Greg Berlanti, director (most recently Life as We Know It), cowriter and producer of The Green Lantern and The Flash was caught comparing The Flash movie to several films last month. The explanation itself did not make much sense of it being that he compared it to such horror suspense thrillers as Se7en and The Silence of The Lambs. It didn’t make sense to many people at the time to find the Flash’s story to be compared such movies. Berlanti spoke with Superhero Hype about the idea, that was a month ago. Now, Marc Guggenheim who is also working on the script for The Flash brings in more information for us to wrap our brains around. Read more of what Guggenheim and Berlanti have to say after the break.
Though Barry Allen was a little lighter in the comic, I think because of the nature that he was a CSI and moved in this world of crime before this stuff happened. I think it’s tonally somewhere in between ‘GL’ and ‘Dark Knight.’ It’s actually a little bit darker than when we were working on (‘GL’), because you’re dealing with somebody who is already a crimefighter in a world of those kinds of criminals and that kind of murder and homicide. I find you talk a lot about different films when you’re working on a film, and we spend a lot more time talking about ‘Se7en’ or ‘The Silence of the Lambs’ as we construct that part of Barry’s world, then I thought when we got into it. It helps balance a guy in a red suit who runs really fast.
The comparison only gets more confusing as they were asked if the time traveling/two Earths elements will show up in the storyline, Berlanti had this to say:
A third thing I’d throw at you is alternate dimensions, so it’s true that we want to find the things that make it… With ‘GL,’ we used to say there’s a space opera component and then there’s the down on earth. In ‘The Flash,’ there’s the sci-fi component and there’s the crime component and it’s fitting those two things together, and the sci-fi thing, we obviously want to nail that and honor that and do that in a way that feels visceral and real and cool and probably more in the tone of ‘The Matrix” films or things like that. I always think of ‘The Flash’ stories where he met Jay Garrick and knows there was Earth Prime and things like that. There’s an avenue for these films to broaden the DC Film Universe in that way, so that’s the hope.
Guggenheim
Shedding a bit more light these days, however still a bit confusing, but makes a bit more sense is Marc Guggenheim, who is working on the script alongside Berlanti and Michael Green. Newsrama interviewed Guggenheim to give a bit more information about how the script is working itself out, and he says that it’s like three movies in one. He goes back to several of Berlanti’s points but gives us a bit more to the story as well. Comic Book Movie transcribed, and here’s what Guggenheim had to say:
We are working on The Flash movie now and typing away… We are being true to whole Barry Allen science police, [back then] that’s what forensic exanimers were, we are being true to those origins and updating them for the 21st century and I feel like, in many ways, the movie, it’s three movies in one, it’s part thriller, that forensic, cool, Se7en, Silence of the Lambs, then part superhero movie and part sports movie because there is an athleticism to this character that other superheroes don’t have so that’s fun to play with and you get to see how all three of those elements form each other and make the whole movie even better.
The script seems to be taking a different approach for this comic book character’s origins as other superhero origin stories have. If it’s true that there is going to be a bit of a dark and mysterious feeling for the beginning of the film in that Barry Allen really is a Forensics Officers/Science Police I can see how we could find some thrilling elements to be added into the script. Of course sticking with the superhero genre will come the origin and the awesome superpowered Flash, if you’ve ever read a Flash comic, it’s not too difficult to find the dark side of his story, but it’s also difficult not to see the lighter side of flash. So the whole dark side/horror thriller could work itself out somehow, just as long as it’s not overpowering. The “athletic” movie is a bit difficult to comprehend if compared to Spiderman or any other acrobatic superhero, I don’t see how Flash would differ from them besides his track and field records.
Greg Berlanti
There have been several rumors flying around that have been debunked and should be announced. Berlanti was said to be directing the film, however it seem highly unlikely since he only really has one small-time film under his director’s belt. Going from Life as we Know It, a feel good romantic comedy, into The Flash may not work out so well in several producer’s eyes. Another rumor is that Bradley Cooper was said to be at the top of the list to play Barry Allen. That rumor is just that, a rumor. It’s not true and there is no names that have been put on a list yet for who’s to play the role of Barry Allen.
The script is said to be finished by the end of the year, and hopefully we’d get more clarity as to what the story is really like for this film.
