Brett Ratner Interview - Rush Hour 3 Movie

"Brett Ratner Interview"
"Rush Hour 3 Movie"
by Chad Michaels
August 7, 2007

Brett Ratner was born in Miami Beach to Marcia Ratner, a socialite. Ratner's maternal grandparents were Eastern European Jews who immigrated from Cuba, imagine, without an inner tube, and then the United States. Brett Ratner directed music videos (including: Mariah Carey's "Heartbreaker," Madonna's "Beautiful Stranger," Jessica Simpson's "These Boots Were Made For Walkin'"), before reaching commercial success with the action-comedy "Rush Hour" (1998), starring Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker, both of whom reunited with Ratner for the sequel, Rush Hour 2 (2001). Brett Ratner was under consideration to direct X-Men (2000) and Superman Returns (2006), although both were eventually directed by Bryan Singer. After Singer left the X-Men franchise to direct Superman Returns, Ratner became director of the final "X-Men" movie (2006), which was a huge box office success. Brett Ratner, who has been known to throw huge parties for underage partiers, such as the druggie/drunk Lindsday Lohan, resides in a multimillion dollar mansion in Beverly Hills, California. Carrie Fisher, Garry Marshall, and Jon Avnet, AND Ratner were judges for the network's filmmaking-competition reality TV series, On the Lot, which premiered in May 2007 which instantly became one of the biggest reality show TV bombs in television history, even though the world's best director, Steven Spielberg was in charge.

All of that is behind Ratner, whose "Rush Hour 3" hits theaters Friday 10 July.

Wild About Movies caught up with Bret Ratner in Beverly Hills, not far from his palatial estate, last weekend. Here is what he had to say about the movie which has been six years in the making!

Watch "Rush Hour 3" Trailer

Below - excerpts from the "Rush Hour 3" junket roundtable interview!

Wild About Movies: You've been trying to get this movie off the ground now for several years. How tough was that?

Brett Ratner: It took 20 years to build the pyramids I think. It took 13 years to build Mt. Rushmore. It took 13 years to lose my virginity. It took 6 years to get Chris Tucker on the plane to Paris.

Wild About Movies: And which of those wonders of the world do you think was more challenging than any of the others?

Brett Ratner: Oh, losing my virginity for sure.

Wild About Movies: Chris Tucker hasn't worked since Rush Hour 2. ???.

Brett Ratner: He works a lot. He works at being a humanitarian. He works at philanthropy. He works at traveling around the world and expanding his horizons. I have a lot of respect for him. You have to understand his psyche. He's a comedian and if you watch his old stand-up like when he was on the Arsenio Hall Show, for instance, he was talking about growing up poor, living in Decatur, Georgia on his mama's couch and getting his car stolen and all those experiences. And he cursed a lot. He wanted to have other life experiences and he did so now his comedy is about traveling around the world with Bill Clinton and going to South Africa with Oprah and hanging out with Michael Jackson at Neverland but he's still funny. And that's what I think is great about Chris Tucker. Talent is talent and he's got talent so he can talk… But he wanted to have a life experience and that's what he did. Don't tell anybody. The truth is he was in jail for five years.

Wild About Movies: What was the challenge in getting him to sign on to the third Rush Hour?

Brett Ratner: I know that's the rumor of what it is. It wasn't. Chris wanted to do it and if he wouldn't have done it, yeah, $25 million is a lot of money but the truth is he loves doing these movies. You can tell he has fun making these movies. If I wouldn't have done it, I don't think he would have done it or maybe he would have. But Jackie wouldn't have done it if I wouldn't have done it. Chris wouldn't have done it if Jackie wouldn't have done it so it was like all of us together. The first day of Rush Hour 3 was like…the day before was like the last day of Rush Hour 2 even though it was six years. It felt like we were just… six years… I'm like what have I been doing for the past six years? This is so weird. I'm like dealing with Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker. So it was great. It was great to be back with your friends.

Wild About Movies: Why Paris?

Brett Ratner: Well you have to understand Rush Hour is not just a buddy cop movies. It's a fish out of water comedy and you have to be in an environment where these guys don't speak the language in order for the fish out of water to work. A comedy has to come in these movies from the situations and not from the jokes. The fact that they both don't speak the language is what makes the movie funny.

Wild About Movies: The underlying theme of brotherhood, where did that come from and why was it important to have that?

