Jarred Hess is the man behind the much-loved Napoleon Dynamite and the Jack Black wrestling comedy Nacho Libre. It’s been over three years since Libre and he’s finally back to bring another offbeat comedy to the big screen. His latest film Gentlemen Broncos deals with a young writer’s ambitions, crappy science fiction and an at-the-end-of-his-career sci-fi writer. To help promote his latest film I was given the more than fantastic opportunity of interviewing Mr. Hess to discuss Broncos and here’s the result. Gentlemen Broncos is now in theaters.
I always like how your films carry an underdog theme. What is it exactly that appeals to you about that?
Jarred Hess: You know, I guess… I moved around a lot growing up and I guess I just identify with the outsider guy — trying to fit in, pursuing his dream. I don’t know, it’s kind of fun to see those stories about forgotten people that are trying to make magic happen.
There’s also always that same comedic sensibility with uneasy characters in uneasy situations. How do you make sure you keep that same way of storytelling fresh?
Jarred Hess: Yeah, well that’s a great question. We draw so much from what we do in real life with experiences. Most of the characters in our films are based off family members or people that we know. I think living in Utah near the Rocky Mountains keeps it fresh. We never know who we’re going to bump into that’s going to inspire our next film.
What’s your and Jerusha’s writing regiment?
Jarred Hess: Yeah, we… when we’re done with a film we’ll just start talking about ideas. Once we have an idea or a character we like we really talk through it for a long time whether we’re in the car or whatever. Then we jot things down on a notebook and once our notebook gets full we get a babysitter and go to the office.
Can you talk about walking that tightrope of showing nostalgia for crappy sci-fi and also making fun of it?
Jarred Hess: For me, all my favorite movies growing up were science fiction films. I tried to make them as a kid and wasn’t very good at it. I always wanted to be a special effects guy and work for ILM. It’s funny, not until I was older did I see or become aware of the more obscure or low budget sci-fi stuff. Which still has a lot of charm and character, because they were really trying to bring to life these fantastic worlds. But they didn’t have the dough so it was a lot of strings and paper UFO’s. To me, that stuff is still fun. I have a lot of love for all of those real high end Blade Runner [films] too and also…
Turkish Star Wars.
Jarred Hess: Turkish Star Wars! Man, you gotta love that film. Its got the best training sequence ever put on screen. It’s such a good sequence. It’s unbelievable.
How was it working with special effects for the first time?
Jarred Hess: Yeah, it was fun. I had read a lot about it as a kid and I felt like I knew what I was doing. I read about green screens and motion control! (laughs) It was fun. I kind of got to nerd out because we had models built and the battle stags were all animatronics. So it was fun, we got to blow crap up and do some composite work. It was pretty sweet.
This was also your first time staging action too.
Jarred Hess: Yeah, yeah. It’s totally different…
Its new territory for you.
Jarred Hess: Yeah, it is new territory for me. I’m not used to shooting with multiple cameras. But when you blow something up you’ve gotta have a bunch of stuff rolling on it since it takes a lot of time to reset and do. So that was a lot of fun. We filmed all the science fiction stuff out on an island in Salt Lake. It was cool, it was fun, got to play with a bunch of toys and blow stuff up.
I know you generally storyboard everything, how much would you say of what’s on screen is exactly what you originally envisioned?
Jarred Hess: Yeah, pretty much. We really like to know exactly what I need to make a scene work. Its good. Once you’ve got something storyboarded and you know what shots you need then you can show up and you might realize you don’t need a few shots. But it kind of liberates you while shooting because you just don’t go, “gosh, how am I going to shoot this?” So you got it already figured out and you just go ahead and do it.
Were you intending to try to switch up your style? Here it’s a little different from your past films because there’s a lot more camera movement and a few really well-composed shots.
Jarred Hess: Yeah, it’s funny because when we filmed Napoleon everything was so locked off since we couldn’t afford a dolly. We didn’t have a dolly so our resources kind of dictated the aesthetic. So now that I’ve been able to do films that actually have a budget we can do fun things. Like afford a crane! So yeah, it’s fun being able to change it up and do things that help the storytelling.
Yeah there are a few shots that stood out to me, especially since you shoot your films in 70’s fashion with all you quick zooms.
Jarred Hess: Yeah, I’ve never met a zoom I didn’t like. A lot of my favorite kung fu and martial arts films have a lot of great zooms.
Where did you find all those covers for the opening credits?
Jarred Hess: We found them… We tracked down some of the authors and a lot of them had died so we talked to their wives and stuff. They were from existing science fiction books and my production designer just scanned them and changed the titles and everything.
I don’t know if this was intentional on your part, but Chevalier actually a very depressing character.
Jarred Hess: Yeah, he is depressing. He’s having this midlife creative crisis, he’s very desperate and he’s sad. Even though he’s kind of the bad guy you feel bad for him.
Not only that though he’s basically at the end of his career and he seems to be completely friendless.
