| Recorded at | March 03, 2007 |
|---|---|
| Event | TED2007 |
| Duration (min:sec) | 17:41 |
| Video Type | TED Stage Talk |
| Words per minute | 228.19 very fast |
| Readability (FK) | 79.4 very easy |
| Speaker | J.J. Abrams |
Official TED page for this talk
Synopsis
J.J. Abrams traces his love for the unseen mystery –- a passion that's evident in his films and TV shows, including Lost, Star Trek and the upcoming Star Wars VII -- back to its magical beginnings.
| 1 | 00:12 | Here's my thing. | ||
| 2 | 00:14 | Hold on. There I go. Hey. | ||
| 3 | 00:18 | I want to start today -- talk about the structure of a polypeptide. | ||
| 4 | 00:21 | (Laughter) | ||
| 5 | 00:23 | I get a lot of people asking me, in terms of "Lost," you know, | ||
| 6 | 00:28 | "What the hell's that island?" | ||
| 7 | 00:29 | You know, it's usually followed by, | ||
| 8 | 00:32 | "No, seriously, what the hell is that island?" | ||
| 9 | 00:34 | Why so many mysteries? | ||
| 10 | 00:35 | What is it about mystery that I seem to be drawn to? | ||
| 11 | 00:39 | And I was thinking about this, what to talk about at TED. | ||
| 12 | 00:42 | When I talked to the kind rep from TED, | ||
| 13 | 00:45 | and I said, "Listen, you know, what should I talk about?" | ||
| 14 | 00:48 | He said, "Don't worry about it. Just be profound." | ||
| 15 | 00:50 | (Laughter) | ||
| 16 | 00:52 | And I took enormous comfort in that. | ||
| 17 | 00:54 | So thank you, if you're here. | ||
| 18 | 00:55 | I was trying to think, what do I talk about? Good question. | ||
| 19 | 00:58 | Why do I do so much stuff that involves mystery? | ||
| 20 | 01:00 | And I started trying to figure it out. | ||
| 21 | 01:02 | And I started thinking about why do I do any of what I do, | ||
| 22 | 01:05 | and I started thinking about my grandfather. | ||
| 23 | 01:07 | I loved my grandfather. | ||
| 24 | 01:09 | Harry Kelvin was his name, my mother's father. | ||
| 25 | 01:12 | He died in 1986. He was an amazing guy. | ||
| 26 | 01:15 | And one of the reasons he was amazing: | ||
| 27 | 01:17 | After World War II, he began an electronics company. | ||
| 28 | 01:19 | He started selling surplus parts, kits, to schools and stuff. | ||
| 29 | 01:24 | So he had this incredible curiosity. | ||
| 30 | 01:25 | As a kid, I saw him come over to me | ||
| 31 | 01:27 | with radios and telephones and all sorts of things. | ||
| 32 | 01:30 | And he'd open them up, he'd unscrew them and reveal the inner workings -- | ||
| 33 | 01:33 | which many of us, I'm sure, take for granted. | ||
| 34 | 01:35 | But it's an amazing gift to give a kid. | ||
| 35 | 01:38 | To open up this thing and show how it works | ||
| 36 | 01:41 | and why it works and what it is. | ||
| 37 | 01:42 | He was the ultimate deconstructor, in many ways. | ||
| 38 | 01:45 | And my grandfather was a kind of guy who would not only take things apart, | ||
| 39 | 01:52 | but he got me interested in all sorts of different odd crafts, | ||
| 40 | 01:55 | like, you know, printing, like the letter press. | ||
| 41 | 01:58 | I'm obsessed with printing. | ||
| 42 | 01:59 | I'm obsessed with silk-screening and bookbinding and box making. | ||
| 43 | 02:03 | When I was a kid, I was always, like, taking apart boxes and stuff. | ||
| 44 | 02:07 | And last night in the hotel, I took apart the Kleenex box. | ||
| 45 | 02:10 | I was just looking at it. And I'm telling you -- | ||
| 46 | 02:12 | (Laughter) | ||
| 47 | 02:14 | It's a beautiful thing. I swear to God. | ||
| 48 | 02:16 | I mean, when you look at the box and you sort of see how it works. | ||
| 49 | 02:19 | Rives is here, and I met him years ago at a book fair; | ||