Brett Ratner: Two reasons. One is I try to figure out how are these guys going to evolve. It's not just a buddy cop film. It's really a love story between these two men so what is the arc of these characters? In the first movie, they became partners. In the second movie, they became friends. Right? By this movie, we wanted them to become brothers. The reason for that really was because when we asked people over the years what's your favorite Rush Hour, some people, 50/50, 50% of the people said Rush Hour 1, 50% said Rush Hour 2, but in my heart I knew that Rush Hour 1 had maybe a little more depth to it because there was more heart and more stakes. We tried to put it in with the father thing in Rush Hour 2 but it's really the emotionality between these characters that really makes it work – the heart that's in it. And Rush Hour 1 had more heart so I wanted to go back to that. I raised the stakes by having a little girl come back, her father gets shot, and then the relationship between Jackie and his brother to emphasize the relationship between Chris and him and that's what I wanted to go for. It's a movie about character, not just about the spectacle of blowing shit up.

Wild About Movies: Where would you go in Rush Hour 4, if you follow that train of thought, if you go from partners to friends - and actually do make a fourth film?

Brett Ratner: Brothers to lovers. (Hahah)

Wild About Movies: So a Brokeback (Mountain) Rush Hour?

Brett Ratner: There's nowhere else to go.

Wild About Movies: Out of all the crazy stunt work that Jackie does himself in all these films, what has impressed you the most?

Brett Ratner: It's little things. The most amazing thing, physically amazing thing I've ever seen him do is in Rush Hour 2 when he jumped through that little hole in the cage at the casino. And I said, "Jackie, do you want me to make the hole wider?" "No, no, I'll get it through it." I'm going, "Are you sure?" So he slowly just starts to creep through it like really slow and literally it's like it's a quarter of an inch off his body. He ran at it full speed. You can imagine somebody can dive, right? Propel yourself forward and dive. He jumped feet first and went forward. I mean I tried that like I'd go to jump in my bed but I'd just go boom! The gravity of my body just makes me drop. So the first time he did it he got through, boom!, and I could see him pushing through with his legs. Then boom!, the cage hits him right here on his nose. I was like, "Oh, my God!" And he literally just was able to jump feet first, meaning have his legs kick forward and the top of his body followed. So physically the guy - there's nobody like him in the world.

Wild About Movies: You always give him versions of the dirty movies line and obviously he doesn't know what he's saying, does he?

Brett Ratner: He has no idea. That's why I got him to do it. If he did, he'd say "I'm not going to say that!

Wild About Movies: If Jackie did the most awesome stunt in Rush Hour 2, how hard was it to think of things for him to do in Rush Hour 3?

Brett Ratner: Everything was hard. Everything was hard in this movie because every scene we felt like we'd been there so how do we top it? How do we revisit it?

Wild About Movies: Change the location?

Brett Ratner: Yeah, change the location, new villains, new characters, new pretty girls.

Wild About Movies: How much of it, if any, was shot on the Eiffel Tour?

Brett Ratner: If any? What movie did you see? We were on the Eiffel Tour.

Wild About Movies: What were the challenges of shooting there? Some close-up shots were done in the studio but was 100% of everything else in the third act shot there?

Brett Ratner: No, not all of it, but it was definitely real and we were there. Some of it was real and some of it was green screen. It depends on how dangerous the shot was. If we'd gotten all the permissions, we probably could've done all of it there but the problem was we could only have the Eiffel Tour from midnight to 6:00AM. Then we could only bring up the equipment at midnight so we have six hours of shooting and then about two hours of equipment to lift up there. Then we have an hour lunch which is really two hours in France because you open wine at the table. So we have two hours every night to shoot there and I'm spending most of my time turning on and off the lights of the Eiffel Tour at night and freaking out a lot of the .French people.

Wild About Movies: What are you thinking about for your next project, or down the road?

Brett Ratner: I'm gonna do a (Hugh) Hefner biopic.

Wild About Movies: Is it true that there was a musical script?

Brett Ratner: There was. The first draft was a musical, but I'm not making it a musical.

Wild About Movies: Do you see any parallels between Hefner's life and contemporary America?

Brett Ratner: Hefner inspired contemporary America. Hefner was a big part of the sexual revolution in America, and changed our thinking and the way people thought about sex and nudity. He was a big inspiration.

Wild About Movies: What period will you cover?

Brett Ratner: To his 50's, probably.

Wild About Movies: Is there a lot we don't know about Hefner?

Brett Ratner: I think so.

Wild About Movies: Can you give us a preview?

