Before becoming the director behind some of the most beloved family films of the early 2000s, Chris Columbus became famous thanks to Gremlins, a film about peculiar pets that transform into monsters when wet or fed after midnight.
This film marked a milestone in the cinema of the 80s due to its plot and the special effects used. However, the filmmaker revealed in a recent interview with Vanity Fair that the original script was much darker and more violent, to the point of including the death of a dog.
The fate of the protagonist's dog, named Barney, was contemplated to be much more tragic. Instead of being found hanging from the Christmas lights, Columbus He planned to have the gremlins hang him and then eat him.
“Barney the dog wasn't so lucky to get hung up on the Christmas lights. Actually, They hung him by the neck and he died. We kill the dog! They ate it! Then they went into a McDonald's and ate the people, but not the food. There were many things that were not in the final script,” he revealed.
But after thinking about it a little more, Chris Columbus assured that this scene was finally discarded thanks to the intervention of Steven Spielbergwho served as producer of the film. Although at the time the filmmaker was inexperienced and did not challenge Spielbergnow recognizes that the decisions made benefited the film. The film, released in 1984, became a cult classic, combining black humor, horror and endearing moments that defined its success.
“It actually wasn't a hard pill to swallow, because even at that time, in 1983, he was Steven Spielberg. had done ET, had done Raiders of the lost ark had done Shark. So he was one of my heroes. At that moment, I asked myself who I was. I didn't have enough ego or experience to tell Spielberg, 'You're wrong. We have to make it as violent as possible'. “He was absolutely right,” he commented.
Likewise, it was not the only scene that Spielberg changed from the original script, since Gizmo would not remain the innocent creature throughout the film, however they thought that the audience would like more to see how he accompanied Billy throughout the plot: “That It was one of Steven's best ideas. He knew it and I didn't: the public needed someone to identify with when it came to elvesand that was Gizmo,” he said. Columbus.
During the talk, Columbus reflected on his inclination towards horror films in his early career. According to the director, in the initial script of Gremlinsthe dark moments were much more explicit. In fact, at first I wanted the protagonist's entire family to be killed by monsters.
“I think the father stayed behind and fought the gremlins. I don't remember well if he survived. The mother, of course, not. Billy, played by Zach Galligan, ran into the foyer of his house and his mother's head rolled down the stairs. So there were some deaths,” he explained.
That is why in the interview, the artist highlighted that his participation in the production of Nosferatu It is partly due to his desire to return to terrifying stories with graphic violence, since he assured that that is in his DNA.
“Nosferatu is certainly pushing the boundaries of what gothic horror and romance can go. Without a doubt, that world inspires me. I felt like Robert Eggers certainly went for it, and I didn't have a problem with that. People would expect, based on my superficial career, that maybe I would steer him away from that kind of thing. But he was pushing it towards as much violence as possible, to make it as bloody as possible. “I love those things,” he said.