| 50 | 02:21 | he does pop-up books. | ||
| 51 | 02:23 | And I'm obsessed with engineering of paper. | ||
| 52 | 02:25 | The scoring of it, the printing of it, | ||
| 53 | 02:27 | where the thing gets glued, the registration marks for the ink. | ||
| 54 | 02:30 | I just love boxes. | ||
| 55 | 02:31 | My grandfather was the guy | ||
| 56 | 02:32 | who kind of got me into all sorts of these things. | ||
| 57 | 02:35 | He would also supply me with tools. | ||
| 58 | 02:37 | He was this amazing encourager -- this patron, sort of, to make stuff. | ||
| 59 | 02:42 | And he got me a Super 8 camera when I was 10 years old. | ||
| 60 | 02:46 | And in 1976, that was sort of an anomaly, | ||
| 61 | 02:48 | to be a 10-year-old kid that had access to a camera. | ||
| 62 | 02:51 | And you know, he was so generous; I couldn't believe it. | ||
| 63 | 02:55 | He wasn't doing it entirely without some manipulation. | ||
| 64 | 02:58 | I mean, I would call him, and I'd be like, | ||
| 65 | 03:01 | "Listen, Grandpa, I really need this camera. | ||
| 66 | 03:03 | You don't understand. This is, like, I want to make movies. | ||
| 67 | 03:06 | I'll get invited to TED one day --" | ||
| 68 | 03:08 | (Laughter) | ||
| 69 | 03:09 | And, you know, my grandmother was the greatest. | ||
| 70 | 03:12 | Because she'd be like, you know -- she'd get on the phone. | ||
| 71 | 03:14 | She'd be like, "Harry, it's better than the drugs. | ||
| 72 | 03:18 | She was fantastic. | ||
| 73 | 03:20 | So I found myself getting this stuff, thanks to her assist, | ||
| 74 | 03:23 | and suddenly, you know, | ||
| 75 | 03:25 | I had a synthesizer when I was 14 years old -- | ||
| 76 | 03:28 | this kind of stuff. | ||
| 77 | 03:29 | And it let me make things, which, to me, was sort of the dream. | ||
| 78 | 03:33 | He sort of humored my obsession to other things too, like magic. | ||
| 79 | 03:37 | The thing is, we'd go to this magic store in New York City | ||
| 80 | 03:39 | called Lou Tannen's Magic. | ||
| 81 | 03:41 | It was this great magic store. | ||
| 82 | 03:42 | It was a crappy little building in Midtown, | ||
| 83 | 03:44 | but you'd be in the elevator, the elevator would open -- | ||
| 84 | 03:47 | there'd be this little, small magic store. | ||
| 85 | 03:49 | You'd be in the magic store. And it was a magical place. | ||
| 86 | 03:52 | So I got all these magic tricks. Here. I'll show you. | ||
| 87 | 03:54 | This is the kind of thing. So it would be like, you know. | ||
| 88 | 03:57 | Which is good, but now I can't move. | ||
| 89 | 03:59 | Now, I have to do the rest of the thing like this. | ||
| 90 | 04:01 | I'm like, "Oh, wow. Look at my computer over there!" | ||
| 91 | 04:04 | (Laughter) | ||
| 92 | 04:06 | So one of the things that I bought at the magic store was this: | ||
| 93 | 04:09 | Tannen's Mystery Magic Box. | ||
| 94 | 04:11 | The premise behind the Mystery Magic Box was the following: | ||
| 95 | 04:14 | 15 dollars buys you 50 dollars worth of magic. | ||
| 96 | 04:19 | Which is a savings. | ||
| 97 | 04:20 | (Laughter) | ||
| 98 | 04:22 | Now, I bought this decades ago and I'm not kidding. | ||
| 99 | 04:24 | If you look at this, you'll see it's never been opened. | ||
| 100 | 04:27 | But I've had this forever. | ||
| 101 | 04:29 | Now, I was looking at this, | ||
| 102 | 04:30 | it was in my office, as it always is, on the shelf, | ||
| 103 | 04:33 | and I was thinking, why have I not opened this? | ||
| 104 | 04:36 | And why have I kept it? | ||
| 105 | 04:38 | Because I'm not a pack rat. | ||
| 106 | 04:40 | I don't keep everything, | ||
| 107 | 04:41 | but for some reason I haven't opened this box. | ||
