of all the people you’ve met from Sundance on, who’s been most exciting to you?

AO: To be honest I think what made the greatest impression on me was going to places like 10 Downing Street and being welcomed. It felt very natural to be there and to present this film, and that people connected to it so easily, that was great.

Q: Did you meet President Obama?

AO: No, I never met Obama. But of course this leaves a huge impression. Otherwise, what touches me most about this, is when I get, for instance recently I got a picture from New Delhi, from a open-air screening on a street corner in New Delhi organized by some local Tibetans. So they were sitting there in the street watching “Burma VJ” and the street was packed. Traffic stopped; they were all just sitting there and totally engulfed with it. They tell me that this has helped to bring Tibetan and Burmese exiles more together in India and those are the stories that really touch you.

Q: And are you looking forward to the Oscar parties? Whether you win or lose you get to go to the Oscar parties.

AO: I guess so. I don’t know what to look forward to but it seems to be pretty intense.

Q: When you’ve gone to Oscar events like the nominees' lunch, there’s got to be somebody you’re really excited to meet. Give me a fan moment.

AO: It was a great moment to say hello to Danny Ellsberg[, the former military analyst whose 1971 release of the Pentagon Papers, a secret Pentagon study of US decision-making regarding the Vietnam War, produced major historical ramifications]. Even though it's not my country'/s history, that was nice. Otherwise, I wouldn't say meeting any specific person, but what I really enjoyed about that lunch was this kind of collegial atmosphere, like we were making this class photo. There was a sense that superstars would mingle with other members of the film industry without any sense of difference. Everybody knew that film is hard work and we share this hard work, we share this effort, and we share this commitment to the medium. So that was very pure and nice, the atmosphere.

Q: What's next?

AO: I've barely had a chance to build up a new film because I’ve been so busy with this for a long time. So that's actually what I'm hoping to get started thinking about once this is finished.

Q: It will be something stylistically different?

AO: Oh yeah it might be entirely different. I just follow whatever story fascinates me.

For more by Brad Balfour: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brad-balfour