We are in the midst of one of the most overcrowded summer movie seasons of all time. Each and every week a slew of great titles have been rolling out into theaters, and this weekend is certainly no exception. I know it can be tempting to give into advertising and see the latest mega-blockbuster starring everyone’s favorite celebrities, but if you’re looking for original ideas and truly engaging cinema then I must demand you drop everything you have planned and see William Eubank’s new film, The Signal.
Opening this week, The Signal tells a coming of age story unlike anything you have ever seen before. Three friends set out on what is supposed to be the road trip of a lifetime, but a chance encounter with a strange entity in the dead of night flips the friends’ very understanding of the world around them on its head. I would go more in-depth about the plot, but to do so would force me to give away at least one of the film’s many mysteries.
I had the opportunity to experience The Signal at the beginning of May, and a few days later was fortunate enough to sit across from filmmaker William Eubank during at Boston’s famous Liberty Hotel. We talked about the creation of The Signal, as well as his previous efforts working with Angels and Airwaves on Love, and even touch on the projects you may soon see him join in the future. You can read highlights from our conversation below.
The Signal opened in a number of cities today, and in the weeks ahead will likely expand further. Click here to read our full review.
UTG: I can’t recall when it occurred, but at some point watching The Signal it dawned on me that you are the person credited for directing Angels And Airwaves’ Love. Before we dive into the new film, I’d like to talk about that feature for a moment. How did you become involved with the band?
WE: They basically saw a music video I had created for a Red Hot Chili Peppers video competition. I was working at Panavision at the time, and the video ended up ranking pretty high. Tom Delonge saw the clip, liked it, and contacted me about making a series of music videos for the band. I went to work for them, and that evolved into a movie idea which, years later, turned into Love. The process of making all the videos begged to be turned into a movie, so we went back to the drawing board a few different times and turned it into a narrative story. It’s still very much a visual poem, and deals with a lot of questions that are not necessarily answered, but yea, over time it slowly congealed into a movie.
UTG: I noticed you’re also credited as the writer for Love.
WE: Yea, I wrote all the story stuff and I am actually really proud of it. There is a lot of poetic writing that I was able to do with that movie that you are not able to do in most films. It’s kind of like The Thin Red Line, where the film is able to do and say lot of unique things because you’re hearing the main character’s thoughts, and in Love you’re in the civil war guys’ head as he seeks answers to his own questions. So yea, as a first film it’s something I am incredibly proud of.
UTG: Are you going to do more projects with the band in the future?
WE: Maybe. Sometimes we talk about projects and other times we don’t speak for months. They’re prepping something right now, and album for the fall I believe, and I saw that their social networks are suddenly alive with images from [Love]. So the answer is, I guess, I don’t know. We’ll see.
UTG: We certainly will. Let’s move on to your latest film, The Signal. I can’t say I really knew what I was expecting walking in based on what I had seen in the trailer, but the final product definitely caught me off guard in a good way. When did you originally begin developing this film?
WE: The basic idea for the story started to develop around the time I was completing Love. I knew that project was going to set me up to do what I wanted to, that is direct movies, and I know I needed some ideas. I had a lot of stories in mind, but as someone with only one film to your name it’s hard to find people to give you millions of money to make movies. So I was trying to come up with something that seemed doable, seemed high concept enough to be interesting, and had a human core. I came up with this.
UTG: I’m curious where the story began for you. The film starts like any other coming of age film and then takes a strange turn that’s followed by another turn, and then another after that.
WE: I had the idea for how I wanted it to end, and I set out to work backwards from there. That was the original idea, at least, but how we got there changed several time throughout the process of making the film. There is this box you are put in when making a film, and the size of the box depends on how much time and money you have to work with. You’re forced, at some point, to put what you wrote inside that box, and that doing so can cause you to change the story from a narrative standpoint.
UTG: There are a couple of clues throughout the film that hint at the ending, and if you’re paying close enough attention it would not be too impossible for someone to figure out what’s really going on throughout the story. As a filmmaker, do you worry about people solving the puzzle at the center of the film early on and how that might impact the way the view the story overall?
WE: It’s funny because I kind of like knowing that people will start to think one thing early on, then more than likely realize it’s something else entirely before the end of the film. It’s possible to pick up on where the story is going, but there are several stop gaps throughout the film that make you second guess what you think may be going on, and I think that’s fun.
UTG: I remember reading a review of Looper years ago that talked about how there was a time when all an original story needed to be good was one great idea that audiences had not seen, but due to how much content is being created today up and coming filmmakers needed two, or even three unique ideas if they wanted to stand out. For that film, the two ideas were time travel and telekinesis. I don’t want to give away the various things that make The Signal unique, but it did seem like you made a conscious effort to continually throw new things at the audience to keep them on their toes. I’m curious, what films would you say influenced the creation of this film?
