Hellboy II director/writer Guillermo del Toro with Hellboy’s revolver.
© Universal Pictures

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Striking Gold! Writer/director Guillermo del Toro

Mania recently had a chance to sit down with Hellboy director Guillermo del Toro (Pan’s Labyrinth, Blade II) at a recent press junket in Beverly Hills and hear how this sequel differs from it’s predecessor, what the upcoming Hobbit means, the possibility of a third Hellboy offering and how Family Guy’s Seth MacFarlane came to voice the newest edition to Hellboy’s team, the protoplasmic Johann Krauss

Guillermo del Toro: The first movie, I fully thought we were doing the exact version that would honor the comic and be faithful to the comic but as time went on I realized that mistakes were made or shortcomings were evident…I was prudish on the first one a little bit and I was completely unbridled on this one. And I really think it made a difference because. Before I was there to satisfy a specific aesthetic which I admire which is Mike’s (Mignola, Hellboy Creator) and a specific which I admire which is Mike’s; I made it my own only to a certain point. I wasn’t conscious of it, it was not a process, it just happened. And I learned and I was desperate to make the second one to improve, to expand, and to go a little wilder. I think it IS Mike’s creation, it will always be Mike’s creation but I really allowed myself to disagree with more people on this one sometimes including Mike and I felt it was a riskier proposition but I feel if we were going to do the second one and be equally timid you were going to come out with the exact (same result).

M: Are you a Jim Henson fan? There are a lot of practical creatures in the film.

GdT: Yes, I am a huge Jim Henson fan and actually Solution Studios who participated in many of the creatures, many of them used to be in the Henson shop, that’s why we went with them. They’ve created some of the stuff I liked the most in Storyteller or Little Shop of Horrors and Return to Oz. I think that one idea I had for the movie is that first and foremost we wanted to make the movie feel handmade. We wanted the movie to have an artisan pride to it; a craftsmanship to the sets, to the golden army. I told them “make sure the gold is hammered, not flat, a little rust, oil stains because I wanted everything to be texturally palatable. One of the approaches was let’s make the creatures as practical as we can.

M: Did you put in the “See You Next Wednesday” reference, as a reference to (director John) Landis?

GdT: Landis and Kubrick, yeah.

M: Also I noticed many references; Bride of Frankenstein, Creature from the Black Lagoon…

 

M: Creature From the Black Lagoon was the first horror movie I ever watched. All those old Universal horror films have a lot to do with who I am today. Obviously those movies had some kind of impact on you. Can you talk about that?

GdT: Every movie that I referenced in the film; Harryhausen, Creature (From the Black Lagoon), Wizard of Oz, American Werewolf in London; whatever it is, those are the movies that I call my twelve year old movies because the idea of Hellboy was “can I shoot a movie like a twelve year old?”. Can I learn to de-evolve emotionally to a guy…that is so in love with these things that I shoot it with that emotion? When you see the resurrecting of the fairy it’s shot wide angle, with everyone standing around; exactly like a stop motion set-up from Harryhausen. When I shot the resurrection of the stone giant portal, I told Danny Elfman “let’s listen to the Thalos que from Bernard Hermann from Jason and The Argonauts and we referenced it. I wanted very much, very much for this movie to have that wide eyed kind of view of the creatures, when you have that love of monsters that is unbridled, untampered by adult concern in the emotional aspect.

M: Is that child-like innocence that you talk about something that attracted you to The Hobbit?

GdT: I believe so; to a point because I think the Hobbit, like this movie, every movie has to be a balance...Pan’s Labyrinth is the same thing, it had a lot of that awe but at the same time it’s a more adult theme and a more adult tone. The theme and the tone of the Hobbit are very different from this movie. Aesthetically, it cannot be as “pop” as “poppy” as this movie (Hellboy II). The approach will be different but hopefully, the emotion…The Hobbit is an “eleven year old book” I read it when I was eleven and it hit me right at that moment so I’ll try to honor that feeling but my most sincere hope would be that somewhere at some point during the Hellboy II exhibition that there is a ten year old, an eleven year old that falls in love with one of the creatures like Wink or The Angel of Death because we created those monsters…everyone that created those monsters

I told them to come from a place of awe.

