Without a doubt, Bong Joon-ho is considered one of the finest filmmakers in the world. And at this point, it’s unlikely that you’ll find any studio that wishes to disrupt his process or somehow prevent the filmmaker from being his creative self. But when the creative genius of Bong Joon-ho came into collision with the controlling studio mogul Harvey Weinstein over the film “Snowpiercer,” a clash was bound to happen.
As Bong relayed in an interview with Vulture, the post-production of “Snowpiercer” was filled with disagreements between the two men, with compromise almost entirely out of the question. And this led to some incredibly odd requests and one ingenious deception.
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“It was a doomed encounter,” Bong said. “I’m someone who until that point had only ever released the ‘director’s cut’ of my films. I’ve never done an edit I didn’t want to do.”
He added, “Weinstein’s nickname is ‘Harvey Scissorhands,’ and he took such pride in his edit of the film. ‘I am so proud of my edit!’”
The crazy notes that Weinstein would give Bong were too much for the acclaimed filmmaker. At one point, the producer told the director to cut out 25 mins of dialogue from the film. This, according to Bong, would have made the film completely incoherent.
At one point, the director took a stand against Weinstein. The producer asked the filmmaker to remove the scene where a character intimidates others by gutting a fish in front of them.
“Harvey hated it,” said Bong. “[He asked,] ‘Why fish? We need action!’ I had a headache in that moment: What do I do? So suddenly, I said, ‘Harvey, this shot means something to me.’”
The filmmaker told Weinstein that the fish was a personal symbol for him, due to his father being a fisherman. At that point, Weinstein told him to keep the scene because “Family is the most important.”
However, little did the producer know that Bong just made it up to save the shot.
“I said, ‘Thank you,’” Bong revealed. “It was a fucking lie. My father was not a fisherman.”
The discussions and debates about what to cut and what to save raged on for months, with Weinstein flexing his muscles against Bong. The director explained that if the producer’s cut of the film was chosen to be released, then Bong would have taken his name off the film. However, thanks to a contract stipulation that allowed the filmmaker to screen his director’s cut of the film to test audiences, combined with outside pressure from actors John Hurt and Tilda Swinton, Weinstein relinquished control.
Of course, that came at a price, with the Hollywood mogul dumping “Snowpiercer” down to the smaller, indie-focused branch of his studio, Radius. But for Bong, even with the perceived demotion, he ultimately prevailed.
“Maybe for [Weinstein], it was some kind of punishment to a filmmaker who doesn’t do what he wants,” he said. “But for me, we were all very happy. Yeah! Director’s cut!”
As the years go on, we hear more and more about Harvey “Scissorhands” Weinstein, with legendary stories of the producers meddling in the editing room. But thanks to the will and persistence of Bong Joon-ho, Weinstein can’t name “Snowpiercer” as one of his victims.