Video:Sam Raimi Interview - Drag Me to Hell at Comic Con 2008
with Rebecca MurraySam Raimi returns to his lower-budget horror movie roots with the bloody thriller 'Drag Me to Hell' starring Alison Lohman as a loan officer whose decision not to approve a loan has terrifying consequences.See Transcript
Transcript:Sam Raimi Interview - Drag Me to Hell at Comic Con 2008
Rebecca Murray from About.com Hollywood Movies at the 2008 San Diego Comic Con.
Drag Me to Hell Writer/Director Sam Raimi
What took so long to bring Drag Me to Hell to the screen?
Sam Raimi: "Well at first my brother Ivan and I wrote a short story called The Curse, which this was. It was just a 22-page short story and it was about 15 years ago. And once the short story was completed, we never thought about publishing it. We just left it on the shelf. And then one day we said, 'Why don't we take that short story and develop it into a feature film?' So we developed it and thus the screenplay was born of this story. And I tried to get other directors to direct it. I wanted to just produce it for a horror company I have called Ghost House Pictures. But we couldn't get quite the financing we needed together for the other directors, so I said, 'Well then maybe I should direct it. I'll give it a shot.' So I did."
And it must feel nice to return more to your roots, doesn't it?
Sam Raimi: "It's great to get back to the things where you started. It's great to come home because there's a familiarity there. But to counter that so that I challenge myself in a new way, I decided to work with a completely different cast I'd never worked with before, and limit myself in the financial ways. Won't have all the tools this time. Won't have as many days as I'm used to, and really try and get into the characters in a different way than I've a chance to before."
Are there a lot of projects like that where you've written a short story and they kind of sit there for a while and gestate and then spring up and are made into films? Are there other projects sitting on the shelves like this?
Sam Raimi: "There's a few short stories that I've written, both with my brother or some other of my writing partners, that maybe one day I would like to develop into screenplays."