| 108 | 04:43 | And I felt like there was a key to this, somehow, | ||
| 109 | 04:45 | in talking about something at TED that I haven't discussed before, | ||
| 110 | 04:49 | and bored people elsewhere. | ||
| 111 | 04:51 | So I thought, maybe there's something with this. | ||
| 112 | 04:53 | And there was this giant question mark. | ||
| 113 | 04:55 | I love the design, for what it's worth, of this thing. | ||
| 114 | 04:58 | And I started thinking, why haven't I opened it? | ||
| 115 | 05:00 | And I realized that I haven't opened it | ||
| 116 | 05:02 | because it represents something important -- to me. | ||
| 117 | 05:05 | It represents my grandfather. | ||
| 118 | 05:07 | Am I allowed to cry at TED? | ||
| 119 | 05:08 | Because -- no, I'm not going to cry. | ||
| 120 | 05:10 | (Laughter) | ||
| 121 | 05:11 | But -- | ||
| 122 | 05:13 | (Laughter) | ||
| 123 | 05:16 | The thing is that it represents infinite possibility. | ||
| 124 | 05:20 | It represents hope. It represents potential. | ||
| 125 | 05:23 | And what I love about this box, | ||
| 126 | 05:25 | and what I realize I sort of do in whatever it is that I do, | ||
| 127 | 05:30 | is I find myself drawn to infinite possibility, | ||
| 128 | 05:35 | that sense of potential. | ||
| 129 | 05:36 | And I realize that mystery is the catalyst for imagination. | ||
| 130 | 05:39 | Now, it's not the most ground-breaking idea, | ||
| 131 | 05:41 | but when I started to think that maybe there are times | ||
| 132 | 05:44 | when mystery is more important than knowledge. | ||
| 133 | 05:46 | I started getting interested in this. | ||
| 134 | 05:48 | And so I started thinking about "Lost" and the stuff that we do, | ||
| 135 | 05:51 | and I realized, oh my God, mystery boxes are everywhere in what I do! | ||
| 136 | 05:55 | In the creation of "Lost," Damon Lindelof and I, | ||
| 137 | 05:57 | who created the show with me, | ||
| 138 | 05:58 | we were basically tasked with creating this series | ||
| 139 | 06:02 | that we had very little time to do. | ||
| 140 | 06:03 | We had 11 and a half weeks | ||
| 141 | 06:05 | to write it, cast it, crew it, shoot it, cut it, post it, turn in a two-hour pilot. | ||
| 142 | 06:10 | So it was not a lot of time. | ||
| 143 | 06:11 | And that sense of possibility -- what could this thing be? | ||
| 144 | 06:14 | There was no time to develop it. | ||
| 145 | 06:15 | I'm sure you're all familiar with people | ||
| 146 | 06:17 | who tell you what you can't do and what you should change. | ||
| 147 | 06:20 | There was no time for that, which is kind of amazing. | ||
| 148 | 06:23 | And so we did this show, | ||
| 149 | 06:24 | and for those of you who haven't seen it, or don't know it, | ||
| 150 | 06:27 | I can show you one little clip from the pilot, | ||
| 151 | 06:29 | just to show you some stuff that we did. | ||
| 152 | 06:31 | (Engine roaring) | ||
| 153 | 06:40 | (Video) Claire: Help! | ||
| 154 | 06:42 | Please help me! | ||
| 155 | 06:44 | Help me! Please, help me! | ||
| 156 | 06:48 | Jack: Get him out of here! Get him away from the engine! | ||
| 157 | 06:51 | Get him out of here! | ||
| 158 | 06:52 | (Engine roaring) | ||
| 159 | 06:58 | C: Help me, please! I'm having contractions! | ||
| 160 | 07:02 | J: How many months pregnant are you? | ||
| 161 | 07:04 | C: I'm only eight months. | ||
| 162 | 07:05 | J: And how far apart are they coming? | ||
| 163 | 07:07 | C: I don't know. I think it just happened. | ||
| 164 | 07:11 | Man: Hey! Hey! Hey, get away from -- | ||
| 165 | 07:23 | JJ Abrams: 10 years ago, if we wanted to do that, | ||
| 166 | 07:25 | we'd have to kill a stuntman. | ||
