Chris Wedge discusses fantasy and the importance of keeping the audience engaged for the Home Entertainment release of Epic
At Blue Sky Studios in Connecticut, Oscar winning filmmaker Chris Wedge talks about directing the animated 3D adventure comedy EPIC.
The exciting and entertaining film tells the story of a teenage girl who is transported into a magical universe in the depths of the forest, where she teams up with an elite band of warriors to save both their world and ours. The film stars Amanda Seyfried, Beyoncé, Colin Farrell and Josh Hutcherson.
Epic: the fantastical new film set IN A HIDDEN WOODLAND WORLD WHERE THE creatures may be miniature, but the STAKES ARE HIGH AND THE ACTION IS EPIC.
In Greenwich, Connecticut on America’s East Coast, Blue Sky Studios is set in 155 acres of rambling woodland. Today the outlying area is quite beautiful, with more than a hint of magic. It is the depth of winter. The trees are frosted with white and sparkle in the bright, cold sunlight. The ground is carpeted in thick snow, the sky is gray. It is quiet, serene and still. Blue Sky has produced hits that range from the wildly popular ICE AGE series, to ROBOTS, HORTON HEARS A WHO and RIO, but it feels like a long way from Hollywood. And it is easy to see how the creative team of filmmakers, led by director Chris Wedge, found inspiration right outside their window for their latest film. EPIC tells the story of a battle taking place in a hidden, natural world populated by tiny beings. In every other season, the Connecticut countryside is green, vibrant, musical and picturesque, exactly the kind of environment that would lead a team of imaginative artists to envisage a whimsical and wondrous universe that exists parallel to our own world even though we can’t see it.
In contrast to the stark, icy landscape, the atmosphere inside the award-winning Blue Sky Studios is warm. A hub of intense activity and focus, there is an upbeat and infectious enthusiasm that permeates the modern, hi-tech, open plan space. Sculptors, art directors and animators are hard at work, putting the finishing touches on their most exciting and ambitious movie to date.
A forest fantasy as thrilling as it is stylistically sumptuous, EPIC is set in a magical universe that is steeped in fantasy but grounded in nature. While the characters and the world depicted in the film are minute, the story itself has a grand scale, chronicling an epic conflict between the forces of life and the forces of decay. Inspired by William Joyce's 1996 book THE LEAF MEN AND THE BRAVE GOOD BUGS, Wedge has created an imaginary world where tiny warriors known as Leaf Men fly around on hummingbirds and where dangerous creatures lurk in the bushes and under logs. The Jinn are the ordinary civilian inhabitants of the forest who are ruled by Queen Tara (Beyoncé). The Leaf Men, led by Ronin (Colin Farrell), are the warriors who have a mission to protect nature and their world. The bad guys, the Boggans, led by Mandrake (Christoph Waltz) are bent on destruction.
“The Leaf Men are the protectors of the forest, the protectors of life and they’re like little samurai,” says Chris Wedge. “The bad guys, the Boggans, ride on bats. They want to destroy the forest by spreading decay. They are creepy crawlies who spread rot. They shoot poison arrows and things die. Who is going to win control of the forest? Who is going to live or die? We meet a cast of characters involved in this struggle. Some are very stoic and heroic and others are more comedic. And we also meet some humans.”
EPIC’s human heroine Mary Katherine (Amanda Seyfried) is a feisty teenager who is told by her eccentric scientist father Professor Bomba (Jason Sudeikis), “Just because you haven’t seen something, doesn’t mean it’s not there.” She doesn’t believe him until she shrinks and is magically whisked off to the forest kingdom where she joins forces with the Leaf Men.
Visually breathtaking, the detail that infuses EPIC is exquisite from the luminous Queen Tara with her dress of iris petals to the Leaf Men warriors with their armor, inlaid with beetle shells, and the brave knights with their leaf shields and twig bow and arrows. The inhabitants of this magical world have taken on the appearance of the world in which they live and are essentially an extension of nature.
“We wanted the audience to feel initially that they are watching something that feels very familiar and natural, that they could find in the woods where they live,” says art director Mike Knapp. “Then we start to play with the familiarity and transform that environment. During research, we went out into the woods and did a lot of drawing and painting and photography. We looked for the little design cues in nature that we could embellish to create a naturalist environment. We looked at rocks and moss and fungus, dead leaves on the floor of the forest and fallen logs. We looked at the balance of life and decay in the world around us. We showed how alien this world could be if you were a little guy running around through the forest. Trees would be like skyscrapers and flowers would seem like they are hundreds of feet tall. Everything is more luminous and bright. It’s a strange world.”
EPIC’s stellar voice cast includes Colin Farrell, Josh Hutcherson, Amanda Seyfried, Christoph Waltz, Aziz Ansari, Chris O’Dowd, Pitbull, Jason Sudeikis, Steven Tyler, and Beyoncé Knowles.
Blue Sky co-founder and creative director Chris Wedge is a classically trained animator with extensive experience in stop-motion puppet animation as well as a Masters degree in computer graphics. A pioneer in the field of computer animation, he won an Oscar in 1998 for his short animated film, BUNNY. He directed the original ICE AGE (2002) and ROBOTS (2005.) Blue Sky is owned by Twentieth Century Fox.
Chris Wedge sat down for the following interview over lunch at Blue Sky...
Where did the inspiration for EPIC come from?
It always starts with a world for me. I started thinking of this particular world depicted in EPIC almost a decade ago. It is a world that is hidden right under our noses in the forest.
The film is beautiful; how did you create the look and feel of this vibrant imaginary world?
It is very rich and romantic and is inspired by Victorian countryside paintings. We looked at illustrators and artists at the turn of the century who were painting little worlds and civilizations with coronations and funerals and battles. We wanted a very natural world and we styled the colors and lighting to support what was happening in the story, whether it was funny and light or exciting, or vibrant or dangerous. We worked with a whole spectrum of color. There is a lot of technical artistry that builds on what we’ve done in the past at Blue Sky and I think we’ve put a great deal of focus into making our world look very natural.
Can you discuss the technology behind the film? You bring the forest world to life so vividly.
As one of the founders of Blue Sky Studios, half of what makes our company unique is our nerdy fascination with technology and what we can do with it. My interest is in images that can’t be made any other way and making them very detailed, complex and natural. I want to take the audience into an immersive world. So EPIC is not just animation or a cartoon, it’s a movie. Part of the intention with this film is to expand our cinematic scope so that EPIC feels like a big, live action adventure that takes place in a fantastic world.
Elaine Lipworth
EPIC IS OUT NOW ON 3D BLU-RAY, BLU-RAY AND DVD