Becca Case
A2 Media
KEY GENRE DIRECTOR & PREVIOUS WORK (HOLLIE)
James Wan
James Wan(born 27 February 1977) is an Australian FILM PRODUCER, screenwriter and film director of Malaysian Chinese descent. He is widely known for directing the horror film Saw (2004) and creating Billy the puppet. Wan has also directed Dead Silence, Death Sentence (2007), Insidious (2010), Insidious: Chapter 2 and The Conjuring (2013). As of August 2014, Wan is directing Fast & Furious 7, which is due for release in 2015.
Before his success in the mainstream film industry, he made his first feature length film, Stygian, with Shannon Young, which won "Best Guerrilla Film" at the Melbourne Underground Film Festival (MUFF)in2000.
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Since creating the franchise, Wan and Leigh Whannell have served as executive producers to the sequels Saw II, Saw III, Saw IV, but was not involved with Saw V, Saw VI and Saw 3D: The Final Chapter — Wan had instead moved on to create other film works with partner, Whannell.
In 2007, Wan directed two feature films. The first of which was the horror film Dead Silence, a film that was the result of advice from Wan and Whannell's agent at the time.
It is based on the premise of a legend, whereby the ghost of a ventriloquist, Mary Shaw, removes the tongue of any person who screams in its presence. Rather than a gore movie, Wan described the film as
"a creepy doll movie. It's in the spirit of those old Twilight Zone episodes or Hammer Horror Films. Very old-school."
Wan's second directorial film of 2007 was Death Sentence. The film's protagonist is played by Kevin Bacon and has no connection to the horror genre—instead, Bacon stars as a father who seeks revenge for his murdered son, who is killed by a local gang. Whannell features as a minor character in the film, playing one of the gang members who is eventually killed by Bacon's character. Wan described the film as
"a raw and gritty, 70s styled revenge thriller ... It's my arthouse movie with guns."
Having worked on his previous three films continuously, Wan told CraveOnline that he was ready for "a bit of time off just to chill... but at the same time I'm using this opportunity to write again" following the completion of Death Sentence.
Insidous
Next, Wan directed the horror film Insidious, which premiered at the 2010 Toronto International Film Festival as part of the "Midnight Madness" programme and was sold to SONY Pictures Worldwide for a seven-figure sum within four hours of the premiere's conclusion. The film began its American theatrical release in the first weekend of April 2011 and achieved third place at the box office, with an estimated 13.5 million in ticket sales.
Starring Patrick Wilson, Rose Byrne and Barbara Hershey, the film was made independently, as Wan wanted to complete creative control and also wanted to make a film that was markedly different from the gore that he had become synonymous with due to Saw. Wan stated in an interview,
"the fact that Insidious was not being run by a committee really afforded me the luxury to make a film with lots of creepy, bizarre moments that a studio might not 'get".
Both Wan and Whannel stated that they wanted to use techniques such as restraint and silence to create a horror film, similar to The Sixth Sense, The Othersand David Lynch'sfilms.
Following the release of Insidious, Wan revealed in an interview, in regard to his career beyond the film: "I definitely do want to experiment in other genres, or make films in other genres because I love, Leigh and I have, we're not just horror fans. We're film fans. I love action films. I want to do action films. I want to do romantic comedies. I love all this stuff. So, if I find the good material, I'll do it."
The Conjuring
The film, later retitled The Conjuring, centred on the real life exploits of Ed and Lorraine Warren, a married couple that investigated paranormal events. The film focused on the couple's most famous case second to the Amityville haunting, in which they investigated a witch's curse on a RHODE Island family farm. In his second collaboration with the pair, Patrick Wilson featured in the film, and he and actress Vera Farmiga played paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren, respectively.
Filming commenced in North Carolina, United States, in late February 2012, and New Line Cinema, together with Warner Bros. The film was released in July 2013, and has received acclaim from critics and audiences alike.
INSIDIOUS: CHAPTER 2
After work on The Conjuring was complete, Wan directed a sequel to 2010's Insidious. The film was once again written by Wan's longtime collaborator and close friend, Whannel, and the cast of the original film returned. Filming for the sequel commenced in January 2013, and the film was released on 13 September 2013.
Wan stated in an interview following a test screening of The Conjuring:
I think the sequel to ‘Insidious’ is kind of my reaction to Saw, where for my own reason I wasn’t as involved in the sequels, and so I felt with Insidious, I think it would be good to shepherd it and keep it more in track to the version I had when I made the first film so that it doesn’t detour too far. So yeah, I’m kind of working with Leigh (Whannell) on the story and the script.
Fast and Furious 7
As of 11 April 2013, Wan entered into negotiations with Universal Pictures to direct the seventh installment of the Fast and Furious action franchise after Justin Lin, who directed the previous four sequels, confirmed that he would not continue as director in January 2013. Wan was an inclusion on a directorial shortlist alongside Jeff Wadlow, Baltasar Kormákur and Harald Zwart. A final confirmation of Wan's directorial role was revealed in an article published on 17 April 2013, while Lin was quoted in an article that was published on 10 April 2013: "It’s time for me to move on to other things and I’m thrilled that Universal and Neal have selected James Wan to lead the franchise into its new chapter."
