Back in 1997 I went on the set of the Vancouver-shot action-horror flick Deep Rising on assignment for Fangoria magazine. I chatted with director Stephen Sommers and actors Treat Williams and Famke Janssen. The movie wound up sucking but, hey, I’m pretty sure it wasn\u2019t my fault.<\/p>\n
It shouldn\u2019t come as any real surprise, when you step onto the set of a horror\/action film, that the first thing that catches your eye is a great big honkin\u2019 gun. Still, the sight of some prop guy casually fiddling with the trigger mechanism of a bazooka-sized weapon gives you cause for concern when it just happens to be aimed your way.<\/p>\n
On the gorgeous summer day when Fango visits the North Vancouver set of Deep Rising, there\u2019s a crew member in the back of atruck handling said minicannon. \u201cDo they use that to kill the monster?\u201d your reporter asks by way of introductory chit-chat, but when the childlike greeting results only in a bored look and a lackadaisical \u201cno\u201d, it\u2019s clear that one would be better of putting any questions about the film\u2019s weapon-vs.-creatures outcome to director Stephen Sommers himself.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not nearly big enough,\u201d says the much more approachable Sommers when corralled in his trailer during a lunch break. \u201cThey need a lot more firepower than that. But they have it!\u201d<\/p>\n
Since Sommers also wrote the script for Deep Rising, which Hollywood Pictures releases January 30, he\u2019s obviously the right guy to provide a capsule description of the film\u2019s story. Barely giving the guy a chance to chown down on his plateful of steak and crab\u2013they sure eat well on this shoot!\u2013Fango pushes for a rundown of the plot.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are two storylines that converge,\u201d explains the youthful-looking, 30-something filmmaker. \u201cIt\u2019s all about a state-of-the-art luxury cruise ship, the most expensive one on the planet, that is on its maiden voyage, while at the same time a bunch of modern-day pirates are going to hijack the ship and rip it off.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen the get there it\u2019s in the middle of a storm, and their boat gets crippled, but they manage to limp to the cruise ship. And when they get on board, all the passengers are gone. Nobody\u2019s on the ship! Then they find out that something else is on the boat. Some other things. And now they\u2019re trapped on it in the middle of the storm.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was concerns about ocean-bound problems of a more prosaic sort that led the Deep Rising crew to avoid shooting the movie on the open sea. According to Sommers, there was no way in hell he\u2019d want to treat the murky depths ofWaterworld.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re always trying to figure out how to beat the water problem,\u201d he reports, \u201cbecause a lot of the movie just takes place in water. I mean, you\u2019ll see sets that are flooded up to our knees, and others that are flooded up to our eyeballs. We have dump tanks all over the place, and we\u2019re building what\u2019ll be the second biggest tank in the world for a lot of our water work. But to go out on the real ocean\u2013that\u2019s insanity.\u201d<\/p>\n
There has been something of a cyclical trend toward seafaring horror flicks in the last couple of decades, what with soaking-wet suckers like Leviathan and DeepStar Six turning up in 1989 and Sphere and Virus coming later this winter. And then there was the TV miniseries based on Peter Benchley\u2019s novel Beast that aired shortly before work got under way on Deep Rising.<\/p>\n
But Sommers says that he\u2019s not worried about fallout from that giant-squid epic tarnishing his film. The mere mention of Beast, in fact, draws a humorously flustered reaction from the director.<\/p>\n
\u201cOh, was that that\u2013oh no! Oh my God, it\u2019s so funny because\u2013well, I shouldn\u2019t hack on them. All I\u2019ll say is, I saw the last 20 minutes of that movie, and I have no concerns, because ours isn\u2019t about a giant plastic floating thing. I won\u2019t get any deeper than that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sommers requests that the tape recorder be switched off while he pokes off-the-record fun at Beast\u2019s shortcomings, but he soon leaves comical criticism of that much-maligned effort aside to focus on the positive aspects of his own film\u2019s monstrosities, which were designed based on real living organisms and creatures.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe wanted to make them as believable and real as we could,\u201d he says, \u201cjust incredibly vicious and large, and as organic as possible. We didn\u2019t want to do them with big puppets, and when you see the creatures you\u2019ll realize they can\u2019t be men in costumes. The only way to make them do what we wanted them to do, and look how we wanted them to look, was through computer generation\u2013with a lot of interactive mechanical effects.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd I don\u2019t want to put other movies down,\u201d he adds, still recovering from the memory of Beast, \u201cbut I hope this has a better plot, better characters, better actors, and better special effects.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sommers is quick to sing the praises of his Deep Rising colleagues, including makeup and creature FX master Rob Bottin, production designer Holger (StarGate) Gross, 2nd-unit director Dean Cundey (whose credits as a cinematographer range from Halloween to Jurassic Park), and veteran composer Jerry Goldsmith.<\/p>\n
