Darren Aronofsky Does Noah?
A tale of biblical proportions.
Back in November 2006 I interviewed director Darren Aronofsky about his new film The Fountain and when I asked him what he was working on he referred to a movie that he wouldn’t give me any detail on other than to say, “I think it’s a mythical epic film. It’s a huge idea and because of the size of our idea we won’t be able to escape commercial ability.” Aronofsky has never really been one for the blockbuster and while this news I am about to bring you doesn’t sound like it is your stereotypical blockbuster the idea certainly is huge.
The Guardian had a chance to speak with Aronofsky from the Romanian mountain resort of Sinaia, two hours north-west of Bucharest and he chatted up the new script he is working on as he is several drafts into a screenplay about Noah. Yeah, that Noah, the one that built the ark and I am not expecting an Evan Almighty story.
The interview says that when the Aronofsky was 13, he won a United Nations competition at his school in Manhattan Beach, Brooklyn with his first poem about the end of the world as seen through Noah’s eyes. “That story has interested me ever since,” Aronofsky told the site. “Noah was the first person to plant vineyards and drink wine and get drunk… It’s there in the Bible - it was one of the first things he did when he reached land. There was some real survivor’s guilt going on there. He’s a dark, complicated character.”
It really takes a guy like Aronofsky to find this kind of level of complexity in a biblical character as well known as Noah, and anyone that has seen Requiem for a Dream, Pi or The Fountain knows how much a visionary this guy is - even if you don’t like his films.
The rest of the article goes on to talk a lot about The Fountain and its upcoming DVD, HD DVD and Blu-ray release on May 15 and he even talks about his take on the Batman franchise when he was asked to take a shot at the script long before Batman Begins. He says, “It was a hard, R-rated Batman… What I pitched them was Travis Bickle meets The French Connection - a real guy running around fighting crime. No super-powers, no villains, just corruption. For the Batmobile, I had him taking a bus engine and sticking it in a black Lincoln. Real low-tech geek stuff.”
If you don’t know who Travis Bickle that was Robert De Niro’s character in Taxi Driver. Yeah, consider that plus The French Connection. Batman fan or not that sounds like a movie I would want to watch.
For the full interview click here.
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