Sunday, April 23, 2006

Confessions of Another Libre

Sometimes I get gut feelings about what the "next big thing" is going to be in the film world, and I'm often correct. For example, I was fairly confident that Nappy D. would have it's huge underground following, when I first heard about the film in the pre-days leading right up to Sundance. (Of course, I never predicted it would be quite as big as it was.) My thoughts at the time were that we were ripe for another Better-Off-Dead- or Ferris-Beuler-type film that would stick like glue to it's nerdy following. Turns out there are just more nerds these days, I suppose.

I'm also predicting Nacho Libre will do fairly well. Perhaps not quite as well as Napolean (it's a hard one to beat), but I think there will be a big enough draw. And here again, I had a gut feeling on a certain type of film that seems to have come to pass. I actually had a screenplay idea that was similar enough to Nacho Libre that I now have to rework it so it doesn't just seem like I stole the idea. Which I've already managed to do. Just the same, it was similar enough and I had a feeling that such a genre or type of film was coming. Voila!

And all this coming at the hands of Hess. Well, now he's managed to be in tune with another prediction/gut feeling of mine. If you get to the end of this article, you'll know what I mean. Of course, I've seen and heard about this kind of thing happening all the time in Hollywood. It's sometimes called "jumping on the band wagon," and it's sometimes just called the "collective conscience." You know, that great database in the sky that we somehow all connect into on some level. But I'm not saying anything more on my next prediction because I'd just hate to jinx it now. :)

That all aside, I thought this was just brilliant (from Hess's mouth):

The best moment was the final shot of Jack Black. Our entire crew was from Mexico, and we had 500 Mexican extras in Jack's final shot.

As Jack left, the whole crowd started to chant for him. He did a jig, and the crowd went nuts. Jack ended up going back to his trailer and bawling his eyes out because of how sad he was that it was all over.

We all were sad that it was over; the whole spirit of the crew was something so special that I don't know if I'll ever experience it again.

This is one of the reasons I can see Nacho being successful. It has a soul. I think we may be surprised at the demographic that decides to come out and watch it.

Here's another fine interview with Héctor Jimenez who plays opposite Jack Black.

posted by Rhapsidiomite @ 10:46 PM
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