Don’t be fooled by this WOLFS sequel news. It’s Hollywood’s version of ‘everyone gets a trophy’ even if their performance was a failure.
Filmmaker Jon Watts’ (WOLFS) descent into director jail. A Case Study in what happens to filmmakers who don’t know their limitations.
Jon Watts’ career truly launched with the premiere of his second feature film COP CAR (starring Kevin Bacon) at the Sundance Film Festival in 2015. It was acquired and theatrically released by Focus World (a label of Focus Features). What made the film work for many critics and home viewers was the ‘never dull’ story and interesting characters that Jon co-created/co-wrote with Christopher Ford. It also had a solid set of lesser known but very talented producers/composers/editors behind it. A model recipe for independent success.
For an encore, not owed to any unique writing or directing style, but thanks to a winning personality and the one agency in town who always puts its clients in a position to succeed (CAA), Watts won the directing job for a trio of Spider Man films. He was one of many credited writers on the first film and not credited on the subsequent ones. His writing partner, Christopher Ford, was credited (along with others) on all three. As far as producers go, heavy hitters like Kevin Feige and Amy Pascal provided a steady hand Watts had the fortune of working with artists with the right sensibilities at the top of their craft. A composer like Michael Giachino. A group of 2nd unit directors etc.
And then came…WOLFS. A-listers Brad Pitt and George Clooney attached as stars with Watts writing, directing, and producing. A bidding war ensued. Apple emerged victorious as the distributor.
All was perfect with the world…well, not exactly. Thanks to a series of missteps—WOLFS went straight to streaming with little to no marketing (or theatres) behind it.
What were the missteps that Watts (and any filmmaker) could have avoided?
MISSTEP #1
THE DEAL:
When you make a deal with a streamer driven distributor, you do so at your own risk. If the budget as big as this one was not going to deliver, the streamer will dump it into the streaming pile. It begs the question: why does every filmmaker have to go for the extra money every time? Why didn’t Watts and company go with someone like Sony who doesn’t have a streaming service, who is all in on theatrical, and who will market something a lot harder even if they don’t believe in it. In addition, because theatrical is the primary component, Tom Rothman would surely have challenged Watts more on many levels to be sure he was making the right creative choices with the right people in place. Tom Rothman is known for spinning his magical spells when the process of getting a film made slides off the tracks a bit. Instead, at Apple, they basically let you do whatever you want and they pray you make the right decisions.
MISSTEP #2
THE SCREENPLAY
Watts confused himself for a great writer who didn’t need a partner on WOLFS. The dialogue wasn’t crisp or funny. The story got bogged down from the get-go (we spend upwards of 30 minutes being tortured in a viewing sense at the scene of a near murder in a hotel room), and from there the film never gained its footing. Also, toss in the uneven tone. From the early moments of the film, you think it’s more of a dramatic thriller than a comedic thriller—and then all of a sudden, in the next scene, you think it’s a comedy with some drama. This uncomfortable push and pull doesn’t end until the film does. This is least likely to happen with you have one or more creative equals to counter balance you. Then again, this is what you get from a filmmaker who wants his film to be like a French noir (LE SAMURAI) mixed with an American buddy comedy (MIDNIGHT RUN)
MISSTEP #3
THE ‘NOT EXPERIENCED ENOUGH’ PRODUCING SPOUSE
Watts tossed in his wife in as a producer (with a PGA acronym to boot!!) in a huge film in what was likely inspired by Chris Nolan. How much influence did she have on this film? Likely more than the other producers. The problem is that Watts’ wife did not cut her teeth sharply enough on smaller budgeted films before being thrown to the WOLFS. Yes, she had produced COP CAR, but not the SPIDERMAN trilogy. With WOLFS, she was way in over her head given how the final product turned out. Christopher Nolan’s wife, Emma Thomas, on the other hand, put in many years producing a series of Nolan’s smaller films before tackling the biggest project of her career: THE DARK KNIGHT.
MISSTEP #4
NOT SHOWCASING YOUR A-LIST STARS RIGHT OUT OF THE GATE
When you have two of the biggest movie stars in the world, you must get their faces on the screen as fast and as much as possible and in memorable style (Ocean’s 11 anyone?) Instead, Watts opened on Amy Ryan for a few minutes, then a few minutes of her talking to someone that sound like George Clooney that we can’t see on screen…to Brad Pitt showing up ten minutes later in beyond uneventful fashion.
MISSTEP #5
MISTAKING YOURSELF FOR BEING CHRISTOPHER NOLAN
In an interview with the Hollywood Reporter, Watts admitted that 2nd Unit teams (they shoot the complicated action sequences separately) exist because of how much shooting and attention is needed for the main shoot…and then, incredulously, Watts referenced Christopher Nolan as someone who shoots every shot, and that Watts wanted to pull a Christopher Nolan on WOLFS. Watts is no Christopher Nolan…and it’s because of this that the action sequences that Watts shot in WOLFS might be pretty cool, but the stuff in between suffered greatly from a lack of focus and energy as a result. It’s very clear that Watts enjoyed shooting the 2nd unit stuff more than he did the 1st unit when you try to get through the film.
MISSTEP #5
EXPERIMENTING WITH OFFBEAT CREATIVE CHOICES WITHOUT ITS MOTIVATION BEING CLEAR
There’s supposedly a dramatic murder in the beginning of the film and yet its offscreen. There’s an introduction to George Clooney’s character…offscreen. There’s no score where there was an obvious need for it and there was score where it was obviously not needed. There were song/music choices that bumped up against what was happening on screen. There was an odd understated way to Pitt and Clooney which left us with nothing to get excited about.
We could go on and on, but you get the point.