From three-time Oscar® nominee and Golden Globe winner Dean DeBlois, the creative visionary behind DreamWorks Animation’s acclaimed How to Train Your Dragon trilogy, comes a stunning live-action reimagining of the film that launched the beloved franchise.
On the rugged isle of Berk, where Vikings and dragons have been bitter enemies for generations, Hiccup (Mason Thames) stands apart. The inventive yet overlooked son of Chief Stoick the Vast (Gerard Butler, reprising his voice role from the animated franchise), Hiccup defies centuries of tradition when he befriends Toothless, a feared Night Fury dragon. Their unlikely bond reveals the true nature of dragons, challenging the very foundations of Viking society.
With the new trailer launching for How To Train Your Dragon before it’s June release, Nick L’Barrow spoke with the film’s director Dean DeBlois about adapting his own animated film into live action, and how he reinvented aspects of the action and characters for this new film.
Nick: Dean, it’s such a pleasure to meet you! I was 15 when How to Train Your Dragon first came out, and it was such a formative part of my love of movies. The trilogy means so much to me. So, as a fan, I’m excited to return to this world. But, as a filmmaker, what excited you about returning to this world?
Dean DeBlois: One of the things was that when we made How to Train Your Dragon, we wanted to push out of the cartoon conventions, and into kind of live action, making it a much more grounded feel. That’s why we brought Roger Deakins in as our consulting cinematographer on all three of those movies. But, that first movie, when Chris Sanders and I joined, it was already pretty far along in its production window, and the scrapped everything they had done up until that point.
So, we only had 15 months before it had to be in cinemas, which is not whole lot of time, so it was a rush to the finish! And as much as we wanted to embrace live action sensibilities, we also were just panicking because we were running out of time and money.
This opportunity allows us to kind of go back in and give it all the live action love that we had kind of mimicked through the animation side of things. I’m first and foremost an animator. I draw. That’s how I got into this world. But I’ve always been influenced by live action movies, and this is an opportunity to combine the two, you know? To take something that I feel very proud of from my animation filmography, and the dressing it up for a new generation. A lot of people, like yourself, who grew up with these movies, have families of their own now. So, it’s a way of giving a bit of nostalgia, and giving it a fresh experience for people who might not have.
Nick: I can’t believe I didn’t know Roger Deakins was involved with the original trilogy of films! He’s one of the greatest cinematographers of all time! This new trailer showcases how action packed this movie is going to be, but that was also something I loved about the animated films too. I’m curious to know if there is a difference in choreographing animated actions, as opposed to live action set pieces?
Dean DeBlois: Yeah, there’s so much planning that goes into live action production. The pre-production is where you kind of make the movie ahead of filming and figure out what your shots are with storyboarding. And there’s also pre-visualisation, and in this case, Roger Deakins recommended Bill Pope for the job. And he’s not just a wonderful person, but he’s very story minded. He, like Roger, knows that you put the camera where the audiences’ focus is, not just for the flashy shots.
And by doing that, we end up with action sequences that are driven by our main characters. That are driven by the emotional stakes. It doesn’t just feel like showmanship for showmanship’s sake. But then all of the careful planning with the stunt crew, every moving piece that involves hundreds of people, is all about making sure there is a precise plan to execute. And if you go off script, it’s because there was a great idea that we can already have a plan to spring off of.
I was learning every day. I told the crew on day one that I was the rookie in the mix, and I’ll be a quick study, and I’ll try to keep up. But I’m always going to come at it from a story point of view, and hopefully in that way I am additive.
But it’s really quite fantastic, and the resulting imagery by having real people on camera, in real places, you get a real sense of the peril. It’s more intense. Because there is no fantasy element anymore. There are people getting burned and hurt. They’re screaming and running. Or, if they’re flying, there’s a distance that feels real. It’s just a much more grounded sense of realist that we can get away with in animation.
Nick: From what I saw in the trailer, it’s all looking truly incredible, especially the way the humans are interacting with the dragons. You mentioned earlier holding on to some of that nostalgic feeling too, did that feed into the decision to have the dragons look almost exactly like they did in the animated films?
Dean DeBlois: Well, that was the core discussion from the start when Universal floated this idea of approaching the movie in a live action sense. The whole thing was, “could we make our dragons convincing and believable?” Because if we could make the dragon you love from the animated film stomp around in reality, it could feel like could meld with any dinosaur in say like Jurassic Park. It has to feel credible.
The team at Frame Store, who is doing all of the visual effects on this movie – there are 1200 animators furiously working to have this movie done by the end of March! – led by Christian Mans, who is our visual effects supervisor, and then Glenn McIntosh who comes from ILM and the Jurassic Park films, and very studied in palaeontology, are bringing that credibility to the dragons.
I think with some dragons, we could take some liberties on by making certain attributes or qualities similar to their animal counterparts in the new designs, leading to stuff that was based on a walrus, or a crocodile. They all have their animal based.
But with Toothless, we really felt like we had to stick pretty close the character that people know. Because, you know, he’s Toothless. His original design isn’t reptilian at all. He’s a panther melded with a salamander! And so, we did a lot of study of big cats, the physiology, the way the muscles move over the skeleton. Everything is very realistic. But he was that Stitch-like quality with the large head, and the big eyes, that are bigger than anything in nature! His big trash can mouth! And so, finding all the subtleties to make that convincing has been the real trick.
Nick: Was that also something you found you had to do with bringing in Mason Thames to play Hiccup? He’s a great actor, and looks great in the role, but what were the conversations with him about this version of Hiccup?
Dean DeBlois: Well, we auditioned a bunch of actors, and very talented young actors. And then Mason came in, and I think immediately had that vulnerability, and the awkwardness of that age. He was 15 when he auditioned, which is meant to be the age of Hiccup in the animated movie, even if he seems quite underdeveloped! We don’t really know his age in the animated film, but he is just a pipsqueak, you know?
And Mason was an average 15-year-old at the time. He could still play scrawny and awkward. But it was more about what he brought in terms of character. He just got Hiccup. He grew up with these movies. He really identified with Hiccup.
And so, there wasn’t much research we had to do or sort of character backstory building. When we would sit and talk about the character, he would just sort of shrug his shoulders and say, “I just get him. I know what he’s thinking.” And that made it really easy because he brought his all to it. The movies are important to him and so is that character. For him, he’s constantly pinching himself because it’s a dream come true.
Thank you so much to Dean for his time, and to Universal Pictures for organising the interview. How To Train Your Dragon is in Australian cinemas in March.
