While John Landis may not have directed a film since 2010’s “Burke and Hare,” his ongoing influence is undeniable. As the director behind “The Blues Brothers,” “Trading Places,” “Coming To America,” “Animal House” and “An American Werewolf In London” his work still resonates with the current generation of the filmmakers (Edgar Wright has already cited “The Blues Brothers” as an influence on “Baby Driver“). Moreover, he’s always pretty current with the contemporary movie landscape, which makes his most recent comments about the tentpole world fairly interesting.
Speaking with the Irish Times, Landis didn’t hold back, explaining his issue Universal’s current Dark Universe, and why he couldn’t care less about Marvel movies. Here’s what he had to say:
Dark Universe:
First of all, it’s not a new idea.
If you remember with Universal back in the ’40s, once they made all their classics, they started cross-pollinating. ‘House of Dracula,’ ‘House of Frankenstein,’ ‘Frankenstein Meets The Wolf-Man‘ — you know what they used to call those? Monster rallies! (laugh) And then of course, one of the great ironies is what was considered… OK — it’s over now!… was ‘Abbott & Costello Meets Frankenstein,’ which is actually a very funny movie and very respectful of the monsters. I think, y’know, maybe that’s one of the problems with Universal’s Dark Universe is that it isn’t respectful of the monsters.
READ MORE: Aki Kaurismaki Says He Can Only Watch “Those Senseless Marvel Things” When He’s Hungover
Y’know, when they want to reinvent and sometimes it works great — look at David Cronenberg‘s ‘The Fly‘ or John Carpenter‘s ‘The Thing.’ It can be done.
Marvel:
I’m just… truthfully, I’m bored shitless with the Marvel Universe now. All the superhero movies tend to be interchangeable, you always have these mass destruction of cities and huge computer-generated extravaganzas to the point where you could take a reel from any of the Marvel superhero movies and put it any of the others and nobody would notice. They’re very well-made, it’s just they’re the same thing over and over again. But, I don’t know, people are showing up. One of the reasons ‘Wonder Woman‘ has been received so well by the critics is that it doesn’t destroy cities! (laughs) Even the superhero stuff is on a very human scale, it’s the gods! We’re not seeing skyscrapers tumbling! (laughs)
I’m not sure how Dark Universe isn’t respectful of the monsters (or what that actually means), but Landis does pinpoint one issue that has been persistent with not just Marvel movies, but many superhero films — a tendency to lean on mega-obliteration setpieces.
Thoughts? Let us know in the comments section.