Brett Ratner: I don't think people are familiar with who he was and what he created in this country and what he stood for and the taboos that he broke. He had Lenny Bruce on television, for the first time. He put black people on national television, performing, before anybody did, on Playboy After Dark. James Brown could not get TV performances, and he was putting him on TV. And, he showed black people and white people dance together. The Playboy philosophy is very complex, but basically says that people should be able to enjoy their lives and have as much fun as they want, as long as they don't hurt other people. His philosophy about life and his First Amendment fights were helpful to women, men, minorities, and all kinds of people.

Wild About Movies: Are you going for an R rating or NC-17?

Brett Ratner: I think R. There will be some orgies from the 70's in there. In that period, that's when orgies became popular.

Wild About Movies: You've been around Hollywood for a long time and you've seen a lot of stuff. With young Hollywood getting out of control these days, what advice do you have for someone like Lindsay Lohan, who is just spinning out of control (whom you have hosted at parties at your mansion)?

Brett Ratner: She is? Hahaha! I don't know if I have advice for her, but for all young actors, I think it's important to work hard. It's easy to get caught up. I know that because I was 26 when I did my first movie, and I was invited to every party. I think it's about keeping your head on your shoulders and knowing that, if you want to really be successful for many, many years, like DeNiro, like Pacino, like Hoffman, even though they became movie stars, they had years of experience working on their craft of acting. Even back in the day, I asked guys like Bob Evans, you never saw those guys out. Brando wasn't hanging out at parties. He was studying. So, hard work is the most important thing. I have that fear of missing out, too, when I was first in Hollywood, but then I realized that hard work is the only thing that's going to get me to where I want to go.

Wild About Movies: So, you haven't seen or talked to Lindsay at all lately?

Brett Ratner: No. Cocaine is the only thing we have in common, really. And, when we're together, she does it all. (LOL)

Wild About Movies: Black comedies don't tend to do as well as the buddy comedies that have a black actor in them. Why do you think that is?

Brett Ratner: It depends on what type of film it is. There's black films that cross the boundaries, or expand the audience. It depends on what it is, really. You're saying that black movies don't perform as well. I don't like white people in films. White people in my films are token whites. Haha!

Wild About Movies: Was it important for you to poke fun at everybody in the film?

Brett Ratner: No. I think any kind of racial statements are really between Jackie and Chris. Of course, we were making fun of the French, but that's a nationality, not a race. If you called me fat, I would be insulted. But, if my friends called me fat, I wouldn't care 'cause they're my friends. They can say that. So, you can get away with a lot more because you know Jackie and Chris have a lot of affection for each other. Jackie can do a black thing and Chris can do a Chinese thing, and it works. If you're my friend, you can say anything you want to me, and if you're not, be careful 'cause if I get mad, I might bite you.

Wild About Movies: How important have the 'Rush Hour' films been for broader culture, since you've really incorporated everyone in them?

Brett Ratner: The rule is, if you speak perfect English, you will not get a part in this movie. I went to a public high school and most of the comedy was coming from the black kids and the Asian kids and the Hispanic kids. And, the coolest kids to me were always the black kids. They were always fashion forward and they always dressed the coolest. They were always the best dancers, and just the coolest people. So, that's where my affection for black people came from.

Wild About Movies: Where did the idea to become a filmmaker come from?

Brett Ratner: I got a Super 8 film camera when I was 8 years old and started making movies. And then, I was on the set of 'Miami Vice' and I was on the set of 'Scarface,' when I realized, "You know what? This is what I'm going to do for the rest of my life" because I got the opportunity to see Al Pacino work. I saw DePalma directing Pacino, and then I saw the movie, and I put it together. When you're a kid and you watch a movie, you have no idea how it's done. And then, all of a sudden, when you see it, you're like, "I wanna be a director."

Wild About Movies: What are your plans for the "Rush Hour 3" DVD?

Brett Ratner: It's going to be a double DVD. It's the first time on 'Rush Hour' that I've had a double DVD. There will be incredible behind-the-scenes footage, outtakes, deleted scenes. There is incredible, incredible stuff.

Wild About Movies: How did you decide which outtakes to put at the end, and which to save?

Brett Ratner: My movies are short and paced well because I know that DVD exists and I know I can always put that stuff on the DVD. Most people are going to see this movie on DVD for the next hundred or two hundred years, or whatever format exists. I don't mind putting all of that on the DVD.

Brett Ratner