As Sommers carves out a morsel of barbecued beef, there seems like no better time to query him about the grisly highlights of the film. The affable director is so eager to explain the gory details that he actually lays his fork down for a minute, an unheard-of practice among lunching directors, most of whom are only too happy to talk with their mouths full.<\/p>\n
\u201cWell, you get to see a man half-digested,\u201d he says, \u201cand the way Rob is doing it is pretty brilliant. It\u2019s half makeup and half CGI, so when people see this half-digested guy stumbling towards them, they\u2019ll have no idea how it was done. You can see through his eye socket to the back of his skull.\u201d<\/p>\n
The opportunity to see FX guru Bottin at work is one that this Fango scribe isn\u2019t about to pass up, and on a subsequent set visit, the FX wizard is caught in action. In one of the huge buildings that make up the Versatile Shipyards section of North Vancouver\u2019s Lonsdale Quay, Sommers and Bottin are giving actor Clint Curtis a crash course in looking mangled and freaked out. He stands half-naked, bleeding from a head wound that has cost him a fair chunk of his hair, staring dazedly at his hands, which are blistered and gory after an intimate encounter with one of the sea creatures\u2019 tentacles.<\/p>\n
At Bottin\u2019s request, makeup assistants slather \u201cBilly\u201d down with more goop as they prepare for another take. \u201cSpaz me like a wildman!\u201d urges Sommers, observing the action from a monitor, and Curtis freaks out more fervently, until the director is satisfied enough to yell, \u201cCut! That\u2019s a print!\u201d<\/p>\n
After viewing all this intense horrorization, a relaxed stroll around the set\u2019s grounds\u2013located right on picturesque Vancouver Harbour\u2013is in order. Inside one cavernous structure, set workers under production designer Gross have constructed mazelike corridors and walkways, and installed scads of nautical piping to create the engine-room interior of the film\u2019s pivotal cruise ship. Crew members slog along in dirty-looking, waist-high water, and in certain dingy corners it\u2019s easy to imagine any manner of sea beastie lying in wait, just below the surface.<\/p>\n
Back outside, a single inflatable mattress floats in an enormous above-ground tank, the only remnant of a recent pool party that crew members threw while taking a breather from set construction. This holding tank is to be used for some of Deep Rising\u2018s close-up water shots, and an even larger one at the other end of the set grounds is being built for a climactic scene that involves an escape on jet skis.<\/p>\n
Having seen what some of the film\u2019s $45-million budget is being spent on, it\u2019s time to get an eyeful of another, more appealing sort\u2013in the shape of lead actress Famke Janssen. When Fango shows up at the beautiful former Bond girl\u2019s trailer, she seems a little burnt out, but is still happy to offer a description of her character, Trillian.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe doesn\u2019t even have a last name,\u201d Janssen says, \u201cjust Trillian. She\u2019s a jewel thief on a cruise ship, and of course she gets caught, \u2019cause she\u2019s really bad at everything she does. She thinks she\u2019s good at everything, but she gets busted, gets put up in a locker room, and then all of a sudden everything goes wrong on the ship\u2013she doesn\u2019t know what. After she wakes up from all the boxes that have hit her on the head, she realizes that the whole cruise ship has been infested by these creatures, and that there are just a few survivors and she\u2019s one of them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Janssen describes her role in Deep Rising as quite a departure from that of GoldenEye\u2018s lasciviously lethal assassin Xenia Onatopp–she of the crushing, killer thighs. And the actress says that the project is a lot more fun, too. She motions proudly to an acoustic guitar she keeps in her trailer, and which she has co-star Kevin J. O\u2019Connor give her lessons on whenever there\u2019s free time on the set.<\/p>\n
\u201cGoldenEye was shot in London,\u201d says the Dutch-born actress, \u201cand I was there by myself, so I didn\u2019t hang out as much with all the other actors. And the character I portrayed in that film was a little more difficult for me to play than this one.\u201d<\/p>\n
Deep Rising marks the second time that Janssen has been cast alongside guitar-strumming pal O\u2019Connor, whose portrayal of Philip Swann was a highlight of Clive Barker\u2019s Lord of Illusions. In that film, Janssen\u2019s Dorothea character shared numerous scenes with O\u2019Connor, but she doesn\u2019t enjoy nearly as much screen time with him this time around.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m mostly involved with myself,\u201d she says with a chuckle, \u201cand then all these other people arrive and I have to deal with them. The person I mostly get involved with is Treat Williams\u2019 character, Finnegan. Kevin sort of tags along, and I treat him like shit.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although she agrees that she somehow \u201ckeeps ending up in them\u201d, Janssen points out that she\u2019s not a fan of horror films per se. And from the sound of things, she wasn\u2019t too crazy about how the theatrical version of Lord of Illusions panned out. \u201cIt\u2019s frustrating to be an actor in a movie and find out that the story has been altered and a lot of scenes have been cut, but that\u2019s the part you have to deal with as an actor. The director\u2019s cut, on laserdisc, is probably closer to what I remember filming.\u201d<\/p>\n
