Caffeinated Clint
He’s one of Hollywood’s hottest producers – having overseen such hits as “Predator”, “Lethal Weapon” and “The Matrix Trilogy” – and she’s making quite a name for herself in the field too. Moviehole caught up with the illustrious Joel Silver and the delightful Susan Downey (wife of Robert Downey Jr) to talk about their spine-chilling new flick, “Orphan”.
Can you talk a bit about the quality of the acting in this film, and the effect it had on the overall piece?
Susan : We were fortunate. I mean, we had great source material. David Leslie Johnson’s script was really solid when we got it. We developed it a bit before we went out to people. And then Jaume came on board and he did an incredible visual presentation to show the feeling and mood. And you could tell he was destined in wanting to make a very classy horror movie-like we always referred to in our development meetings-from the seventies, those kinds of great horror films. And the characters that David wrote had these interesting back-stories. These were built from the base up. And it allowed us to have an opportunity to cast these great people. Vera really sought this role out. Before we had even started talking about who should be Kate, she had heard about it. She’d read it.
She cracks me up because she lives on a farm in the middle of nowhere and she reads every script that is viable for someone of her age and something she’s interested in. She came after us and really wanted to do it. Jaume spoke to her and they were absolutely on the same page. And we were fans of her work. I mean, she’d done smaller roles in everything from The Boy in the Striped Pajamas to The Departed. She’s one of those actress who you remember. There was something really real about her performance. And so it was exciting for us to give her so much more to play with. After we cast her, Peter came on board.  And they knew each other. They’d worked together. And they just really let us do something hopefully pretty special.
After seeing the movie, we have the challenge now of keeping our mouths shut about the twist at the end.
Joel: I know. I would like to challenge you guys to not tell the twist. It’s really great to have a movie that has a great twist in that you don’t see coming. I don’t think it’s not enjoyable if you know it or you’ve heard about it. But I think it’d be fun to try to experience it yourself.
Isabelle Fuhrman did excellent work as Esther. What did you see in her? Did you know what she was capable of from her audition?
Susan: Pretty much. That’s what it was. There were a lot of kids who went on tape, and there was a casting website where we could look at them. And Joel sort of tells the story that Leo [DiCaprio] had called him the minute he saw Isabelle’s. He saw it before all of us because he was in a completely different time zone. He got up and looked at it. And he’s like, ‘There’s this girl. You’ve got to go look.’
We went, and you see a picture first. And I was like, ‘That looks nothing like how Esther is described in the script. How is this going to work?’ So we played her audition, and it just was a no-brainer. I mean, she just completely popped. There was a sophistication there. And she came in kind of dressed as described in the script. She came with an accent. I guess her grandparents are from that region. So, she knew the sound of it. I mean, it was incredible. It actually made our job pretty easy.
The other thing is the mystery of what happens when this girl comes into this family because you’re dealing with real life situations.
Joel : I think that’s it’s just a good story. It’s a creepy story, a disturbing story, and I think it affects you. You watch it, and it kind of grabs you in a couple of ways that you don’t really see coming. And all the performances are great. The music’s good. And Jaume did a great job directing it. It has a great feel, a great look. I think that as a package it worked out pretty well.
Do you as producers enjoy watching this film with an audience and seeing their reaction, especially to something like this?
Joel: We had a preview of the movie and saw the jumps and bumps coming, and you look at the audience when that happens and see their reaction. It’s so cool. It’s not a conventional horror movie because there’s more meat there. And I think that people kind of get sucked into the story and then they don’t realize that something is going to happen that’s going to shock them.
Do you guys still have the same enthusiasm for making movies as you did before, especially with the number of movies you both have?
Joel: Of course. I love the process. I mean, we’re lucky. We’ve had a lot of them. And some that don’t work. But, yeah, each time you’re up to bat you hope you’ve got something special and different. The whole idea of Dark Castle, this company that we created, was to make these kinds of movies that you might not have seen before, with twists on the genre. And some of them are not all just horror. There’s action and there’s comedy. We have great movies coming out that we did with Dark Castle.  But this one came out really good. And we’re really proud of it. I love the fact that we pulled it off. We made it and it worked.
What are some of your favorite horror movies?
Susan: Well, of the more recent ones, what we talk about in our creative meetings, you always go right to The Sixth Sense. You go to The Exorcist. You go to The Omen. You go to just all those great classic ones from the seventies, like Carrie. And as far as more recent ones, I really enjoyed Drag Me to Hell. I thought that was a lot of fun. I kind of knew what it wanted to be and went for it. So, I pretty much see all the horror movies that are out there. The only ones I don’t personally love are ones that are just completely sadistic. That’s the only ones that I just don’t get to. But I love being kind of thrilled at any others. The Shining is probably my absolute favorite though.
Joel: I guess Alien. I think the first Alien is the probably the greatest horror movie I ever saw. And also, of course, Showgirls, but that’s a joke for me. That’s the joke for the screen.
I was wondering how all-consuming producing is, and also knowing how to develop a great story like this.
Susan: It’s exhausting. (Laughs) I wrapped a movie last night at like one thirty and came here. So, it’s a lot. But, you know what? It’s a lot of fun when you get to see it all come together. And Joel’s been doing it for a long time and I’ve had the honor of being able to watch him do it. And you just see it. He is a producer. You look it up in the dictionary, there’s got to be a picture of Joel there.
Joel : I mean, look, we have four movies coming out this year, three more after this. So, we’re busy. She finished one last night. We start another one on Thursday. But it’s great. I mean, as long as they let us make them we’re going to make them. As long as they say go ahead and do it we’re going to do them and hope that we have a lot of years ahead of us. Because I have a lot more stories I want to tell.
ORPHAN is now showing
