HELLBOY: THE CROOKED MAN Director Says No AI Is Being Used, Says It's "100% Gloriously Practical"
There’s a new Hellboy movie currently in production titled Hellboy: The Crooked Man, which is set for release later this year.
This is yet another cinematic reboot of Mike Mignola's beloved comic book, and it’s been in the works for several years. Nothing has been revealed for the movie yet, but its already found itself in a bit of controversy.
During a recent panel at the 74th Berlin International Film Festival, Jonathan Yunger, President of Millennium Films, seemed to indicate that he used AI to redesign a previously-practical creature on Hellboy: The Crooked Man.
He said: "I was able to make 3000 creature designs in an hour. So now I can start to cherry-pick and edit those and then send it to visual effects."
A lot of people haven’t embraced the AI overlord, so as you might expect, people were pretty upset with this. So, director Brian Taylor took to social media to clear things up an confirm that Yunger was misquoted and that his comments on AI were about another movie in Millennium's portfolio.
Taylor reassured fans that "our gloriously practical hellboy looks phenomenal."
The filmmaker said: “to be clear: there is exactly *ZERO* AI used on hellboy: the crooked man. both characters - hellboy and the crooked man - were created and shot 100% gloriously practical, as the movie gods intended, with no cgi enhancement... and look AMAZING.”
He went on to explain: “he was misquoted, my man. the comment was referring to a different film, THE OFFERING. rest assured there is zero AI used on HBTCM and our gloriously practical hellboy looks phenomenal. probably the article was written by AI...”
So don’t worry, AI is not being used to muck up this Hellboy movie. Hopefully, the actual real creative team doesn’t muck it up either!
The script for the film is written by franchise creator Mike Mignola and Chris Golden. The story is based on the comic of the same name, and in that story, Hellboy teams up with a rookie BPRD agent named Tom Ferrell, and find themselves stranded in 1950s rural Appalachia.
It’s there “they discover a small community haunted by witches, led by a local devil with a troubling connection to Hellboy’s past: the Crooked Man.” The story will “expand Hellboy’s world through one of the most beloved issues of the comic series.”
Jack Kesy takes on the role of Hellboy in the movie and when talking about the movie Mignola talked about the director’s vision for the film saying: “His intention is to make a horror movie, so that’ll be nice. That’ll be interesting.
He added: “I read the new draft of the screenplay yesterday, and yes, it is definitely R. It’s the first Hellboy script that I read and I went, ‘Oh, it’s a horror movie,’ which is what I wanted.
Mignola continued: “Taylor does not have a reputation as a horror movie director. But, so far, we’ve had two horror movie directors make Hellboy movies and we’ve never gotten a horror movie.”
He went on to say: “For years, we’ve been saying, if you’re going to make a Hellboy movie, make it small. And the perfect story to do that with is my personal favorite, ‘The Crooked Man.’ I think it’s one of the best things I’ve ever written.”
He explained: “It’s beautifully illustrated by Richard Corben, and it’s a solid story that doesn’t involve a million different characters. Everybody actually agreed from the very beginning, ‘Yes, we want to do that one.’ Budget-wise, it’s good because it’s a lower budget kind of a story. It’s not the Hellboy origin. It’s not Hellboy saving the world. It’s not huge. It’s a subtle, dark, little folk horror story.”
Mignola also said that this movie is one of the most faithful adaptations yet.
Via: MotionPictures.org