| 167 | 07:27 | (Laughter) | ||
| 168 | 07:32 | It would be harder. | ||
| 169 | 07:34 | Take two would be a bitch. | ||
| 170 | 07:35 | (Laughter) | ||
| 171 | 07:37 | So the amazing thing was, we were able to do this thing. | ||
| 172 | 07:40 | And part of that was the amazing availability of technology, | ||
| 173 | 07:43 | knowing we could do anything. | ||
| 174 | 07:44 | I mean, we could never have done that. | ||
| 175 | 07:46 | We might have been able to write it; | ||
| 176 | 07:48 | we wouldn't have been able to depict it like we did. | ||
| 177 | 07:50 | So part of the amazing thing for me is in the creative process, | ||
| 178 | 07:53 | technology is mind-blowingly inspiring to me. | ||
| 179 | 07:55 | I realize that that blank page is a magic box, you know? | ||
| 180 | 07:59 | It needs to be filled with something fantastic. | ||
| 181 | 08:01 | I used to have the "Ordinary People" script that I'd flip through. | ||
| 182 | 08:04 | The romance was amazing to me; it would inspire me. | ||
| 183 | 08:06 | I wanted to try and fill pages | ||
| 184 | 08:08 | with the same kind of spirit and thought and emotion | ||
| 185 | 08:12 | that that script did. | ||
| 186 | 08:13 | So, you know, I love Apple computers. | ||
| 187 | 08:15 | I'm obsessed. | ||
| 188 | 08:17 | So the Apple computer -- the PowerBook -- this computer, | ||
| 189 | 08:19 | it challenges me. | ||
| 190 | 08:21 | It basically says, what are you going to write worthy of me? | ||
| 191 | 08:23 | I feel this -- I'm compelled. | ||
| 192 | 08:25 | (Laughter) | ||
| 193 | 08:27 | And I often am like, you know, dude, today I'm out. | ||
| 194 | 08:29 | I got nothing. You know? So there's that. | ||
| 195 | 08:31 | In terms of the content of it, | ||
| 196 | 08:33 | you look at stories, you think, what are stories but mystery boxes? | ||
| 197 | 08:36 | There's a fundamental question -- in TV, the first act is called the teaser. | ||
| 198 | 08:39 | It's literally the teaser. It's the big question. | ||
| 199 | 08:42 | So you're drawn into it. Then there's another question. | ||
| 200 | 08:44 | And it goes on. Look at "Star Wars." | ||
| 201 | 08:46 | The droids meet the mysterious woman. | ||
| 202 | 08:48 | Who's that? We don't know. Mystery box! Then you meet Luke Skywalker. | ||
| 203 | 08:51 | He gets the droid, you see the holographic image. | ||
| 204 | 08:54 | You learn it's a message. She wants to find Obi Wan Kenobi. | ||
| 205 | 08:57 | He's her only hope. But who's Obi Wan Kenobi? | ||
| 206 | 08:59 | Mystery box! So then he meets Ben Kenobi. | ||
| 207 | 09:01 | Ben Kenobi is Obi Wan Kenobi. Holy shit! So it keeps us -- | ||
| 208 | 09:03 | (Laughter) | ||
| 209 | 09:04 | Have you guys not seen that? | ||
| 210 | 09:06 | (Laughter) | ||
| 211 | 09:07 | It's huge! Anyway -- | ||
| 212 | 09:08 | So there's this thing with mystery boxes that I started feeling compelled. | ||
| 213 | 09:14 | Then there's the thing of mystery in terms of imagination -- | ||
| 214 | 09:17 | the withholding of information. | ||
| 215 | 09:20 | You know, doing that intentionally is much more engaging. | ||
| 216 | 09:24 | Whether it's like the shark in "Jaws" -- | ||
| 217 | 09:26 | if Spielberg's mechanical shark, Bruce, had worked, | ||
| 218 | 09:28 | it would not be remotely as scary; you would have seen it too much. | ||
| 219 | 09:32 | In "Alien", they never really showed the alien: terrifying! | ||
| 220 | 09:34 | Even in a movie like a romantic comedy, "The Graduate," | ||
| 221 | 09:38 | they're having that date, and they're in the car, | ||
| 222 | 09:40 | and it's loud, and so they put the top up. | ||