A little more trailer-hopping soon finds us face-to-face with star Williams, whose trailer walls are adorned with snapshots of his Vermont farm and his infant son. The actor leans back on a comfy-looking couch and goes about explaining what attracted him to Deep Rising in the first place.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have always been looking for a fun action-adventure film,\u201d he says, \u201cand it\u2019s been interesting. I\u2019ve had some come along that I\u2019ve passed on, and others that I wanted that I didn\u2019t get, but what I like about this is that it\u2019s an action film that doesn\u2019t pretend to be anything else. It\u2019s got elements of the horror and B-movie genres, but it\u2019s elevated. The thing that I was most attracted to was that there\u2019s a real sense of humor involved. Stephen has such a great sense of humor and a sense of style that will surprise a lot of people.\u201d<\/p>\n
Williams is riding somewhat of a comeback on film, what with his roles as crimelord Xander Drax in The Phantom, arms dealer Billy Burke in The Devil\u2019s Own, and Critical Bill in Things to Do in Denver When You\u2019re Dead. He sees the latter portrayal in particular as being indicative of a return to strong characterizations.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was a point in my life when I said, \u2018I don\u2019t want to be an actor in bad films,\u201d he confesses. \u201cI had done three films in a row that I was unhappy with, and I felt that I was trying to hang on to what had been a very promising career, with Prince of the City and other movies. I was tired of apologizing for the films I was in, and I just decided to back off from that.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was making a very good living in television, and waiting patiently\u2013sometimes painfully, but always patiently\u2013for Critical Bill. I didn\u2019t know it was going to beCritical Bill, but I knew that there\u2019d be a part that would come along where eventually I would be able to demonstrate that I\u2019m still capable of doing good work in good films.\u201d<\/p>\n
One of Williams\u2019 credits that no doubt falls into the disappointment category is director Mark Goldblatt\u2019s Dead Heat, the 1988 zombie-cop flick he co-starred in with Joe Piscopo. He remembers it as a very difficult shoot\u2013and has basically been happy to forget everything else about the unsuccessful project. Still, Williams admits that is is a recognizable part of his oeuvre in certain cinematic circles.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere have been many people who see me and go, \u2018Oh, you\u2019re the guy in Dead Heat\u2018,\u201d he says, \u201cso there is a group of people who like that movie. But I thought it could have been much better.\u201d<\/p>\n
Williams admits to a strong love of horror flicks, but says that that attraction resulted only from his life-long adoration of movies in general. \u201cI have always had a very eclectic love of film,\u201d he says, \u201cand I don\u2019t differentiate the independent art film from the big Hollywood spectacular. As a kid growing up, watching Fred Astaire dance was as important to me as watching Godzilla crush buildings\u2013all of it was a part of my youthful view as to what film is.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut one of the most frightening experiences of my life was watching one of the Quatermass movies, my first real horror film experience. There\u2019s another film I remember watching about space creatures in a guy\u2019s backyard and they had this sand pit, and people would drop down into it and get these things stuck in their necks. Invaders from Mars.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd when I was a kid in New York there was a thing called Million Dollar Movie, and in those days\u2013when television only had like six channels\u2013the station would purchase a film for a week-long showing, so when King Kong played, it aired like 50 times. And I saw it about 48 times. The next week it was Godzilla, another week it would be Frankenstein or Bride of Frankenstein or Son of Frankenstein. There were a whole lot of them.\u201d<\/p>\n
So does Williams expect that Deep Rising will instill the same kind of thrills in \u201990s horror fans as his fave bookings on The Million Dollar Movie did way back when?<\/p>\n
\u201cOh, absolutely,\u201d he says. \u201cRob Bottin is doing a great job\u2013not only creating these monsters, but creating monsters with personality. They aren\u2019t just attacking everybody; they also rear back and examine us, and are trying to figure out how to get us in one part of the ship.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat they\u2019re really doing is feeding, and that\u2019s the fun part. From our perspective we\u2019re being attacked by monsters, but all they\u2019re doing is having dinner.\u201d