Director Lee Unkrich Talks Oscars and What’s Next
Anyone driving down Highland Avenue has probably noticed the enormous billboard of Buzz Lightyear billboard boasting the film’s critical acclaim as the best reviewed film of the year and Oscar nominations. With votes due by February 22 by members of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences, anticipation is high for the creators of 10 films up for Best Picture, including Lee Unkrich, director of “Toy Story 3”, the second Pixar film to receive the top nomination for the yearly ceremony. Between award ceremonies and special events, Unkrich spoke with us about awards, the film and where it all began.
How are you doing with the Academy Award voting just around the corner?
Pretty good. The movie came out back in June and I feel Like I’ve been going non-stop since then. Which has been great. It’s been awesome how much everyone loves the movie and how well it did everywhere. We often joke that we’re done with the movies but the movies aren’t done with us. And that’s kind of been the case with this film. As much fun as it is, it’s like running a marathon: I feel like I’m in the home stretch now.
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| Lee Unkrich (Disney) |
A lot of traveling to New York and L.A. We’re up in the Bay Area, so anytime there’ve been events, I’ve flown down. I’ve to all kinds of things: I’ve given talks, there’ve been different guild awards ceremonies. A whole lot of stuff that ultimately leads to the Oscars.
How does it feel to personally be nominated for two Oscars?
It’s amazing, as you could imagine. I’ve wanted to make movies for a long time, and for most people, it remains a dream and never happens. For me to have gotten these two nominations and the film to have gotten five nominations is just incredible. I feel completely humbled and thrilled that this is happening.
What’s interesting is that it comes on top of critical and box office success. Did everybody expect this one to do as well as it did?
Well, you hope it will do well in every regard, box office and critically and come awards time. It’s one thing hope for things and another thing for them happen. I feel like we have a triple crown going here. I can’t imagine this going any better than it did. I almost feel like this is a once in a lifetime experience for me.
I caught the Golden Globes and had a good laugh at what you said to Justin Bieber and Hailee Steinfeld.
Yeah, I threw that in at the last second as I was walking up the stage. It’s just been so funny to me because when we made the first “Toy Story”, we were all relatively young. I was in my mid-20s when I worked on that movie, and all this time has past. It’s been like 16 years since “Toy Story” but it doesn’t feel like that to us. We all feel like we’re the same people. When you get older, you don’t feel like your aging, you feel like a kid.
It’s just funny to me to see this new generation of kids. I even had crew members who were only eight or nine years old when the first “Toy Story” came out, and I found that endlessly amusing. So as I was walking up the stage, it struck me that the people presenting my award probably weren’t born yet. It turns out Hailee Steinfeld was not born but Justin Bieder was actually a baby.
I just have to ask, what did you think of the Golden Globes this year?
I had a good time. Ricky Gervais was definitely edgy that night. I won’t disagree with the critics who thought he was bit too mean spirited. But at the end of the day I thought he was funny but I questioned the venue. He took a couple swipes at the Hollywood Foreign Press which seemed kind of strange to me, given they were the ones hosting the event. Beyond that, he got a little blue with some of his humor, which I questioned because it was primetime television. Still we had a good evening and I thought he was funny. I think they got what they paid for when they hired him, so it shouldn’t come as any surprise what he did.
Back to the Oscars, what did you think of the other nomination? Were there any you were surprised were there? Any you wished would’ve been there?
My biggest disappointment was in the animation category that there were only three nominations. The rule of that category is that there need to be a certain number of animated features released in any given year for them to even have the category. If it’s fewer than a certain number, then they don’t even have it. Once the category is triggered, then there are three nominees, unless there a certain number that can trigger it up to five, and unfortunately, we were only one movie short of having five nominees.
This was an especially strong year for animation. For instance, the movie “Tangled” by Disney, was a really good movie and worthy of a nomination. So I was disappointed to see it didn’t get in there. But “The Illusionist” got in, which was also a good movie. It’s a very beautiful looking film and has great animation. Otherwise, I’ve been pretty happy with everything. It’s been a good year for movies and a great year for performances.
The only movie I liked that got some recognition but not a lot is the movie “Rabbit Hole”, the Nicole Kidman film. It’s a good film and got lost in the shuffled of the other good movies this year.
You actually hit on what I was going to ask next since 2010 did seem like the year of animation. There were a lot of big films this past and my assumption would be that Pixar raised the bar for other studios.
We raise the bar for ourselves all the time, and that’s all we’re really trying to do. If us raising the bar for ourselves helps raise the bar, not only for other animated films but for other films periods, then great. It’s win, win for everybody. We were the first to make a digital animated feature and like it or not, we set the tone for modern CG animated features. It’s interesting to see the films that have come after, both from us and other studios. As time goes on, you’re going to start seeing more experimentation–more people doing different things like we’re seeing right now. There are a lot of live-action directors starting to delve into animation. “Rango” this year will be directed by Gore Verbinski. Stephen Spielberg and Peter Jackson are doing the “Tin Tin” movies. The barriers are between live action and animation are going to become more permeable.
So this was your first solo directorial film.
I co-directed three other Pixar films (“Toy Story 2”, “Monsters, Inc.” and “Finding Nemo”), but this was the first one I did solo.
How was that process, being in charge of everything?
In some regards I fled completely ready to do this because I have been doing it for the last ten years. I pretty much was thrown into the deep end of the pool, and I had to just start swimming, which I did. Luckily I was surrounded by a lot of fiercely talented people who were able to shore me up and help me get the movie made. Ironically, it was only when I finished the film that I felt ready to make the film. I guess I’ll be ready to make the next one.
What’s your next plan?
I’m going to make another film at Pixar. I’m going to be working with Darla Anderson, who produced “Toy Story 3”. Once we get past the Oscars, we’re going to start on the next film, which we haven’t announced yet.
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Now you began at Pixar in 1994?
Ya.
And how did you get involved there?
I was working as a film editor. I was just a few years out of film school at USC. Pixar wanted “Toy Story” to be the first film they would edit on computers, using non-linear editing software, which is ubiquitous now, but at the time, there weren’t many people using that yet. They wanted the technology bar to raised across the board, and at the time I was known as someone in the industry who knew this editing system well. So I got the call and went up and helped them edit the original “Toy Story”. Luckily, I was a big fan of Pixar already. I had seen all of John Lasseter’s short films and loved them.
It was perfect timing and I was the perfect person to get sent up there because I was a big fan already. And then one thing lead to another and I hit it off with the core creative team at the studio: John Lesseter, Pete Doctor and Andrew Stanton. It’s kind of like a band coming together: you just never know when you’re going to have the right people come together and make something special, and in that moment in time it happened. We all complimented each other and we found that the sum of all of us was better than each of us individually.
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