–I saw you in the window. What do you think of me? Sir, you don’t need to know what I think. You aren’t interested in what I think, I’m sure. That man wasn’t guilty. But I’m not here to dispense justice. I’m here to bring peace. When it comes to peace, one dead man is as good as any other. The best offering for peace is what’s hanging from that tree. everyone understands that. sooner or later I’m going to hang someone that they’re.
GDT: This [opposite] is the restaurant bill for an Indian lunch with Joe Hill and Stephen King on the day I showed them Pan’s Labyrinth. It was one of those cheap thermal papers, so it faded, but I glued it on my notebook with the little note that Stephen King did, “We had a blast!! Steve King,” and a smiley. Because I think he is my favorite living writer. I think he is one of my favorite writers of all time. And that day I still didn’t know if he was going to like it or not, but I had just shown my movie to Stephen King, you know? So I drew the Faun on the empty paper of the faded receipt. And then beneath is a sketch for Abe Sapien’s new glasses.
MSZ: This also speaks to the design evolution of the Faun. Earlier, it was almost like a Hellboy kind of thing—muscular with big horns.
GDT: Definitely. And it evolved a lot even after this. DDT made an exquisite creation. I was making it bigger to hide the mechanics, and they said, “We think we can really sculpt it so that it can be the actor’s mouth. We can do that delicate a sculpture.” And I must say, without them, the Faun would not be what it is. They are masters of their art. I knew Doug Jones was the only guy to play the Faun, because his sensibility in playing Abe Sapien is amazing.
–Screenings P.L. WB, FD, M.P. S.S. they need to clean it!!
Feeling a little afraid is normal when facing something new, in a place or in a way you’ve never experienced before. But to learn something it’s necessary to surpass that fear completely.
–Luke Goss for the role of the prince, but will need to work his eyes, forehead
–We need Johann for something that is not the final gag?? And I know that it would be Abe who would appear before the B.P.R.D. and is loved by everyone and makes Hellboy jealous? If it was so, then Johann could be introduced in the Eurospec portion of the movie.
–I have an irrational fear. A superstition. I fear that a terrorist act will take the world one more time. As was the case on 9/11 during Backbone.
–Bring me BIG BABY, but Manning said—he said, to be discreet!! HB: And the silver please—and B.B. (watch out!) it’s enormous.
–Sometimes (Abe says) with feeling an extraordinary desire to cry.
–I know—yes??!!—Yes!! Oh God!! Oh God!! Silence—give me another beer.
–Perhaps in the place of Goggles. Abe with new Goggles. Abe uses CONTACTS or glasses.
–It’s impossible to find the beautiful without first exploring everything that is terrible. 2/14/05 Madrid.
–They CHANGE the princess into a
–The nano-robots are called CELLBOTS.
–I GUESS I’M OUT.
–He’s just about to step outside when they insult him. He closes the door quietly and turns around with a smile on his face. The camera makes a push…
–We are—you see?—the fallen. HB II
–The point of the sword moves toward his heart
–For how long? Until you can stand on your own two feet.
–I know what I am but I didn’t know the name others have for it. What to call it.
–You can go up and see her. She’s resting right now.
–A biography’s lucidity is the result of the man, the journey he takes in his final days as he unknowingly approaches his own death.
–Thin. in front.
–Or the proportions could be even more extreme:
–The prince slices off Johann’s hand/arm. Protoplasm escapes out.
–IRON SHOES.
–Wheelchair Ghost.
–HB imitates static while talking with Myers over the radio.
Well.
–Keep the mushrooms for the Toad’s lair (fig tree).
–The real world is made of straight lines, and the world of fantasy is curved. Reality is cold. Fantasy is warm.
–The fantasy world should feel UTERINE, INTERIOR, like the subconscious—of the girl/photo.
GDT: Here [opposite] it says, “It’s impossible to find the beautiful without first exploring everything that is terrible.” I think this is true. I mean, this is probably a conclusion I reached there. But it’s true.
“The real world is made of straight lines, and the world of fantasy is curved. Reality is cold. Fantasy is warm.” These are Pan’s Labyrinth ideas for the initiation pit in Portugal.
The pit is still pretty much the same in the movie—the composition is almost the same; the labyrinth corridor in front of a pit. There are these pits in Portugal that have great alchemical and occultist symbolism, and we reproduced that shadow in the pit where the Faun lives. These are little things—details that are important for me or for my designers.
MSZ: And what are all these little doodles? One of the figures looks like Abe Sapien smoking a cigarette. And the pig?
GDT: Some of those are for Hellboy II—ideas that were abandoned. The guy with the cigarette is the captain, lifting weights in his undershirt with dark glasses. And the pig? They make those pigs in Mexico. They come with a little tape that you put a fly on. You put it inside, and as the fly dies, it animates the pig.
MSZ: This [opposite] is the underground city Ofelia goes to at the end of Pan’s Labyrinth. I have a question about that, because at the last moment, when she returns, it seems so cold and so austere. Was that your thinking?
GDT: When she comes back, I wanted her not to embrace anyone because then it would become very sappy. So I put her father and her mother in these super-high thrones, because if we made her embrace them and then you cut to her dying, it is melodramatic in the wrong way. There is melodrama that is a little more austere, and melodrama that is a lot more syrupy, and I thought if we had them all dancing around her and embracing her, and then you cut and she’s dying, it’s really cheap. But if you hear them applaud, and she’s there but she’s alone, still alone, it’s an easier transition to her dying. So I made them sort of very high and mighty, literally.