MovieWeb Interview with David Slade

Posted on 03. Dec, 2010 by Amanda31 in News

MovieWeb talked with David Slade this week about the making of Eclipse.

As an individual artist, how much actual input do you have coming into a huge franchise like this. Especially midway through the series?

David Slade: This film had to be different from the others. I was encouraged coming in to make a different film. I think we did make a different film. Besides the basic ground rules, which were to continue the story, and Stephenie Meyer’s rule that said you couldn’t kill anybody that she didn’t kill in the book…From the script onward, I had a lot of input. I wouldn’t say I was allowed to run riot and free. But I was absolutely encouraged to make the film my own. Which I seized upon.

The tent scene is the most iconic moment from the movie. It’s the one that everybody remembers most, and it’s the one the fans responded to the most. How did you go about choreographing that scene, and how do you feel about it being one of the scenes that you’ll be most known for in the future?

David Slade: It’s an odd one, that one. Because we shot it months apart. And we only had a day to shot it, which wasn’t enough time. We went back and re-shot bits of it. We cut two of them together. It’s literally months between one second to another. Really, it was a tough scene to shoot. All you have is words. It’s a small space. There are only three angles you can really get. Essentially, the rest has to come down to the charisma of the actors. It wasn’t something you’d really rehearse. They rehearsed a little. It was one of those things that we kept cracking at. It was one of these things we kept doing over and over again until we had it down to the right place. How do I feel about it being my contribution to cinema? I don’t know. I don’t know if it’s entered the books. In terms of cinema, I think there are things of mine that are going to be remembered. This brings me to another point about the differences between a novel and a film. And the fact that they have different requirements. Part of my approach to this film was to pay the most attention to the requirements of the film, and not so much to the novel. As a result, I didn’t pay attention to what the fans may perceive this to be. The most important things. As payback on the DVD, I thought it was important to talk about the deleted scenes, and why they were deleted. In cinematic terms. Through my point of view as a director.

You can read the rest of the article at MovieWeb.

Tags: David Slade, Eclipse DVD, Eclipse Movie