DJ Carusos directorial resume doesnt pin him down easily.
Joe 3, in which he wanted to introduce the Transformers.
Den of Geek: Did your involvement in this spring out of your talks with the studio about doingG.I.
We had something over at Sony calledInvertigo, this cool antigravity movie.
Things didnt work out and so about a couple months, I was working onG.I.
Were handing in those scripts.
A couple months into that, he called and said, I want to bringxXxback.
Would you be interested?
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I thought, Okay, let me think about that.
That could be kind of a good character to reintroduce and bring back.
I thought, Yeah, I would be interested.
Were those elements that you wanted to see in it the more you thought about it?
I mean, I love extreme sports and I love that whole world.
I also thought, too, thePoint Breakremake that came out was like theyre extreme athletes.
Theyre extreme sports people and I thought, Okay, it didnt click.
It didnt get people excited.
Thats one of the chances or the risks youre going to take.
I felt like wed developed a relationship prior to the cameras rolling, that if we were in sync.
I made sure I was in sync.
We dont have more.
Its really about how creative can we be and how outrageous can we be.
As a producer, he was very supportive.
But yeah, you worry.
Id be lying to tell you how as a filmmaker you worry about How can this happen?
Can the relationship dynamics work?
Talk about getting everybody on board and setting the tone for having that.
But then we honed in on Donnie Yen when I showed them theIp Manseries.
We kind of wrote Xiang for Donnie in hope that hed do it.
I had seen Ruby Rose and just sort have been following her for about 12 months.
I had met her in just a general meeting.
We wrote Adele for her.
As we just started to piece it together, we thought, Well, we have Talon.
I was pinching myself.
Then we just started to build off that.
We also wanted a UFC Fighter.
It was kind of constructed in a really cool, organic way.
It was really sort of natural.
It came together very naturally, but at the same time it made really good movie global sense.
Yeah, I think youre right.
I think youre right.
I think there is a balance in the way that the world is.
Its just that the world is shrinking.
I think cinema, particularly, is there just a true American action movie?
Its just seems such a natural way that to go.
Theyre barely in the movie but thats what …
This way we integrated them all in a way where they all got to shine.
It was really cool.
Also knowing that when we were shooting our film, Donnie had come to us fromRogue One.
Were shooting, rehearsing, everything was good.
He had to leave us at the very end to go back toRogue One.
We had one shot left with him that we had to get.
We had to wait until Los Angeles to do a pick-up day.
Then he went toRogue Onenot for the three days he was going toRogue Onefor.
Can you talk about capturing the right tone?
Theres a little bit.
Not camp, hes not quite winking at the audience but hes having a good time.
We want to have fun.
We wanted to find that fine line.
We had the character cards when the characters come on, and Neymars character card pops on.
We thought, why dont we put for fun, Thought he was being recruited for the Avengers.
We just kind of laughed and we left it, and the studio saw, and the studio laughed.
You kind of gauge that.
So once that started to work we realized we could push it that far but not too far.
Hopefully if we get to do something like this again, it becomes expected of this franchise.
Do you have ideas for a next film?
We have some ideas because we fell in love with these characters now.
Weve talked about it.
Well see what happens if we get a chance to do it again.
You blew up the internet a little the other day when you told Collider that your take onG.I.
Joe 3would have brought in the Transformers.
Was that an idea you actually pitched?
We actually had that in our first script.
(Producer) Lorenzo di Bonaventura and I hired Aaron Berg (to write the script).
It was like this perfect blending of the franchises, I thought.
I think (the studio) was shocked in a way.
I was like, Yes, we need to do this.
We had a few different ideas about that.
I think that injection in theG.I.
Joefranchise of the (Transformers) world that Michael Bay created would be fantastic.
Can you say what the scene was?
Are you still involved withG.I.
Im still loosely involved.
You were also working on something calledStolen Timewith Will Smith.
Its still in development over at Fox with Will Smith.
The thing Im really working on next is, theres a book calledGod Is A BulletIm adapting.
Its got our independent financing.
Its a great book.
Its down and its dirty.
Its what Im most excited about next.
What movie do people talk to you about the most?
You know what, it depends on where I am.
I was just in Mexico City, and a lot of people were really big intoEagle Eye.
You just go, Oh, thats interesting, but then when I was in India,Disturbia.
It was reallyDisturbia,Disturbia.
Other filmmakers as well.
It always seems likeSalton Seais the one that sort of resonates a lot with the filmmakers.
Then its the popularity of some of the other movies.
I had a gambling problem, and I watched that movie, and it reminded me…
But I would say in general it probably would beDisturbiaandSalton Sea.
xXx: The Return of Xander Cageis out in theaters now.