| 223 | 09:42 | You don't hear anything they're saying! | ||
| 224 | 09:44 | You can't hear a word! But it's the most romantic date ever. | ||
| 225 | 09:47 | And you love it because you don't hear it. | ||
| 226 | 09:49 | So to me, there's that. And then, finally, there's this idea -- | ||
| 227 | 09:53 | stretching the paradigm a little bit -- | ||
| 228 | 09:55 | but the idea of the mystery box. | ||
| 229 | 09:57 | Meaning, what you think you're getting, then what you're really getting. | ||
| 230 | 10:01 | And it's true in so many movies and stories. | ||
| 231 | 10:03 | Look at "E.T.," for example -- | ||
| 232 | 10:04 | "E.T." is this unbelievable movie about what? | ||
| 233 | 10:06 | It's about an alien who meets a kid, right? | ||
| 234 | 10:08 | Well, it's not. "E.T." is about divorce. | ||
| 235 | 10:10 | "E.T." is about a heartbroken, divorce-crippled family, | ||
| 236 | 10:13 | and ultimately, this kid who can't find his way. | ||
| 237 | 10:15 | "Die Hard," right? Crazy, great, fun, action-adventure movie in a building. | ||
| 238 | 10:19 | It's about a guy who's on the verge of divorce. | ||
| 239 | 10:21 | He's showing up to L.A., tail between his legs. | ||
| 240 | 10:23 | There are great scenes -- | ||
| 241 | 10:25 | maybe not the most amazing dramatic scenes in the history of time, | ||
| 242 | 10:28 | but pretty great scenes. | ||
| 243 | 10:29 | There's a half an hour of investment in character | ||
| 244 | 10:31 | before you get to the stuff that you're expecting. | ||
| 245 | 10:34 | When you look at a movie like "Jaws," | ||
| 246 | 10:36 | the scene that you expect -- we have the screen? | ||
| 247 | 10:38 | These are the kind of scenes | ||
| 248 | 10:39 | that you remember and expect from "Jaws." | ||
| 249 | 10:42 | And she's being eaten; | ||
| 250 | 10:44 | there's a shark. | ||
| 251 | 10:45 | (Woman screaming) | ||
| 252 | 10:46 | The thing about "Jaws" is, it's really about a guy | ||
| 253 | 10:49 | who is sort of dealing with his place in the world -- with his masculinity, | ||
| 254 | 10:52 | with his family, how he's going to, you know, make it work in this new town. | ||
| 255 | 10:56 | This is one of my favorite scenes ever, | ||
| 256 | 10:58 | and this is a scene that you wouldn't necessarily think of | ||
| 257 | 11:01 | when you think of "Jaws." But it's an amazing scene. | ||
| 258 | 11:58 | (Video) Father: C'mere. | ||
| 259 | 12:03 | Give us a kiss. | ||
| 260 | 12:05 | Son: Why? | ||
| 261 | 12:08 | Father: 'Cause I need it. | ||
| 262 | 12:10 | JJA: Come on. "Why? 'Cause I need it"? | ||
| 263 | 12:12 | Best scene ever, right? | ||
| 264 | 12:13 | (Laughter) | ||
| 265 | 12:15 | Come on! So you think of "Jaws" -- | ||
| 266 | 12:16 | so that's the kind of stuff that, | ||
| 267 | 12:18 | like, you know -- the investment of character, | ||
| 268 | 12:21 | which is the stuff that really is inside the box, you know? | ||
| 269 | 12:24 | It's why when people do sequels, or rip off movies, you know, of a genre, | ||
| 270 | 12:27 | they're ripping off the wrong thing. | ||
| 271 | 12:29 | You're not supposed to rip off the shark or the monster. | ||
| 272 | 12:32 | You know, if you rip something off -- rip off the character. | ||
| 273 | 12:35 | Rip off the stuff that matters. | ||
| 274 | 12:36 | I mean, look inside yourself and figure out what is inside you. | ||
| 275 | 12:39 | Because ultimately, the mystery box is all of us. | ||
| 276 | 12:42 | So there's that. Then the distribution. | ||
| 277 | 12:43 | What's a bigger mystery box than a movie theater? You know? | ||
| 278 | 12:46 | You go to the theater, you're just so excited to see anything. | ||
