Jean-Pierre Jeunet: Tales of an Alien Director

Jeunet was not arrogant enough to plunge into his Alien project without thinking about Fincher's failure, or about the benchmarks set by Ridley Scott and James Cameron. "I was absolutely, completely terrified. I didn't sleep the night before we began shooting because of jet lag. All through that night, I kept thinking of the first Alien, going, Oh man, is it possible that I'm actually doing this film? I kept thinking, I have to find a big idea, right at the beginning of the movie, first page of the script, to make sure I can even do this. I felt like I was the high-diver in the circus. Either I had to jump or I had to descend down the ladder. I jumped. I thought of a nice idea for the titles--which I can't tell you because it's a surprise in the movie--but I told it to the people at the studio and they were all happy. I also changed the ending, because nobody liked that. Again, the studio accepted it. I was relieved and that made me feel free."

Jeunet's confidence was rapidly put to the test by Sigourney Weaver, who, after all, had seen the series through three previous movies and directors, who exercises director approval, and who protects her interest in the franchise a little like Ripley guarded Newt. Did things indeed grow so cool between star and director that they stopped speaking altogether? "There were some difficulties," Jeunet concedes, widening his eyes and chortling at the question. "That was hard for me, because if Sigourney had doubts about me .. . well, it's a terrible thing to be in doubt when you're working. We had met before we started the movie. I like to know exactly what an actor is going to do--I don't want to discover it on the set, because then you're shooting. Within five minutes of our being together, I knew exactly what she wanted to do with the part. But then ..."

"But then things suddenly got rocky?" I offer Jeunet nods. "I thought, After all these other directors who have done Alien movies, Sigourney has come to the conclusion that I am nothing. That I'm incapable. That lasted three days."

Jeunet pauses, then continues, "I'd known from the beginning, because I could see she was very strong, that one day there would be sparks. That much was obvious. And that's not a problem at all. On every project, there are fights--it's almost obligatory. But I also realized that an actor needs to understand that the director is strong. So, I did something to her--it's an intimate something between her and me--and suddenly, that was it. It was over. Her smile came back."

What exactly was this intimate something that brought back Weaver's smile? "I will not tell you," Jeunet insists, quite the discreet gentleman and quite the tease. No matter what else I ask about this emotional pas de deux, Jeunet will not dish. "I think it was just a matter of different personalities finding ways to work together," he demurs. "These things that happen are just a part of beginning to work together, of dealing with a relationship." And these things did not, apparently, keep him from appreciating his star. "She has real courage, great imagination," he declares. "What I had to do was to be there to help her, to push her when I thought it was good, to give her a signal when I thought it wasn't. It's impossible to hide anything from her. She'd say something like, Jean-Pierre, didn't you only last week shoot this scene in close-up?' I'd say, 'Yes, I did.' And she'd say, 'So, how are you going to edit that with what we're doing now?' And I'm thinking to myself, 'Oh man, she knows.'"

In the movie, Ripley has been cloned, so she embodies both human and alien traits. As such, she is something of a predatory vamp. How much did Jeunet contribute to the conception of Weaver's character? "The sensuality, the almost vampire-like quality was a direction she wanted to go in," he explains. "But I pushed it. There are going to be some very surprising aspects of that sensuality. Sigoumey is a special case. There are not many women capable of starring in an action movie, women who can be believable carrying a gun. She's a kind of male fantasy: the woman with the gun. But when she does action scenes, she doesn't become Rambo. She's strong, yet open. There's something completely believable about her. We both know that women are stronger then men. Sigoumey represents that strength. Everything she does in this role works."

Since we know Sigourney was tough on Jeunet, I'm curious how tough she was on herself. "I have to tell you a story about Sigourney's willpower," Jeunet confides. "We had a scene in which her character was supposed to shoot a basketball into a basket from behind her back and from very far away. We had a special effects person, of course, but Sigourney trained to do it herself. I said, 'Sigourney, let's do it with the special effects.' She insisted she wanted to do it, but in the end, she said, 'OK, I'm going to throw it and let special effects sink the ball in the basket.' She walked away 15 meters from the net, threw it from behind and it fell right through the middle of the net. That is impossible to do, even for a professional. She wanted to do it, she trained and she did it. That's the way Sigourney is."

And what's the way Winona is? "She has a magical quality. God's little finger is pushing Winona along," Jeunet says, smiling. "You can make a take of everything she does, but if you need 20, she's perfect on all of them. Sometimes, I would need a close-up of her, a reaction, when, because of special effects, I didn't actually have an alien for her to react to. I'd say, 'I m going to tell you what the alien is going to be doing, going here, here, here.' She'd say, Jean-Pierre, I have a powerful imagination.' And she'd do everything exactly right. She's even better in the dailies than when you're on the set, and she's better still when you edit the details.

"I understood right away that we had to adapt the character to Winona, not the other way around," Jeunet continues. "In the script, the character was very tough and I didn't think it would be good for Winona to do that. I thought instead it would be interesting to have this character in a science-fiction movie be almost like a little girl from an old fairy tale lost in a huge forest."

"Your previous movies are filled with extraordinary, bizarre faces, something that clearly fires you up," I comment to Jeunet. "Did you get similarly inspired by working with these two movie-star faces?"

"Sigourney has an extraordinarily intense, extreme face," Jeunet observes. "Winona's is almost the opposite. She's like an angel. To put that angel in a universe full of extremes was interesting" to me--the angel among the ogres. Movie-star faces are interesting, but it always depends upon the role and the story. A face has to be as 'right' for a movie as the set or the costumes or lighting. Why not Julia Roberts in this movie, for instance? Because she would not have a place in an Alien movie. It would not work. Neither would Juliette Binoche--she's one of the rare French actresses I admire, but, again [not for this] kind of film. It's difficult for me because I mostly work in France and will probably continue to do that, but there are no movie stars in France anymore. Tarantino was right to say that French moviemaking is in such a terrible state because of the lack of movie stars."

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