The Future Boy

Chris Cunningham

Words: Shari Roman
Photo: Kiino Villand

 Chris talks about the body of his work...

Could that be why you're interested in adapting the '70s graphic novel, Ranxerox? The drawings make it seem sort of like a cross between Mad Max and Blade Runner.

I'm more interested in the characters than the drawings, and the flavor of it. It's something I want to start working on really soon. I have a lot of ideas on how I want to approach it as a film.

You use both high-tech and low-tech in your work, counterpointed with human behavior and emotions, making work that is meant to be heard and felt, as much as seen. Where does that come from?

Most of my inspiration comes from nature and technology. That's what I want to come across in the work. I think what I find the most frustrating is that people think my work is dark or scary. It's almost insulting. It's too silly to be scary. I see my work more like live action cartoons.

Do you find storyboarding helpful?

Some people think that storyboards kill spontaneity but the truth is, when I start shooting, I hardly even use them. I just literally jump in, fly off on some other tangent that takes my fancy and run with that. But they make me feel more relaxed, more prepared the night before the shoot. I get to kid myself that I've got everything in control. I still have all of them. They're all sitting propped against the wall in my office. Hundreds and hundreds. And most of the drawings I've ever made. I'm collecting them together at the moment.

Why?

I've just started working on a book.

You started out as a sculptor. How did you get interested in film?

I love anatomy. I love the human form, I always have. That's why I got into painting and sculpting, that's why I got into doing prosthetics, that's why I got into making films about bodies. But the one thing that I hadn't been able to incorporate was sound. And that was my favorite love of all. And as soon as I started doing that in film, that was it for me.

Is that why you love the editing process?

Yes. I never thought you'd be able to replicate the feeling of sculpting but you can with editing in film and adding sound on top of that... It blows away sculpting, to be honest. It's also where I am most in my little fantasy world. Shooting at times can be so miserable, because my fantasy of what the film is going to be like gets replaced shot by shot with this other "thing" and I feel like I've failed. Then during editing I slowly forget what my original fantasy was and I start feeling more excited as something new takes shape.

Leading the FX crew on Alien 3 at 19 years old -- how did that happen?

I had a big portfolio of work from other films, and stuff I had done in my garage when I was a teenager and showed it to them and they hired me.

How did you get the wherewithal to go to a film company?

When I was 16, I saw a program on TV that had an interview with some people at an English FX company who were doing Hellraiser 2. I realized they were quite young and their studio was about half an hour away from where I lived. I thought maybe I could down there and try... It was a long shot, but the truth is, at the time, it was a choice between going to art school or making a fool of myself going around film studios, so I thought I'd rather make a fool of myself. It wasn't anything to do with being brave. It had more to do with the fact that I had just gone to an interview at art college and had been so offended by their patronizing attitude that I just didn't want to do it. I'm really glad I didn't go.

Did you sneak off for the interview?

My parents drove me down there. And they made me wear a suit. It was embarrassing. But I got the job. I was so happy. It's funny really, to be that age and to be working on a film. You'd rather not be at school, and all of a sudden you're not and you're getting paid to do something you love, something I had been doing in my garage. I moved away from home straightaway and shared a house with some other guys. It was brilliant. A house full of nerds. I'm still a nerd.