A man accidentally gets into a time machine and travels back in time nearly an hour. Finding himself will be the first of a series of disasters of unforeseeable consequences.
BD: Timecrimes is an extremely complicated film, what got the ball rolling on the project?
NV: Nowadays, I can’t be sure. If they confided in me first It was because I was an Oscar nominee in 2005 with a short film called “7:35 in the morning” (you can check it out at YouTube). Anyway, that short film was a comedy - a sinister one, but comedy at the end of the day, so it was hard to find money to build such kind of horror film. Finally, I was helped by the regional government and regional TV channels, we could raise the money. I have to thank the production company. They believed in this all the time.
BD: How do you keep the rules of time travel in pact and keep from hitting plot holes along the way?
NV: Making too much drafts of the story, I’m afraid. Once you imagine the whole concept, you start writing, and that’s when you discover 90 percent of the pieces still need to be fixed in time and space. It’s closer to solve a logical problem than storytelling. It’s the same with filmmaking. Each shoot you have to know what to show... but most important, what to hide. It was so complicated.
You can be sure my next one hundred movies won’t have time travel in it. Well, actually you never can tell. I’m thinking now porn and time travel would be an incredible combination: People fucking themselves!
BD: How did you come up with the idea? Did any other films inspire you?
NV: I love science fiction, from novels, primary, though there are so brilliams films. The fact is if you love Sci-Fi, the weirdest and more daring part of it, you may find more bizarre and spectacular ideas in novels than films. Think of works like the ones from K.Dick, Heinleim, Stanislaw Lem, Alfred Bester and contemporary authors like Jonatham Lethem or Greg Egan. I love 12 Monkeys, Back to Future, Primer... But there are not a huge number of such films. I wanted to make a film in that sense. I wanted to make a “very first film”, a provocative film to be discussed. My first attempt was to make a real time story in one location! I failed in that. On the other half, I love the American tradition of crime films, such Fritz Lang’s, Hitchcock’s, Raoul Walsh’s. Few character and locations but such violence!
BD: I remember reading an article about time travel that stated, “If a time machine was created, the furthest back in time you could go would be to the day it was created”, you really hit the realism on the nose. Did you read the same article or are you just a friggin genius?
NV: None of them! The idea just came with the script. When you want to do a small movie, with small characters and few locations you face some difficulties, but at the same time, you are led to ideas like this. It’s something very logical, if you think of it. The time machine has to be a transmitter, but what’s the recipient? If it’s the same machine, then it has to be necessary switched on! That is what I call a perfect trick: It makes funnier situations, with less money!
BD: If you started that time machine, do you think it would overload from people trying to go back to that one day?
NV: That’s such a good idea! Picture this: A genius switch on the first time machine and zillions of people appear from it, coming from a horrible future! A massive invasion of people from the future! Do you have plans as screenwriter? I love it! Forget the previous answer about not making time travel films in the future! I’ve changed my mind!
BD: Do you believe time travel will be one day possible?
NV: I don’t know. Russians said recently that it’s possible to travel to future, if enough energy is involved. To tell the truth, I’m more interested in the funny consequences, that in time travel itself. Just the same as UFOs. I love UFOs. But I don’t care about Ufology. I love westerns, but I don’t have interest in America in the XIX century. The same with cars, I don’t have drive license, but my favorite item in movies are cars. One of my scripts involves a car and a UFO.
BD: If you could go back in time, would you do it? Would you change anything about the film or the process of making it?
NV: I would just visit myself two years ago and would tell to myself “
don’t worry, some of them will like the movie, you can go to bed without taking pills.”
BD: What’s next? Anything B-D fans would be interested in?
NV: Definitively yes. Most of my projects are into horror or sci-fi. I mentioned the UFO and CAR story. It’s called THE RAMP. I want to work the zombie, alien and superhero stuff in less than five films. It’s so funny to go into such traditions, if you find a surprising twist, or a realistic or touching point of view.
BD: Timecrimes is a time travel movie unlike most I’ve seen; was it important to base it in reality as opposed to fantasy?
NV: Reality is an incredible tool if you want to turn things scarier, or simply funnier. Comic Books have already told us that putting the superhero stuff into the real thing can turn into something really exciting, as we saw in Watchmen, or The Ultimates - my favorite comic book. I you keep realistic, but don’t forget the drama, you can reach new limits.. With less money, don’t forget!
TIMECRIMES will arrive later this year from Magnet Releasing.