| 279 | 12:49 | The moment the lights go down is often the best part. | ||
| 280 | 12:52 | And you're full of that amazing -- that feeling of excited anticipation. | ||
| 281 | 12:56 | And often, the movie's there and it's going, | ||
| 282 | 12:58 | and then something happens and you go, "Oh --", and then, "Mmm ..." | ||
| 283 | 13:02 | When it's a great movie, you're along for the ride | ||
| 284 | 13:04 | because you're willing to give yourself to it. | ||
| 285 | 13:06 | So to me, whether it's a TV, an iPod, computer, cell phone -- | ||
| 286 | 13:10 | It's funny, I'm an -- as I said, Apple fanatic -- | ||
| 287 | 13:12 | and one day, about a year or so ago, | ||
| 288 | 13:14 | I was signing on online in the morning to watch Steve Jobs' keynote, | ||
| 289 | 13:18 | because I always do. | ||
| 290 | 13:19 | And he came on, he was presenting the video iPod, | ||
| 291 | 13:22 | and what was on the enormous iPod behind him? | ||
| 292 | 13:25 | "Lost"! I had no idea! | ||
| 293 | 13:27 | And I realized, holy shit, it'd come full circle. | ||
| 294 | 13:30 | The inspiration I get from the technology | ||
| 295 | 13:32 | is now using the stuff that I do to sell technology. It's nuts! | ||
| 296 | 13:35 | (Laughter) | ||
| 297 | 13:36 | I was going to show you a couple of other things I'm going to skip. | ||
| 298 | 13:39 | I'll show you one other thing that has nothing to do with anything. | ||
| 299 | 13:42 | This is something online; six years ago, they did this. | ||
| 300 | 13:45 | This is an online thing done by guys who had some visual effects experience. | ||
| 301 | 13:49 | But the point was, that they were doing things | ||
| 302 | 13:51 | that were using these mystery boxes that they had -- everyone has now. | ||
| 303 | 13:54 | What I've realized is what my grandfather did for me when I was a kid, | ||
| 304 | 13:58 | everyone has access to now. | ||
| 305 | 13:59 | You don't need to have my grandfather, though you wish you had. | ||
| 306 | 14:02 | But I have to tell you -- | ||
| 307 | 14:04 | this is a guy doing stuff on a Quadra 950 computer -- | ||
| 308 | 14:06 | the resolution's a little bit low -- | ||
| 309 | 14:08 | using Infinity software they stopped making 15 years ago. | ||
| 310 | 14:11 | He's doing stuff that looks as amazing | ||
| 311 | 14:13 | as stuff I've seen released from Hollywood. | ||
| 312 | 14:16 | The most incredible sort of mystery, I think, | ||
| 313 | 14:19 | is now the question of what comes next. | ||
| 314 | 14:21 | Because it is now democratized. | ||
| 315 | 14:24 | So now, the creation of media -- it's everywhere. | ||
| 316 | 14:26 | The stuff that I was lucky and begging for to get when I was a kid | ||
| 317 | 14:30 | is now ubiquitous. | ||
| 318 | 14:31 | And so, there's an amazing sense of opportunity out there. | ||
| 319 | 14:34 | And when I think of the filmmakers who exist out there now | ||
| 320 | 14:37 | who would have been silenced, you know -- | ||
| 321 | 14:39 | who have been silenced in the past -- | ||
| 322 | 14:42 | it's a very exciting thing. | ||
| 323 | 14:43 | I used to say in classes and lectures and stuff, | ||
| 324 | 14:46 | to someone who wants to write, "Go! Write! Do your thing." | ||
| 325 | 14:49 | It's free, you don't need permission. | ||
| 326 | 14:51 | But now I can say, "Go make your movie!" There's nothing stopping you | ||
| 327 | 14:54 | from going out there and getting the technology. | ||
| 328 | 14:56 | You can lease, rent, buy stuff off the shelf | ||
| 329 | 14:59 | that is either as good, or just as good, | ||
| 330 | 15:02 | as the stuff that's being used by the, you know, "legit people." | ||
