The Suicide Squad director, James Gunn, recently revealed the two conditions he had for directing the movie. With the film set to be released this weekend, reviews are already coming out in favor of the anti-hero sequel. With any luck, Gunn’s entry in the DCEU will give him even more clout for future films.
Gunn started in Hollywood as a writer with a penchant for both R-rated and family pictures. He was writing Zack Snyder’s Dawn of the Dead and Scooby-Doo (plus its sequel Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed) around the same time. His first directing gig was the 2006 horror film, Slither, which still had a lot of comedic elements in it.
Gunn revealed the sweet and sad conditions he had for directing The Suicide Squad while speaking with Indiewire recently. First off, the film needed to be R-rated as he felt it was a war movie and wanted audiences to feel the violence of war. Second, the film needed to be shot in the US as he wanted to stay close to his ailing father. He goes into more detail in the interview, an excerpt of which is below:
“When I was finished with it, then they asked me to direct it, and I said I’ll do an under two conditions, and they were both conditions they hated,” Gunn said. “One of which was, it needs to be rated R. The other was which I needed to shoot in Atlanta, Georgia, because my father was dying and he lived in St. Louis, and they wanted to shoot in the UK. I couldn’t be that far away from my dad. The UK one was actually the bigger [condition], because it’s a lot more expensive to shoot because of all these tax things in the United States. But those were my conditions. But they said yes, and they were fantastic. They just really let me do my thing.”
Gunn’s condition for an R-rating was the easier one for Warner Bros. to deal with, as he had already negotiated for an R script when he was writing. The one for shooting in the US was more of an ask due to how much more expensive it is to shoot in Atlanta, Georgia, especially when compared to the UK (where it was originally going to be shot). The fact that Warner Bros. agreed to these terms was a big win for Gunn, though it was likely a bittersweet one as his father ended up passing away about a week before shooting began.
With the current reviews for The Suicide Squad, not to mention his track record with Guardians of the Galaxy, it seems like a no-brainer for Hollywood to let Gunn do pretty much whatever he wants. The man always seems to have a passion for whatever film he is making, and that translates very well on screen. Warner Bros. would be lucky to convince Gunn to come back for future DCEU projects, especially as it looks like Guardians of the Galaxy: Volume 3 is likely his final entry in the MCU.
SOURCE: Indiewire