M: Like those older horror movies, like The Wolfman or Frankenstein, these tend to be more tragic characters as opposed to being evil or malevolent. I found the same thing to be true for the creatures in Hellboy II particularly the Elemental. At first the Elemental is an evil, we-gotta-kill-this-thing, but then you realize…

GdT: He’s the last of a race. Well, the idea I had was that there were two things that concerned me when I first saw a Godzilla movie; I always said “my God, where does he poop?” I really thought about parking lots filled with Godzilla poop and the second thing was “he’s just destroying a few buildings, why do you kill him? He’s extraordinary!” I didn’t see it in its human tragedy proportions and I thought the Elemental had that possibility, I thought “you’re going to kill it, are you killing it because it’s destroying a city block?” The Hellboy movies not unlike Pan’s Labyrinth are about choice and they are about the most pedestrian concerns railroading fantasy and grinding it into dust.

M: If you do a third Hellboy how are you going to logistically do that if you’re committed for the next several years to The Hobbit?

GdT: There was four years between the first Hellboy and the second one. There can be legitimately be four years between the second one and the third one. On the third one the ante is up considerably in that it’s a very complicated movie because I wanted to signal the end of, at least, this incarnation of Hellboy. I’m not saying forever but I would not be involved past that. And it will probably be the last Hellboy that Ron has in him and I think we would love to make it sort of a capper.

M: Given that the films were made at different studios, how are we going to get a DVD set?

GdT: I know! Isn’t that a bitch to figure out? I don’t know. I had the same concern and the answer is we won’t unless somebody strikes a deal that nobody wants to make. If at all possible I think the second and third movie could be in a set.

M: Will Ron Perlman be in The Hobbit?

 

GdT: I have demonstrated in our friendship a lot of loyalty and he has to me and I believe that there is a commitment to enjoying each others work together but it doesn’t come before the screenplay. If the script has a character that he can play then he’ll be there but if there isn’t then we’ll wait for the next one.

M: How’s the screenplay to The Hobbit coming along?

Gdt: We’re starting. We started taking notes on the novel for the first movie and making annotations for ideas for the second film. It’s in its infancy.

M: Will it be a faithful adaptation of the book?

GdT: Look, somebody said, and I agree, that the only faithful adaptation is to actually put the book in front of a camera and turn the pages one by one. Hitchcock used to make a joke; if you give a goat…a book and a film…to eat…it will say “I prefer the book!” We will be as faithful to what we believe has to be done; like with the Hellboy movies, the first one was slightly too slavish in some ways. I think that we’ll try to honor that (the book).

M: Where do you see a middle point to break The Hobbit in two?

GdT: I don’t see a middle point. I think that the book should be contained, if possible, in the first movie. The second film would be that would lead through the gap of about a half century between The Hobbit and the first of the trilogy films and connect them. Ideally, we will have created an overture and a sort of a first movement to a symphony of five films. This is the Ideal but it’s too early right now. When people ask me where I am in The Hobbit I tell them “I’m in post on Hellboy and I’m in post on The Lovely Bones, that’s where I am on The Hobbit. Then, in three weeks from now, we’ll be actively….I’ll be more and more able to answer.

M: What brought you to Seth MacFarlane for the voice of Johann (in Hellboy II)

GdT: You know, when we came to the conclusion that Johann was going to be essentially a voice I thought “who would be the best performer” and we talked about Seth early on and Lloyd Levin brought him up and I said “absolutely ideal.” I love Stewey, I love Brian. I do think the guy is an incredibly gifted vocal actor. Incredibly gifted and he makes a killer crooner if you’ve ever heard him sing! I thought we’d never get him; the guy is essentially his own cottage industry. You know, we thought why would he be interested in 10,000 bucks for a movie or whatever and we called him up and he said “absolutely! Send me the script.” He said “I love it, let’s do it.” It was easy but I never thought I would get him. To this day, the days he was in the booth were the happiest days of my geek life. I kept asking him “In that episode, when peter…what was going through your mind?” and he told me fantastic stories! I was like the James Lipton of Family Guy (del Toro goes into a remarkably accurate James Lipton impersonation) “What is your favorite color…”

M: I asked Seth if you would be making a cameo in Family Guy…

GdT: (laughs) I would love to!

M: Has he talked to you about it yet?

GdT: He said something to me about it. I said to him “whatever you need” ‘cause I’d love to do it. For whatever reason I think a constructive rivalry has existed between The Simpsons and Family Guy and they are, in name and in goals and in styles are so different and I love them both for completely different reasons. I think the Simpsons generates almost literary insights into what it is to be human, where Family Guy is about rhythm and hits and going where you normally don’t dare to go, unless you’re really drunk! And I think that it’s a beautiful (thing).