| 331 | 15:06 | No community is best served when only the elite have control. | ||
| 332 | 15:10 | And I feel like this is an amazing opportunity | ||
| 333 | 15:12 | to see what else is out there. | ||
| 334 | 15:14 | When I did "Mission: Impossible III," we had amazing visual effects. | ||
| 335 | 15:17 | ILM did the effects; it was incredible. | ||
| 336 | 15:19 | And sort of my dream to be involved. | ||
| 337 | 15:21 | And there are a couple of sequences in the movie, | ||
| 338 | 15:23 | like these couple of moments I'll show you. | ||
| 339 | 15:30 | There's that. | ||
| 340 | 15:38 | (Video) Luther: Ethan, move! | ||
| 341 | 15:45 | (Explosion) | ||
| 342 | 15:52 | Obviously, I have an obsession with big crazy explosions. | ||
| 343 | 15:55 | So my favorite visual effect in the movie is the one I'm about to show you. | ||
| 344 | 15:59 | It's a scene in which Tom's character wakes up. | ||
| 345 | 16:01 | He's drowsy. He's crazy. | ||
| 346 | 16:02 | And the guy wakes up, and he shoves this gun in his nose | ||
| 347 | 16:05 | and shoots this little capsule into his brain | ||
| 348 | 16:07 | that he's going to use later to kill him, as bad guys do. | ||
| 349 | 16:16 | (Video) Brownway: Good morning. | ||
| 350 | 16:19 | JJA: OK, now. | ||
| 351 | 16:21 | When we shot that scene, | ||
| 352 | 16:22 | the actor who had the gun, an English actor, Eddie Marsan -- | ||
| 353 | 16:25 | sweetheart, great guy -- | ||
| 354 | 16:26 | he kept taking the gun and putting it into Tom's nose, | ||
| 355 | 16:29 | and it was hurting Tom's nose. | ||
| 356 | 16:30 | And I learned this very early on in my career: | ||
| 357 | 16:33 | Don't hurt Tom's nose. | ||
| 358 | 16:34 | (Laughter) | ||
| 359 | 16:36 | There are three things you don't want to do. | ||
| 360 | 16:38 | Number two is: Don't hurt Tom's nose. | ||
| 361 | 16:40 | So Eddie has this gun -- and he's this sweet English guy. | ||
| 362 | 16:42 | He's like, "Sorry, I don't want to hurt you." | ||
| 363 | 16:45 | I'm like, "We have to make this look good." | ||
| 364 | 16:47 | And I realized that we had to do something because it wasn't working. | ||
| 365 | 16:50 | And I thought back to what I would have done | ||
| 366 | 16:52 | using the Super 8 camera that my grandfather got me | ||
| 367 | 16:55 | sitting in that room, | ||
| 368 | 16:56 | and I realized that hand didn't have to be Eddie Marsan's. | ||
| 369 | 16:59 | It could be Tom's. | ||
| 370 | 17:00 | And Tom would know just how hard to push the gun. | ||
| 371 | 17:02 | He wouldn't hurt himself. | ||
| 372 | 17:03 | So we took his hand and we painted it to look a little bit more like Eddie's. | ||
| 373 | 17:07 | We put it in Eddie's sleeve, | ||
| 374 | 17:09 | and so the hand that you see -- | ||
| 375 | 17:10 | that's not Eddie's hand, that's Tom's. So Tom is playing two roles. | ||
| 376 | 17:14 | (Laughter) | ||
| 377 | 17:15 | And he didn't ask for any more money. | ||
| 378 | 17:17 | So here, here. Watch it again. | ||
| 379 | 17:19 | There he is. He's waking up. | ||
| 380 | 17:21 | He's drowsy, been through a lot. | ||
| 381 | 17:27 | (Video) Brownway: Good morning. | ||
| 382 | 17:29 | JJA: Tom's hand. Tom's hand. Tom's hand. | ||
| 383 | 17:31 | Anyway. | ||
| 384 | 17:32 | So ... | ||
| 385 | 17:33 | (Applause) | ||
| 386 | 17:37 | Thanks. | ||
| 387 | 17:38 | (Applause) | ||
| 388 | 17:40 | So you don't need the greatest technology to do things that can work in movies. | ||
| 389 | 17:45 | And the mystery box, in honor of my grandfather, stays closed. | ||
| 390 | 17:48 | Thank you. | ||
| 391 | 17:49 | (Applause) |