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BIG PICTURE: LEGEND OF THE GUARDIANS<br />
PETER<br />
RAMSEY<br />
WITH HIS<br />
CAST OF<br />
GUARDIANS<br />
HO HO—HOLD ON!<br />
THINK YOU KNOW SANTA CLAUS?<br />
THINK AGAIN, SAYS RISE OF THE GUARDIANS DIRECTOR PETER RAMSEY<br />
Every year, there’s a<br />
movie starring Santa<br />
Claus. But there’s<br />
never been a Santa<br />
Claus like this one:<br />
tattooed, tough and<br />
borderline crazy.<br />
First-time director<br />
Peter Ramsey should<br />
have been scared to<br />
completely reimagine<br />
the biggest heroes<br />
of the holidays. Was<br />
he? Not really. But he<br />
does think Rise of the<br />
Guardians might have<br />
been a little too evil<br />
to its elves.<br />
THIS FILM IMAGINES SANTA CLAUS,<br />
THE EASTER BUNNY AND THE TOOTH<br />
FAIRY MUCH DIFFERENTLY THAN<br />
WE SEE IN GREETING CARDS. TALK<br />
ABOUT PUTTING YOUR OWN SPIN ON<br />
THESE ICONS.<br />
We wanted to give people a little bit of a shock,<br />
to startle people into looking at these guys in a<br />
new way, so that we could reveal things about<br />
them that we thought were the most powerful<br />
and enduring and resonant all along. These<br />
ideas were there in the original books, but for<br />
the film we really oiled them down to their<br />
essential qualities. What do these characters<br />
represent? Why have they been around for so<br />
long? How and why does the Tooth Fairy collect<br />
teeth from every kid in the world? Those<br />
simple questions propelled us into coming up<br />
with the personalities for these guys.<br />
AND COMING UP WITH DETAILS LIKE,<br />
SAY, SANTA CLAUS’ “NAUGHTY” AND<br />
“NICE” TATTOOS ON HIS FOREARMS.<br />
INSTEAD OF HIS JUDGING CHILDREN<br />
ON WHETHER THEY’RE ONE OR THE<br />
OTHER, IT’S LIKE CLAIMING THAT HE<br />
HIMSELF IS BOTH.<br />
Our version of the character really is! What<br />
he does is literally impossible, so we thought,<br />
“Why not base his personality on that? Why<br />
don’t we make him this wild man where everything<br />
he does is a sheer act of will?” He doesn’t<br />
care if something’s impossible—he’s going to do<br />
it anyway. That’s where he gets his magic from.<br />
He’s a larger-than-life pirate kind of a guy. He’d<br />
be the first to say, “Yeah, I am naughty and<br />
nice. I’m everything!” The tattoos were a great<br />
symbol of that.<br />
BUT TWO QUESTIONS: ONE, WHY IS<br />
HE RUSSIAN? AND TWO, WHERE IS<br />
MRS. CLAUS?<br />
The Russian thing came from Bill Joyce,<br />
who made him Russian in the books, but we<br />
thought it was really cool because it’s different.<br />
We’ve never heard that before, but in a way it<br />
makes sense. The legends and lore of Santa are<br />
all Northern European and from that general<br />
area of the world, and the Russian accent just<br />
made him fiery and unpredictable—it gave him<br />
a rough edge. As for Mrs. Claus, I don’t know?<br />
Maybe she pops up in the sequel. But I always<br />
fantasize he’s got girls in every port. “I saw<br />
Mommy kissing Santa Claus …”<br />
LET’S BE FRANK: THIS MOVIE IS A<br />
LITTLE CRUEL TO ELVES.<br />
That’s true. Actually, we’re a little crueler than<br />
sometimes I thought we should be. The story<br />
department or the animators would come up<br />
with these gags, and I’d be like, “No! You can’t<br />
do that!” But they were so funny. And I guess<br />
our thing with the elves is that they’re kind<br />
of annoying little gremlins. They’re vermin,<br />
68 BOXOFFICE PRO NOVEMBER <strong>2012</strong>
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