'Swiss Army Man' filmmakers on humor's 'lowest common denominator'
This could be the gassiest week of the millennium where the movies are concerned.
Take Steven Spielberg's "The BFG." One of its major scenes, certainly the funniest, depicts a lot of British people and a giant emitting colored clouds of flatulence called "whizzpoppers."
Or consider the Daniels' fantastical farce "Swiss Army Man" in which a flatulent corpse (played by Daniel Radcliffe and his stunt dummy) emits so much gas that Paul Dano can ride across the ocean using him as a human speed boat.
To get to the bottom of this cheeky phenomenon - once a favored device in juvenile comedies and many Walt Disney family films - I asked "Swiss Army Man" co-directors Daniel Scheinert, 29, and Daniel Kwan, 28, to explain the appeal of this particular bodily function.
Collectively billed as Daniels - just Daniels - Scheinert and Kwan created the popular music video "Turn Down For What" and many others before turning their attentions to their first feature film.
Q. What drew you to flatulence?
DS. In some ways you're too embarrassed to ever make a movie about farts. That sounds like a terrible idea. But we had to re-examine that impulse. We understand it's like the lowest common denominator when it comes to humor. It's one of the easier jokes you can make.
At the same time, the first thing you learn about your body is that you should be ashamed of these things. It's a simple relatable thing that everyone has an intimate connection with.
Q. And?
DK. The idea of flatulence made us laugh, but we were very embarrassed about making a movie about that, but then it became like a way to make a movie about the things that embarrass us, as a society or as people. What are the other things we don't talk about? What are the other things that embarrass us?
There was one line we kept repeating to ourselves. "How embarrassing to be human."
Q. Did you know that Mozart was quite fond of flatulence jokes?
DS. Yeah, we heard about that. Mozart and Ben Franklin as well.
DK. There's a connection between the scatological and immature and the profound and the beautiful. Ancient Egyptians used to worship the dung beetle because it could roll up some poop and turn it into fertilizer.
DS. What we found is that this absurd stuff gets past people's protective walls. As we grow up, we become desensitized to what we see in movies already, stories we've seen a thousand times. By coming at it from a direction you don't expect, you can make things seem fresh again. That's kind of how it works for us. It's fun.
Q. Making "Swiss Army Man" seems to have been a liberating experience for you. Am I wrong?
DK. Yeah, it's a lot of fun. It's a fairy tale in some ways. One of the things that resonated with us was that we could explore imagination and why we tell stories.
Q. Isn't your movie a prism for viewing the world in a slightly different way? Through a new lens?
DS: Yeah. We wanted it not to be surreal and use dream logic and be crazy. We wanted it to be a perspective on real things, relatable emotions and situations. But just packaged a little different. A little weird.