Filmmaking is an incredibly tricky work of alchemy. Thousands of elements factor into the success or failure of any given film. Spend one day on a working set and you’ll see just how many minute decisions have to be made, how hard everyone works on getting each piece of the puzzle right, and how even the tiniest of these can affect the end result. That’s before the film even gets to the editing room. But what happens when your film turns out exactly how you wanted it to and it still bombs?
Neill Blomkampcan tell you a little bit about that, and in a refreshingly candid interview withDen of Geek(h/t/Film), the filmmaker opened up about the critical and commercial failure ofChappie– a film he loves. Blomkamp made a stunning debut in 2009 with District 9, the critical darling sci-fi film that earned four Oscar nominations and instantly became a sci-fi classic. His 2013 follow-up,Elysium, faced its fair share of criticism, but his 2015 effort,Chappie, was utterly throttled by critics and hastily dismissed at the box office with an anemic $31 million haul.
Here’s what he had to say,
“Chappiewas unbelievably painful for me. That was difficult on several levels. But the thing withChappiewas, it felt like it was extremely close to the film I had in my head. Up until the film came out, I felt like I had given my all, and that I’d tried my hardest to make the film I had in my head, and I felt like I achieved that.
It put me in an interesting place, where I was needing to decide how I felt, when I create a piece of artwork that I feel positive about, and then the audience really rejects it - what does that mean? That puts you in an incredibly interesting space. I’m not judging the film based on box office merits or pure Rotten Tomatoes scores. I’m doing it because I love it, and I’m basing how I feel about it on what it makes me feel.
Blomkamp went on to compare the experience with the reception ofElysium, which the director says “isn’t that good”, but fared much better commercially and critically.
“We could go on for hours aboutChappieand where it sits. But it definitely hurt several parts of my career, I think. Those are all secondary to just the repositioning myself as an artist and just thinking about that. I mean,Elysium, I didn’t feel that way. I feel likeElysiumwasn’t actually that good. That’s the difference. I feel like I got it right withChappie, and then when the audience turns on you, that puts you in a different place.”
Finally, the director talked a bit about his wild, intentionally over-the-top vision forChappie, which he executed exactly how he wanted to, and why it didn’t resonate with audiences the way he hoped it would.
The main reason forChappieexisting in my mind is because it has the most farcical, weird, comic, non-serious pop-culture tone, that is almost mocking or making fun of the fact that it’s talking about the deepest things you can talk about. The fact that those two things exist in the same film is what the film is about. Because that’s what the experience of life is about. It’s an unknowable question, and no one’s going to answer it for you.
So it’s almost a grand joke, in a sense. That was the main thing. People confuse that by saying the film was tonally all over the map. And it’s because they couldn’t comprehend that the tone was existing as one, united thing; it was saying, “Here’s the most important thing you can talk about, wrapped up in a farcical giant joke that looks like we’re all having a big laugh.” And that was the point. Because that’s how I view life in general.
If you skipped it,Chappiefollowed a sweet and naive sentient robot who grows up gangster at the hands of Die Antwoord’sYo-Landi VisserandNinjaafter being separated from his creator (Dev Patel). It’s a strange brew, to be sure, and I’m not surprised the film was a little too far-out for mass audiences, but I’ve always been a bit taken aback by the vitriol it gets. I’ve always found it to be an odd and flawed, but deeply lovable movie. However, there’s no denying most folks just didn’t vibe with Blomkamp’s vision (the only otherChappiefan I’ve talked with is the lovely Perri Nemiroff, who picked it as one of herfavorite films of 2015).
What do you guys think? Do you join Perri and I in the legion ofChappiedefenders, or was Blomkamp’s quirky sci-fi a swing and a miss for you? Sound off in the comments.
