Gary Oldman Confirms Roles in Robert Zemeckis’ A Christmas Carol
Gary Oldman not only confirmed that he is in Robert Zemeckis’ upcoming performance capture adaptation of A Christmas Carol, but revealed that he is playing three characters in the film.
“I play [the ghost of] Marley, Bob Cratchit, and Tiny Tim,” Oldman told at the Dark Knight junket. “I saw the designs, and the realizations of London and the characters. The design of it, and the look of it, is beautiful. It’s quite stunning. It should be quite magical.”
Oldman isnt the only one playing multiple roles. The film stars Jim Carrey as Ebenezer Scrooge, the Ghost of Christmas Past, the Ghost of Christmas Present, and the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come. At one point Michael J. Fox was rumored to be Tiny Tim, and Christopher Lloyd as Marley’s ghost. Both Zemeckis regulars are even inaccurately listed as such on imdb. Oldman talks about the unusual performance capture process for Tiny Tim:
“They put you in a trench. They’re on platforms that they wheel in and wheel out. So you’ve got all this crew moving floor around. And when I’m walking on my crutches, the actors are much higher than me, so the eyelines work. And later they will animate little legs on me,” Oldman said. “It would be so expensive to do it [live action]. And you can do things with the ghosts that you couldn’t do in the more conventional way. Much like [Batman Begins and The Dark Knight], [Zemeckis] has sort of reinvented The Christmas Carol. It’s probably closer to how Dickens saw it.”
Oldman insists that while the process is different than a normal movie, it isn’t that different.
“It’s kind of like shooting a regular movie I think. Alot of people say ‘working in that motion capture with Bob Zemeckis, it’s like theater, isn’t it?’ And often the people who have never done theater say that. I don’t think it’s like theater, but I feel it’s like doing a regular movie, but without the breaks abd the costumes. You just keep going, and there is no lighting, so you don’t have to wait for two hours while they turn the set around. You actually keep filming.”
Oldman can be seen next in The Dark Knight, which hits theaters on July 18th 2008.
Casting Robert Zemeckis’ A Christmas Carol
Robert Zemeckis has signed a bunch of new stars for his upcoming performance capture digital 3-D adaptation of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol.
Robert Zemeckis revealed in the official Beowulf podcast that Bob Hoskins, Colin Firth and Gary Oldman have officially joined the cast. Robin Wright Penn also announced that she will also be involved in the project.
Hoskins, who will play Mr. Fezziwig, inadvertently and prematurely announced his involvement in the project before Zemeckis had made an official announcement, which I think pissed off some higher ups. And when the project was announced the studio denied that any deal had yet been made with him. But this is the first official confirmation of his involvement.
What we already know: Zemeckis wrote the script specifically for Jim Carrey, who stars as four different characters: Ebenezer Scrooge (at various different ages), the Ghost of Christmas Past, the Ghost of Christmas Present and the Ghost of Christmas Future. Tom Hanks (Bob Cratchit), Christopher Lloyd (Marley’s Ghost) and Michael J. Fox (Tiny Tim) are also rumored to be involved in the film, but have yet to be officially confirmed.
And before you ask, I’m not sure if the teaser movie poster to the upper right is legit or fan made. The art makes me believe it’s legit, the lettering makes me think it might be a fan creation.
While I see the potential of performance capture technology, and admire Zemeckis for pioneering the new form of filmmaking, I’m still not sold on the result thus far. The animation feels stiff, the people look like zombies, and the action looks like a highly rendered video game cut scene. And while I loved Beowulf for the 3D, I totally don’t understand why someone would create a character (Angelina Jolie for instance) who looks exactly like the real actor. Doesn’t that negate most of the benefits of the technology?
In Beowulf, I found Ray Winstone and Chrispin Glover’s (who played Grendal) performances to be the most interesting. Maybe because the animators didn’t have to concern themselves with making the animated characters look and move exactly like the performance captured actors. After all, animation is all about exaggeration of movements, and that’s why it works.
Anyway, my point is that the performance capture technology has yet to deliver a product that couldn’t have been made faster, cheaper and better looking using traditional film methods. I think something like James Cameron’s Avatar might accomplish this feat. And while I like the gimmick of Jim Carrey playing four characters, one of the characters at different ages (taking full advantage of the technology), the rest of the book is mostly talking and walking. And while I’ll anxiously await anything Zemeckis will ever create, I just wish he would pick some more visual and cinematic stories for this new format.
A Christmas Carol will hit theaters on November 6th, 2009.
via: ComingSoon