Darren Aronofsky’s biblical epic Noah has already become epic behind the scenes. The story will focus on the familiar story of Noah and his ark, but with a more realistic bent that eschews the typical “guy in robe and sandals stands at the head of a boat flanked by zoo animals”. The movie will have tons of special effects, and Aronofksy recently told DGA that he feels he has more control over Noah than any of his previous movies. “Increasingly, the images are coming out of a computer,” says Aronofsky, “but that means you can change anything and have more control.” However, he added that a large amount of preparation was required because “[you] have faith that your collaborators are going to breathe life into what you aren’t photographing. You have to trust that down the road things are going to come alive.”
Hit the jump for more including Aronofsky’s “badge of honor” when it came to creating some of the more complicated effects. The film stars Russell Crowe, Emma Watson, Jennifer Connelly, Logan Lerman, Douglas Booth, Ray Winstone, Anthony Hopkins, Kevin Durand, Martin Csokas, and Mark Margolis. Noah opens March 28, 2014.
Aronofsky tells DGA Quarterly [via The Playlist] that in order to push back against the clichéd image of Noah’s story, they had to rethink the animals on the ark. “We had to create an entire animal kingdom,” says the director. He continued:
“We basically went through the animal kingdom and pinpointed the body types we wanted: some pachyderms, some rodents, reptiles, and the bird kingdom. We chose the species and they were brought to life with different furs and colors. We didn’t want anything fully recognizable but not completely absurd either.”
This process meant some of the most complicated rendering in the history of the effects studio, Industrial Light & Magic:
“It was a nice badge of honor,” he smiled. “I don’t think it’s the most incredible shot, but I think because of all the hair on the animals it was incredibly complicated for them. They said, ‘We can only render it two or three more times so make sure those are exactly right because they take so long and are so complex.’”
It looks like Aronofsky is completely reimagining one of history’s oldest stories, and I can’t wait to see how it turns out.
