Aladdin 2019: “We wanted the film to be as realistic as possible”

“Make way for Prince Aliiii…” Aladdin returns to M6, this Monday evening.

Visual effects supervisor Chas Jarrett explained in First the many challenges of the live action remake ofAladdin by Guy Ritchie for Disney on the occasion of its release on DVD, Blu-ray and VOD. We are republishing his remarks on the occasion of the rebroadcast of the blockbuster on television.

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Interview from October 4, 2019: Aladdin starring Will Smith is out now on DVD, Blu-ray and video on demand: this live-action adaptation of the 1992 Disney classic is the sixth highest-grossing film of the year, and the biggest hit of the Bad Boys and Men in Black actor's career. Chas Jarrett, the film's visual effects supervisor, a close friend of Guy Ritchie (he worked with him on the two Sherlock Holmes films) and a veteran of SFX (his CV includes the first two Harry Potter films, Speed ​​Racer or even Logan), tells us about the specifications of a film that oscillates between magic and realism.

What was Guy Ritchie's relationship with digital effects?
Guy Ritchie doesn't naturally go for digital special effects or green screens. He always prefers to shoot “hard”. He wants costumes and not motion capture. The big problem to solve was to let Will do his thing. There were very “choreographed” moments, very precise, and others totally free where he could improvise. So the trick was to find the way to do both in terms of digital effects… But Guy was super excited to test these digital tools.

The difference between animation and live action is the levels of reality: in animation everything is at the same level, in live action the effects are noticeable… Did you try to make visible effects or for everything to be on the same level of reality?
Good question. That was the first problem to solve. We really wanted the film to be as “realistic” as possible, really “grounded” in its environment. First, we created a plausible Middle Eastern universe, which could really exist, in which people live. The architecture was inspired by real buildings. Then there is the problem of the characters. Abu and Iago, for example. In the cartoon, they are hyper expressive, almost human, in fact. Guy was clear from the beginning: in our version, they had to look like real animals. They had to behave like them. But we couldn't use real animals. If you use trained animals, you make them do things, you film them but that's not what you want, you are dependent on their goodwill. Here, we could make them do what we wanted but while remaining realistic: everything Abu does, a real monkey could do. Our first attempts at animation with Abu were very “human”, he did things that Aladdin could do. Guy said “no” right away. The carpet is different, but hey, it's a flying carpet, it's necessarily magical. (laughs)

Speaking of which, how did you create the Genie?
Yes, his nature is also fundamentally magical. He is out of this world. He changes shape. It was difficult. At first, our first attempts stayed very close to the animated original. But when Will Smith was hired, we completely changed our plans. We brought our Genie back as a human performance. We knew that our work would inevitably be compared to the 1992 one. But nobody wanted that – nobody could reproduce this character, everyone loves him, who would want to copy him? We had to be more naturalistic, less cartoonish, very close to Will's physicality. The Genie was born from these two reasons: we wanted to move away from the 1992 original, and we had to integrate the character with Will's features into our “realistic” world. The great thing about Will, among other things, is his little hand and shoulder movements, very recognizable. We used them for the Genie in digital. But the goal was really to make believe that the Genie was physically present, in flesh and blood. No transparency, no aura, he had to be there. He had to have skin. If he was too cartoonish, it became too strange, the character made people uncomfortable.

Did you feel that you were in a Disney visual tradition or, on the contrary, that you were completely outside of it?
We tried to be as respectful as possible. We were making a film with characters that had already been loved for 27 years. We didn't try to reinvent anything. We had to find a balance between respecting the original work and our own ideas. Guy was the guarantor of respect for the work. There were “obligatory passages” like the song I am your best friendwith lots and lots of visual effects and preparation, and other more free moments, let's say. But we were in the Disney method of storytellinglet's say. We couldn't deviate much. But there are new characters, and new songs…

You worked on Guy Ritchie's first two Sherlock Holmes films. The third is in preparation, but under the direction of Dexter Fletcher (Bohemian Rhapsody, Rocketman). Are you going to re-enlist?
Sorry, but I can't talk about it. It was super fun to work on it, but… no, really, I can't say anything.

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