Soon, the world will get to witness David Fincher’s genius yet again when ‘Gone Girl’ starring Ben Affleck, Rosamund Pike, Neil Patrick Harris, Tyler Perry, and Carrie Coon hits theaters this weekend. Just as he did with previous films ‘Fight Club,’ ‘Zodiac,’ ‘The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,’, and ‘The Social Network’ the director takes his audience on a crazy ride filled with many unexpected twists and turns. But what if he had chosen something else as his next film instead of the adaptation of Gillian Flynn’s acclaimed 2005 novel? What if, instead, Fincher chose to travel to a galaxy far, far away? The filmmaker opens up about some talks that he had about potentially helming ‘Star Wars: Episode VII’ before J.J. Abrams landed the gig and why he ultimately turned the job down.
In an interview with Total Film, Fincher revealed that he had spoken to Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy about the possibility of directing the first film in a new era of ‘Star Wars’, but he had some reservations about the regime change:
“I talked to Kathy about it, but I think that it’s a different thing from… I don’t know what Disney-Lucasfilm will be like. It’s tricky. My favourite is ‘The Empire Strikes Back’. If I said, ‘I want to do something more like that,’ then I’m sure the people paying for it would be like, ‘No! You can’t do that! We want it like the other one with all the creatures!’”
He went on to share his unique understanding of the franchise, which may have been a direction that he would have taken if he had been given the reins to the new trilogy:
“I always thought of ‘Star Wars’ as the story of two slaves [C-3PO and R2-D2] who go from owner to owner, witnessing their masters’ folly, the ultimate folly of man… I thought it was an interesting idea in the first two, but it’s kind of gone by ‘Return Of The Jedi’.”
Speaking of ‘Return of the Jedi’, it’s interesting to note that Fincher would know what was and wasn’t gone in that chapter of the beloved space epic since he worked as an assistant cameraman on that production. It would have been really awesome to see him go from the bottom of the totem pole to the top dog, but alas the story did not play out that way. However, let’s not rule out the filmmaker’s involvement in a future ‘Star Wars’ film since there are apparently a lot more spinoffs and supplemental endeavors in the works that could see the director stepping into a prominent role in the future.
What do you think about David Fincher’s approach to ‘Star Wars’? Would you have liked to see him direct ‘Star Wars: Episode VII’? Let us know in the comments.