WE: Lots of different stuff, to be honest. Yesterday I came to the realization that there have always been a lot of filmmakers who have influenced me, especially the Scott brothers. Then there is all this recent science fiction that has been coming out, and it’s all very different and very unique, but it also has a human element that keeps it grounded, and I really admire that quality in films. They deal with something that has a bit more soul, if you know what I mean. You have all this high concept stuff, and today you’re free to mix as many ideas as you want, but they all work to create a stage for a simple human story. And in film, it’s about a kid trying to embrace his emotional self.
UTG: Is that something you related to at that point in your life, when you were the same age as main character?
WE: I can’t really pretend to be able to put myself completely in his shoes with what he’s going through, but I definitely do struggle with putting up emotional walls, especially when I work. There is nothing like the feeling of being close to someone, but if you put your all in and things fall apart that result can be devastating. Nick is afraid of losing his girlfriend in this film, and instead of trying to fix that he puts up a wall and decides the logical thing to do is break up with her even though it isn’t what he wants to do.
UTG: I actually found myself relating to the character of Jonah most of all. There is just something about the way he exists as a fly on the wall, yet carries himself as if he already knows how everything will play out.
WE: Isn’t that great? To me, that’s so real. You have friends who are involved in emotional struggles and you want to be there for them, but you can’t really help. They turn to you and you have to be like, “I don’t know, man, I’m just here.” I love Jonah for that reason.
UTG: You are someone who loves to use slow motion in his films. I think might actually be your calling card at this point, or at least it will be after people see The Signal. When did your love affair with that style of video manipulation begin?
WE: You know what it was? I was right there at the beginning of video slow motion, basically. I was working at Panavision at the time, and I met this guy who was working on a new iPod commercial. They brought in this camera that just so happened to be one of the first video slo-mo cameras. You could watch it and see the shot, for the first time. So I came up through the inception of the switch to digital, when films like Collateral came out. This was before you could do HD video editing at home, and I got one of the first Black Magic cards, from Black Magic, before there was even SATA drives yet. You would cut a whole in the back of your G4 mac and create HD capture from scratch (laughs). i literally had seventeen hard drives pile on top of one another, it was crazy. I took the whole thing into Panavision and showed people, who were all like “What the heck?” We took in some footage form an F900, spit it back out to the camera, and then played it on screen and the HD guys were just like, “Ho-ly crud.” It was in this moment we realized anyone would soon be able to edit HD. Before that there were all these stop gaps between amateurs and professionals, but that soon changed.
ANYWAYS, getting back to slo-mo. I realized slo-mo was a tool that was super unique, especially from an indie perspective, because it allowed you to do something super cool without needing as much time or resources. So you could still give audiences something bold and impactful without needing six camera and multiple days for shooting. You can still get an emotive feeling with less, and that was a trick I really developed while making Love. We had to shoot war scenes without having the budget for war scenes, so I shot vignettes of it.
UTG: Interesting. I definitely enjoy it, and the moments it appears in The Signal really takes the impact of those scenes to a different level.
WE: I know Snyder has used a lot of slo-mo, but I read somewhere that Man Of Steel used no slo-mo and he was apparently proud of that fact. I really dig it though, I think it’s great. I like thinking of pictures, which is sort of what slo-mo allows me to create, and then I go about working out how to capture that image in the most impactful way.
UTG: I wanted to touch on the music for a minute. A lot of the score sounds influenced by classic science fiction films, but then at the end there is a dubstep bass drop essentially comes out of left field.
WE: That’s sort of the nature of the end, to be a big jolt to your system. The story is much larger than the characters can even imagine, and when I was thinking of how to emphasize that point the sound of dubstep working out really well. The track was created by a kid who goes by Free The Robots. He’s a really cool guy who creates a lot of good music.
UTG: We’re almost out of time, but before I let you go we might as well touch on your upcoming projects. Do you have anything in the pipeline?
WE: I have a military thing that I am working on, sort of a ‘loss of innocence/drone’ movie.
UTG: Sounds like there could be another sci-fi element in there.
WE: Oh no, not at all. I mean, there are drones, but like military drones. Things we have right now.
UTG: I follow. That sounds interesting. I think we have a lot of drone-related stories coming in the next few years.
WE: I also have a Scottish film I am working on about a Highlander type character. It’s like 1% fantasy. It’s not really based on anything, but I love movies about crazy dudes with big beards, kilts, and stuff.
UTG: There are not enough of those.
WE: There are not, man. I have a cool one coming though. It’s on the way.
Written & conducted by: James Shotwell Follow @utgjames
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXV_CU_ryKs
