NYCC 2014: James O’Barr on ‘The Crow’ reboot, didn’t want to remake Brandon Lee film
While the news has been sparse, The Crow reboot moves ahead and comic book creator James O’Barr sounds confident that it’s in good hands. O’Barr spoke with fans and the press at New York Comic-Con.
“I don’t wanna make the Brandon Lee film. I want to make the book,” noting that only about 40 percent of what was in the original film was in the book. According to his remarks, Relativity films is all in, “We’re a team. We’re gonna do this.”
He noted the difference of opinion on the target audience and making a PG-13 film.
“Well, we’re leaving now,” was his response as they appeared to be thinking the film would be more for the Twilight crowd. O’Barr said to them, “You need to think of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo crowd.” To the panel audience he said, “which made a lot of money.”
The panel, “Twenty Years of ‘The Crow’ with James O’Barr,” gave the creator a chance to explain his endorsement of Luke Evans (Dracula Untold, The Hobbit trilogy) as the main character.
“I said, “this is the guy. This is perfect. And it was Luke Evans. He flew over from England [paid for own ticket] to get my blessing.”
Back to Luke Evans: “You know if a film doesn’t do well, they always blame the actor. So much is in the hands of the director. I hope Dracula Untold [which stars Evans in the lead role and opens today] does well. Luke is one of those British actors that become the role. He’s growing his hair out and working out. He’s on the cover of Men’s Fitness. I’m pretty excited.”
O’Barr hinted at the film being shot in Detroit.
“The exteriors are in Detroit. It’s a ready-made apocalypse. It’s essentially an abandoned city, built on one industry and that industry left. The city is bankrupt. They are filming Batman vs Superman over there. There’s a lot of vacant buildings. The policy is….you can blow up any building as long as you clean up afterwards. Not a lot of set dressing to make Detroit look like Detroit.”
Check out more from the panel over at Geeks of Doom
[…] Creator James O-Barr spoke at the NYCC about the film, not wanting a remake of the 1994 film which Brandon Lee and much more – check out that coverage HERE […]
Hi Stephen,
I was at the Twenty Years of The Crow Panel with James O’Barr, one of the fans asked him about the Lee family’s reaction and he said he didn’t get on well with Linda and Shannon was taking the wait & see approach. I wanted to ask about Eliza Hutton’s reaction. Were you able to ask him even more questions? Or do you know whether she’s for or against the remake? I would ask Mr. O’Barr if I knew where to write him. I think he was clear and convincing about the remake, and this comes from a big Brandon Lee (since Kung-Fu/Showdown In Little Tokyo) fan. Same title, different movie as I understood him. Thanks for any info.
Very best regards,
Karen
Thanks for the response Karen. James did not make himself available for us so I can’t speak to your additional questions. To my knowledge Lisa (Eliza) has not spoken about the remake one way or another about the new film. Last we saw her she was an assistant on “The Confession” a couple of years back