David Fincher (b. 1962) did not go to film school and hates being defined as an auteur. He prefers to see himself as a craftsman, dutifully going about the art and business of making film. Trouble is, it’s hard to be self-effacing when you are the director responsible for
Se7en, Fight Club, and
The Social Network. Along with Quentin Tarantino, Fincher is the most accomplished of the Generation X filmmakers to emerge in the early 1990s.
This collection of interviews highlights Fincher’s unwavering commitment to his craft as he evolved from an entrepreneurial music video director (Fincher helped Madonna become the undisputed queen of MTV) into an enterprising feature filmmaker. Fincher landed his first Hollywood blockbuster at twenty-seven with
Alien3, but that film, handicapped by cost overruns and corporate mismanagement, taught Fincher that he needed absolute control over his work. Once he had it, with
Se7en, he achieved instant box-office success and critical acclaim, as well as a close partnership with Brad Pitt that led to the cult favorite
Fight Club.
Fincher became circumspect in the 2000s after
Panic Room, shooting ads and biding his time until
Zodiac, when he returned to his mantra that “entertainment has to come hand in hand with a little bit of medicine. Some people go to the movies to be reminded that everything’s okay. I don’t make those kinds of movies. That, to me, is a lie. Everything’s not okay.”
Zodiac reinvigorated Fincher, inspiring a string of films—
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The Social Network, and
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo—that enthralled audiences and garnered his films dozens of Oscar nominations.
عن المؤلف
Laurence F. Knapp, an instructor of film studies at Northwestern University, is author or editor of many works, including Directed by Clint Eastwood.
المزيد من الكتب الإلكترونية من نفس المؤلف (المؤلفين) / محرر
358 كتب إلكترونية في هذه الفئة
