A Chat with Robert Rodriguez

When I was in high school, I used to carry around a binder with a picture of Robert Rodriguez taped to the cover. Not only did I fantasize about shooting rockets out of my trombone case El Mariachi style, when I bought my DVD player, The Faculty was the first disc I purchased. That is because Rodriguez, the mastermind of such blood-spattered action spectaculars as Desperado and From Dusk Till Dawn, is, quite simply, one of the most extravagantly entertaining filmmakers working today. Crimson Arts recently caught up with the laid-back, low-budget icon at a college roundtable to discuss his latest madcap action-thriller, Spy Kids.

The Harvard Crimson: Hi.

Robert Rodriguez: Hi.

(Rodriguez begins to ponder the Four Seasons notepad sitting in front of him and, all of a sudden, begins to scribble furiously.)

Q: What are you doing?

A: Whenever I see a blank piece of paper, I just have to fill it up.

(He proudly displays a sketch of a short kid with a backwards baseball cap, shaggy hair and shifty, oversized eyes.)

A: See that? It looks just like me when I was a kid. I've noticed that you can often see a lot of a person in their style of drawing. When I first met John Lasseter, I realized that he looks EXACTLY like Buzz Lightyear! He, of course, had no idea what I was talking about.

Q: All right, first things first. The man behind Desperado and From Dusk Till Dawn decides to make a kiddie flick. Have you gone soft on us or what?

A: Actually, I think all of my films are basically the same at heart. I think Spy Kids definitely reflects my own particular sense of humor, as well as my love for gadgets and toys. In fact, if you hadn't seen any of my movies, I'd actually tell you to see Spy Kids first, because it would probably give you a better sense of what I'm about and the kind of comedy that's at work in my other films. Because really, when you get right down to it, what do you have in Desperado? A bunch of guys firing rockets out of guitar cases and stuff. A lot of people watch From Dusk Till Dawn and don't know whether they should be laughing or not. Spy Kids is obviously my least violent film, but then my approach to violence has always been pretty cartoonish and over-the-top, so it's really not that different.

Q: So did your drawings have any particular influence on the conception of Spy Kids?

A: Sure. In fact, I remember this one drawing I made when I was younger. It consisted of a bunch of guys who were all thumbs and they were kicking around a soccer ball that was really an eyeball. And I ended up putting them in the movie. But that was what I was after-I wanted the entire film to feel like it was made from a child's perspective. I wanted it to be very imaginative and childlike-something similar to Toy Story or Willy Wonka or Labyrinth.

Q: I love Labyrinth! I watched that movie so many times when I was younger!

A: You know when David Bowie does all that crazy stuff with his hands and the crystal ball? There was really some guy who could do that and it was really his arms that were being used.

Q: Man, now I'm all disillusioned...So what ultimately made you want to do Spy Kids? Did you just want to shift gears?

A: Actually, I grew up making exactly this kind of movie and knew that someday a film like Spy Kids would be my trump card. I have nine siblings, of which I'm the third oldest, and I was always shooting these "family comedies" with my brothers and sisters that would actually win at festivals and stuff. But the actual genesis of Spy Kids itself came when I was shooting my segment of Four Rooms and I saw the kids in their tuxedos and commented to Antonio [Banderas] that they looked like little spies. So then I got to thinking about a mini-James Bond secret agent story, although I didn't pursue it right away because I knew it would require some sizable special effects and I felt I should get some FX experience under my belt first. Plus, I wanted to make sure that I took the time to develop a real story about keeping family together-after all, too many movies, especially movies for children, simply aren't about anything.

Q: I know it's well-documented that you were able to make El Mariachi for only $7000, but how on earth did you pull off Spy Kids with a budget of just $35?

A: Hey, I'm the king of low-budget filmmaking. But seriously, part of the reason that budgets are so out of control in Hollywood these days is that people tend to forget that moviemaking is essentially like a magic trick-you don't really need to saw the lady in half. Take the scene in Spy Kids where the robotic Carmen and Juni run up the wall, do the flip, and land on their feet. How would you film that?

Q: I don't know, build a revolving set?

A: That's exactly what most people would do and it's a needless expense. We basically strapped the kids in harnesses, had a pair of guys move them up the wall, shot them separately, edited them together and digitally erased the harnesses later. We got it done in one day and didn't have to train the kids or anything. I planned the special effects out very carefully-in fact, I planned them out simultaneously with the script so I could show everything to the studio at the same time. Of course, once I assured them that I could keep the budget under $40 they knew they'd be in the green financially and couldn't care less what I showed them.

Q: What's your basic approach to making a movie?

A: Well, as far as the screenwriting is concerned, I usually just start with a single character or a little speck of an idea and just go from there. You start small and build little by little. I went to film school for about a semester, but that was just so I could get my hands on the equipment-you really have to use film rather than video if you want to make it on the film festival circuit. But in my opinion, film school won't teach you anything.

Q: So what's next on the slate?

A: I'm juggling a couple of different potential projects. I've reached that point in my career where everything has basically become a labor-of-love, which is why I intend to only shoot my own scripts from now on. I did From Dusk Till Dawn and The Faculty, but the whole filmmaking process is a lot more personal if you're filming your own story. And I've actually already written the Spy Kids sequel.

Q: Really? What's it going to be about?

A: Can't tell you. You might try to steal my ideas.