Dragonball Movie Blog

James Marsters Interview

Tuesday, July 8th, 2008

DBTheMovie has a newly translated interview from Japan’s Jump Square (which the previous set of scans originated from).

What is the difference between the original and the live-action movie ?

JM: Definitely the story of this movie is different from the original. But it’s a necessary change because we need to condense the long story of the original for a movie. For example, some characters in the original don’t appear in the movie. And we try to give it a more gritty and graphic (realistic) feeling.

Though there are differences between the two, I think it is all right if the core part of Dragonball remains. I let my son watch the anime’s Dragonball, DBZ and DBGT since he was eight years old. At first, I thought it was too violent, but I realized this is the best show for training to become a true man. True men need not to flaunt themselves. Their calm, gentle and modest but when it comes to the crunch they don’t hesitate to kill the enemy, and I think that’s what Goku is.

Goku is a real man. I know my son received such a message and applied it to his own life. My son doesn’t use violence to others, but he isn’t afraid of his own anger. I think it’s an important thing.

How many hours does it take to apply the make-up?

JM: It takes about four hours. Luckily, my make-up artist is very chatty, we have a lot of chat during the make up.

Please tell us the most remarkable scene in the movie, especially action scenes!

JM: It is the last battle after all! I like playing the battle scene. When I worked for a TV show for seven years, every Friday I fought till sun rise, I felt I would never have such a good time again until now. In addition, I have never gotten terribly hurt (laugh).

Do you talk with other co-stars as well?

JM: When I have a problem, I have a talk with Justin [Chatwin]. At first, we worried about the costumes. We thought it should reflect the spirit of the original, we persisted this thought to the producers. We didn’t want to make our characters beautiful and safe. I talked with Justin, and he agreed with me. So did the director.

What do you care about in acting for this movie?

JM: That’s a good question. Speaking of Piccolo, one word comes into my mind, it’s “loneliness”. Piccolo is always floating in the air in the beautiful landscape, but he never even admires the landscape, he is only thinking or musing and staring at his feet. I think that is a characteristic of piccolo more than anything else. Maybe it must be a characteristic for revenge. He hates himself and blames the people who has trapped him. His desire to kill not only them but their family, furthermore to destroy the city and the planet they live and protect. To get revenge is everything to him. Everything.

How was shooting in Durango?

JM: The desert of Durango is very cold at night (laugh). I was luckily wearing armor, but Goku was freezing at the beginning of shooting. The local people are very kind and get along with us. Besides they love to party very much! If I didn’t have work, I would be willing to join them. They are drinking and singing songs until 4:30 a.m. But I need to sleep for the shooting the next day, after all so I changed the hotel to get away from the partying people.

Finally, please give us a message to our readers in Japan.

JM: Japan is beautiful. Thank you for giving Dragonball to us! It’s an important show to us all and I want you to watch it, especially the young people. I thank the show for a lot of good times with my son. I’ll do my best to meet the high expectations the fans have.

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First Image From Dragonball Special

Monday, July 7th, 2008

Remember my post about the new Dragonball special coming this fall? Well, Toonzone.net has your first look!

I know this isn’t film related but I thought it was worth a post. This new special is an original story created by the man himself, Akira Toriyama!

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DBMB reader Tallal has provided us with some info from the Dragonball set. This report is from the Mexico City/High School shoot. This is the filming that took place from late November to mid December before production was moved to Durango.

There were vaious scenes in the highschool during about the first half of the story. They had 4 groups of differnt extras. The 4 groups were, Outside the school, Inside the school, Goku’s class room, and the hall ways. There were about a good 20 people in each shot. The scene he was in was the outside of the school. This was the first shot they show of the school, Goku was walking in down the street to get to school. He crossed the road, and got to the school. The first few promotional pics were for that scene. How ever there was speculation going around that there was a car crash… there was no car crash in that scene. Either they added it in later I dont no but that was the scene.

Working with the crew was amazing, even though I was only there for 2 weeks I got to meet Justin Chatwin. He was soo comitted to getting Goku right. He, in my opinion, took this movie more seriously then anyone else. James wong was a great director, he just basiclly told us what to do and we all just went and did that scene. I was surprised that for 1 of the scenes there were quite a few blocking mistakes but he decided that the scene was all right. It felt a bit rushed through out those 2 days because we managed to cram in almost 20 scenes in 1 day. Everyone was in a constant rush. I didnt get too meet any other cast member personally other than Justin. I did see James Marsters but I didnt see Emmy any where. James Marsters was another one of the guys who made sure he gave 100 %. I cant say much about the sets because it would be breaking my agreement. But I can say that the sets that I saw were astonishing. It felt like these sets took years to make, but in fact it only took a few months. Everything felt like it was in the right place at the right time. The extras were also used as extras in the tournament. We were the audience. They just basically told us that go crazy. Yell as loud as you can!

The promoting of the film wont start for a while. We were told that about late October to mid November we can see a teaser trailer, but hopefully it will come out before. This movie has alot of surprises that no one would ever expect. Working in James Wong’s adaptaion of Dragonball was amazing, and I cant wait to see this movie when it comes out next April.

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Archive for the 'Uncategorized' category

James Marsters Interview

First Image From Dragonball Special

Dragonball Set Report