![]() ![]() For the most part, Chanéac continues to work in France on TV series, short films, and made for TV movies, as well as independently released features like Nicholas Bushman's "Stranger in the Dunes." Dren may be the role most English-speakers know Chanéac from, but it certainly isn't the only role she's played. Natali was wise to cast such a gifted French actress in "Splice," and it's a shame that we haven't seen more from her stateside. Chanéac also starred in the spin-off series "Transporter: The Series," based on the film series from Luc Besson and Robert Mark Kamen. A few years later, she appeared in the Ellie Kanner action drama "For the Love of Money," alongside James Caan, Paul Sorvino, Edward Furlong, and Jonathan Lipnicki. The same year, she starred in the crime thriller "Verso," about a cop that goes through extreme measures to protect his family after his former partner joins the mafia. Splice is released in the UK today.While Chanéac hasn't been seen much in American cinema since "Splice," she certainly hasn't stopped acting. So from the Child Dren stage onward, it is always an actor, all be it one who is digitally enhanced. And I was adamant that we use real performers as much as possible. The assumption being that the best digital effects are always grounded in reality. ![]() But as much as possible we tried to have a physical representation on the set, even if it was going to be completely replaced later on. Sometimes she's completely digital, sometimes partially, sometimes not at all. More Splice Info IGN: How much of the character's final appearance was practical, and how much CGI? Natali: It would be hard to give you an exact percentage because it varied from stage-to-stage. For example at every stage of Dren's growth she always has Delphine's eyes. Once we had Delphine, we reverse-engineered her into all the earlier stages. She developed all of Dren's physical behaviour and most importantly, she gave Dren a soul. Delphine embodied the character perfectly. She understood the character on a very visceral and intuitive level. It felt like she walked out of my head and into the room, she was that close to my vision of what Dren should be. Fortunately, the very first person to come to the auditions was Delphine Chaneac. Splice was a Canada-France co-production and it necessitated that certain elements come from overseas. IGN: How did you go about casting the character? Natali: We cast adult Dren out of France. At that point CORE Digital pictures started doing R & D testing. All of these artists did stunning work that developed my initial ideas into usable designs. Later on I worked with Amro Attia in Toronto and Peter Konig in Berkley CA. In particular I worked with a New York based artist named Dan Ouellette, who did brilliant work. But there was a point about 10 years ago that it looked like Splice might get made and I was able to hire some artists. Splice at IGN.com IGN: How did you settle on the look of Dren? Natali: The earliest conceptual drawings I did myself. We tried to be subtractive in our design, to pull things away from the human form rather than sticking things on top of it. ![]() So from early on the philosophy was always 'less is more'. She is more than a creature, she is a character in the film. But with Dren we tried to scale her down to a human level. The tendency in creature films is to make a creature that is larger than life. IGN: What early discussions did you have about creature design? Natali: My overriding desire with designing the creatures in Splice was to make them feel believable. And it was such a shocking image that I immediately felt there was a movie in that mouse. Not genetic experiment, but it looked like one. It was a nude mouse (hairless) that looked as though there was human ear growing out of its back. IGN: Where did the idea for Dren come from? Vincenzo Natali: I was inspired by a thing called the Vacanti Mouse. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |