Eastern Film Fans presents The Third and Final Part of our Interview with Mr Gareth Evans

Are you excited about the Hollywood remake?

OldboyUSPostYeah, I've been a fan of Asian cinema since I was really young and I used to have a really negative reaction whenever a remake was being announced, there are certain things that go along with the territory, one that it helps to get the sequel made, I got to make part 2.  Also when it comes to something like Oldboy that I don't get, as its so plot specific, so for me if you do an oldboy film you can't deviate from the story as there's not enough room to deviate from it.  But with The Raid you can keep the original set up in the same in the first 5, 10 minutes and then once your in that building you can do anything you want, you can do any action sequence, any design of it, you can change the architecture of the building you can change the whole layout and structure and the colour scheme of the film, there's so much you could do with the remake of The Raid.

O yeah and then you could call it Dredd?

<laughs> Yeah, Fuckin ell, yeah I think the guys from Dredd get it alot from fans of The Raid and I get it from the fans of Dredd as well, Like yesterday I just wrote, I can't remember I was was writing a comment about the election in Indonesia or something and all of a sudden somebody just couldn't help it they had to wined me up about Judge Dredd, I was like get over it , it was 2 years ago now. Man I'd wanna goto see Dredd 2 as well.

If you could work with any actor/actress in the entire Industry?

ToBI've always been a huge fan of De Niro and Pacino, they've been my heroes since I was a teenager when I started to get into the idea of being a filmmaker, recent actors I'm a big fan of Fassbender and Ton Hardy, for me I've always been more of a fan of those that looked liked they've lived a life.  Like Lee Marvin was one of the best and you watch like Point Blank its such an intense performance, its so brilliant.  O and if only he was sill alive today Toshiro Mifune as I was just watching Throne of Blood for the first time today, I can't believe I hadn't seen it before, I've owned the BFI dvd of it from 10/15 years ago and I bought the Criterion Blu recently and then I thought well lets watch it and I finally got to watch it, such an incredible film and the end with the arrows is insane.

So at the moment your producing a film The Night Comes for us with Joe Taslim?

NightComesPoster1Were about to start shooting sometime in October were just finalising everything at the moment and getting the prep work up and running so fingers crossed now when we start back up in August it'll be final prep ready for the shoot.  Its coming on good,  going to be fun its going to be crazy breakneck thriller and Timo Tjahjanto is going to direct it.  We co- directed a short film together a few years ago for VHS 2 and just did Killers last year, I believe that's coming out in the UK this month?(Ed. Its come out on selected cinemas in July and The Dvd and Blu ray is out 1st September), its a crazy film!

So after that raid 3?

No not yet, i do have plans for it, I do have a storyline in my head but nothings been put down on paper yet its all just buzzing away in my brain, I might not do it for another 2/3 years yet as next year I'm developing two projects at the moment one is with Universal to shoot in Uk and one is with MRC to shoot in  US, there both action films to a certain degree, there's action elements in both at least.  Its a step away from Martial Arts because I think what I want to do when I get to do the The Raid 3 is I really want to come to it fresh I don't want to dive right in and then try and figure out what's different, what's  new, I really want to be able to think about it properly first, and that will be the last part,  there won't be a fourth and to finish the franchise on a high I really want to make sure we do something special with it.

Finally the Eastern Film Fans question is if you were stuck on a desert island and could only take 3 films with you what would you take? (it can be any genre)

HardboiledId say, Fuckin ell this is hard! I'd probably go for Amelie, Im trying to think about films I want to watch over and over.  Fight Club, last one as I haven't got anything all out action so, I'll cheat and take four so I can take The Wild Bunch and Hard Boiled, I'll pop one of the discs inside one of the other cases!

Thank you so much for supporting.

Thanking Gareth Evans and team for making this happen remember The Raid 2 is out on Dvd, Blu Ray and Steel book from 11th August 2014 and you can order here.

One Response

  1. Etant cinéphile depuis toujours,depuis les films superbes de JOHN WOO je regarde et j’écrit beaucoup de films asiatique j’en ai vue beaucoup mais pour moi THE KILLER de JOHN WOO est mon préféré, A BITEERSWEET LIFE AUSSI mais il y en a tellement comme I SHAW DEVIL, THE MURDERER, MEMORIES OF MURDER. ACTEUR,LEE BYUNG-hun, song kang-ho choi min-sik et the beast chow yun- fat

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