James Gunn on His TIFF Hit SUPER, Sidekick Sex and Blending Art House with the Grindhouse

The flip side of that vision and candor is that you have to cast actors who are game, and you most definitely did that.

It all hinges on Rainn. Try to think of somebody who could play that role. I don't know anybody. We had funding for this movie five years ago, but I couldn't find anybody. There were a lot of actors who wanted to play that role -- some pretty famous actors -- but there was nobody who could do the comedic stuff, who could do the dramatic stuff, who you could believe was a big enough doof that he was getting picked on by the dishwasher at his diner but was also physically present enough that you could imagine him beating the sh*t out of people. And it wasn't until Rainn -- whom I'd known for five years and never thought of -- came along that it was like, "He's perfect."

One of the things that makes this movie fun for me is that I love Rainn, I love Ellen, I love Liv, and giving them the opportunity to do something different from what they usually do -- to see Rainn as something completely different than Dwight [Schrute, his Office character]. I was honest with him from the beginning. I told him, "If I see you do anything that's Dwight-like, I'm going to shut you down. We don't want to be reminding people of Dwight during this movie; we want to take it someplace different. With Ellen, we don't want her playing this wise-beyond-her-years character who's tongue-in-cheek and smart as hell. She's not smart! She's an idiot! Not in a bad way, but she's got a lot of issues. And to let her really express that energy onscreen -- the sexual energy, the crazy energy that she's able to bring forth -- and let those actors be seen in a new light was very important to me.

Conceptually you don't hold back either. There are places you go in SUPER where I thought seconds before, "Oh, he won't go there." How much of a consideration was that?

Listen, I love Karate Kid-like endings, or Rocky -- actually, not Rocky, because the ending is f*cked-up -- or romantic comedies where you know what's going to happen. There's a comfort to that. Those movies are well-told and they can be a great joy to watch. But I wanted to have a movie where you didn't know what was going to happen next. I spaced characters differently -- Ellen becomes a major character halfway through the movie -- and the things that happen to those characters are surprising to people. And we do go places that people don't think we're going to go -- both in terms of what happens to the characters and in terms of the choices the characters make. And also the tonal choices the characters make; it's not a light comedy.

It was also important to me that the movie built, and the last act was the best. To do that meant the movie's getting progressively more in-your-face than it started out. That means we're offending a few people, but that's OK.

The spiritual components of this film -- the prayers, the Holy Avenger, the finger of God -- are really interesting. What inspired them?

Well, I'll be completely honest: I'm a spiritual guy. I relate to Frank in that journey. A lot of the ways Frank feels called to put on that costume and do what he's doing, I felt called to make this movie. That's the way it is. I don't know what to say about it other than that, except that Rainn is, too. There was one actor we almost cast a few years ago, and at the end of the movie, he couldn't see that part of the film. And I knew I couldn't make the movie with him because of that. He was a popular actor -- he was going to get the movie green-lit -- but he didn't see it the same way I did. He thought Frank was a buffoon, basically, and I don't. I love him, and I think he's got a lot of nobility.

It seems like you're working out your spiritual issues in the film. There are send-ups of Christian TV programming, but these still are noble characters with ambitions and goals.

Listen, the movie's a fable. We're raised in a society where we're told what's right and what's wrong, and there's another part of us that knows what's right and what's wrong. Sometimes what we know is right is not what seems like it's right, whether you're falling in love with the wrong person -- that you know you're not supposed to fall in love with but you know you belong with. Or you need to take a stand when you're a kid and everybody else is doing something different. That's what this movie is about for me: Frank is doing something that, for all intents and purposes, is absolutely mad. But in his heart, he knows it's the right thing to do. It seems like a terrible thing, but it's right. And I believe that. I believe in what Frank does -- as messed up as it is -- while saying in real life I wouldn't hit someone with a pipe wrench who butts in line in front of me.

[Top photo of James Gunn by Patrick Jube/Getty Images]

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