Ever wondered just what happened to the Fantastic Four movie? How did something with so much promise ended up really… bad? The latest superhero “blockbuster” from 20th Century Fox is considered as one of the biggest stinkers right now, with a Rotten Tomatoes ranking of 9%, making it even lower than Dragonball Evolution (2009).
Now, behind the set stories are emerging and THR managed to piece together what exactly happened during shooting. It is reported that the studio and the director, Josh Trank had agreed on a particular vision of the movie but just before the start of the production, the studio told him that he cannot include three major action sequences. Fox is constantly interfering with the production, causing consternation and confusion during filming. To cap it all, the director was fired after the production and did not have any say during the final editing process.
Whereas the director was reported to be aggressive and erratic on set. He is described as “extremely withdrawn”, where he even “built a black tent around his monitor” to “cut himself off from everybody”. In addition, he is very strict with the main cast: “During takes, he would be telling [castmembers] when to blink and when to breathe…He kept pushing them to make the performance as flat as possible.” There are even reports that he showed up at the set drunk or high but this is not confirmed. His hardball style pushed the cast to the limit, Kate Mara reportedly stormed out crying during a shoot.
The mood behind the shooting then soured further:
“As filming wound toward an unhappy close, the studio and producers Simon Kinberg and Hutch Parker engaged in a last-minute scramble to come up with an ending. With some of the cast not fully available at that point and Kinberg juggling X-Men: Apocalypse and Star Wars, a lot of material was shot with doubles and the production moved to Los Angeles to film scenes with Teller against a green screen. ‘It was chaos,’ says a crewmember, adding that Trank was still in attendance ‘but was neutralized by a committee.’ Another source says the studio pulled together ‘a dream team,’ including writer and World War Z veteran Drew Goddard, to rescue the movie.”
The studio’s hasty reshoots are very obvious, one just have to look at Kate Mara’s hair. In some parts she sports her natural dark blonde hair and in some scenes, her blonde wig is painfully obvious. Officially, Fox is still planning the sequel according to Fox domestic distribution chief, Chris Aronson: “remain[s] committed to these characters.”
Realistically though, we are very doubtful if the sequel will ever come in 2017.
On the other hand, it is rumoured that Josh Trank was fired by Disney after he is hired as the director of an upcoming Star Wars anthology movie because of his antics during the Fantastic Four shooting.
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