Jarred Hess: Yeah, he’s also ego-tripping the whole time too. He’s a bit of a narcissist.
How did you come up with his look?
Jarred Hess: The look of Chevalier… I worked as a camera assistant during college and I remember one time I was working on a movie and I was the focus puller. One day the screenwriter visited the set and he looked just like Chevalier!
Like I said earlier, I think you’ve sort of grown in a visual sense. How do you think you’ve grown as a director?
Jarred Hess: Oh cool, yeah, I mean, you approach things by, “what’s the story?” and what type of style is necessary to convey the right tone. So with each different project that I do depending on what is required to help tell that story better you kind of conform your style and change it up as you go.
I’ve heard you don’t read reviews…
Jarred Hess: I don’t, I really don’t.
Is that because you think it’s harmful to the creative process?
Jarred Hess: No, I don’t spend a lot of time on the Internet really. I mean I check my email. Its not just with reviews; I just don’t spend a lot of time online. I don’t have a MySpace, a Facebook, or a Twitter. I feel like technology is taking over. I got two kids and I spend most of my time playing with Legos. Life’s too short. I think in a way, I’ve heard from a lot of different people… It’s not going to influence me creatively one way or another; it’s just life’s too short man. I think you can get consumed by that sort of stuff.
Can you talk about some of the music choices? With all the ambient music and the great use of 2525.
Jarred Hess: We had a great music supervisor named Randall Poster who put the soundtrack together. He did such a great job. We have a bunch of different and weird characters in the film that it kind of warranted a very eclectic soundtrack which all works very well.
Since your films always have uneasy characters in a string of uneasy events, how do you make sure that doesn’t feel contrived?
Jarred Hess: Yeah, I think you have to have affection for the characters that you’re portraying. If you don’t then I think it feels…
Mean-spirited.
Jarred Hess: Yeah, mean-spirited. I think we identify so closely to the main characters in our films that we want their lives to end happily. We only want them to get what they’ve been trying for.
What advantages came from being an executive producer?
Jarred Hess: Dude, it’s just kind of credit (laughs). It doesn’t mean anything! It just means that I found more locations… I don’t know, it doesn’t really mean anything. It’s just more power and glory. (laughs)
I think many executive producers will cry when they read this.
Jarred Hess: (laughs) For me, it didn’t really mean anything. It does mean a lot for other people though who have that credit. When a director gets that credit it’s just more glory and thunder!
Would you ever want to work on someone else’s script? Or just what you and Jerusha write?
Jarred Hess: Yeah, I hope that I can find something that I don’t have to write someday. That would be ideal to just roll right into production. That would be sweet, but it just hasn’t happened yet.
Last night at the Q and A you mentioned how you didn’t have final cut on Nacho Libre and you also said something about casting. Did you have problems on that film?
Jarred Hess: No, no, no. I mean there weren’t any problems. The great thing was that I had a lot of cool producers that protected my vision on that film, but I still didn’t have final cut. So you’d have to take studio notes and try something in this or that form. Yeah, there weren’t any problems. I didn’t have full control, but I did to a degree, which was really great. Ultimately I got to cast the people I wanted to, but it was a process in the beginning trying to convince people in the beginning that it’s okay to cast unknowns. We had Jack [Black], but we really wanted to populate the film with real people who’d be in Nacho’s life.
Is there another cut out there?
Jarred Hess: Of Nacho? Yeah, I mean there were early ones but I don’t know if they exist anymore even though someone may have it on DVD. I don’t know, I think a few things ended up on the DVD. We had a really weird emperor scene that got cut and there’re some other fun things.
How much would you say those early cuts differ though? Because that film still feels very much like you.
Jarred Hess: Yeah, yeah, yeah it does. I think just different scenes that were very funny to me and also very amusing and entertaining while other people would just kind of scratched their heads. That’s the stuff that usually gets cut, but I actually think it helps the pacing of the film and makes the storytelling a little leaner.
What will we see on the Blu-ray/DVD for Broncos?
Jarred Hess: We’ve got a lot of fun scenes, that I love, but people were just, like, “huh?”
Didn’t you have final cut?
Jarred Hess: Yeah, yeah, yeah I did. They were ones that I cut just for the pacing of the film and the film is better because of it. They’re still really entertaining scenes to me, but they just didn’t work in the body of the film. We have two very funny deleted scenes: one with Bronco and the other with Brutus.
I heard you may be doing some TV work, is that true?
Jarred Hess: Yeah, possibly.
Can you talk about that or is it too early?
Jarred Hess: Yeah, probably too early. I might be doing some TV stuff, but I’m not sure.
I presume it’s going to be a comedy.
Jarred Hess: Yeah, comedy junk. (laughs)
Film wise; do you know what you’re working on next?
Jarred Hess: Film, yeah. Probably too early to talk about that as well. I got some other things cooking, but I want to do a western someday.
Like a straight western or a comedic version?
Jarred Hess: Yeah, granted it will probably be silly in some places. But I love a good western.
