Step 1: Hire Foreign Director w/ 0-1 Visa. Step 2: Fire HIm
Remember all that banter on Oscar night about how international the American film business has become? (Look Three Amigos! directors from Mexico making acclaimed and successful films like CHILDREN OF MEN and BABEL, and English-as-second-language stars like Penelope Cruz and Djimon Hounsou up for acting awards — it’s almost as though moviegoevers don’t care who makes a movie, as long as it’s good.
Hang on a minute. It’s still a rough landing for many international talents — especially acclaimed directors who get a first chance to make a US studio film.
As this Guardian piece by Patrick Goldstein points out, more than a few have been hired and then bounced from their own projects — or pretty much left out of the post production process.
Ang Lee’s Chinese language films (from PUSHING HANDS and THE WEDDING BANQUET) have nearly all won critical acclaim and international awards. His studio films have not: RIDE WITH THE DEVIL, a post-Civil War combat film was uneven but ambitious in scope — and THE HULK turned out to be an expensive letdown to fans and the studio that bankrolled.
But the Guardian doesn’t point out that Lee wasn’t unfamiliar with the US way of working — he’d long ago emigrated from Taiwan and was a resident of upstate New York. Others cited in the piece, though, were newcomers: Oliver Hirshbiegel of Germany won acclaim for DOWNFALL, a 2005 Academy Award nominee — he’d also made thrillers back home. But while in charge of THE INVASION, another remake of INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS, the studio brought in the Wachowskis (of MATRIX fame) and James McTeigue (V FOR VENDETTA) to handle reshoots.
I interviewed Ang Lee just before the release of the film and he insisted that he had full control over the film and if “the film sucked,” he was to blame.