The trailer for DreamWorks’ upcoming adaptation of The Bad Guys children’s graphic novels has just been unveiled. For the occasion, AlloCiné was able to speak with director Pierre Perifel, a Frenchman living in the United States.
After crazy adventures on paper, the Bad Guys created by Aaron Blabey will be entitled to a feature film on the big screen. And it is to a Frenchman, Pierre Perifel, that DreamWorks has entrusted this adaptation expected in dark rooms on April 6, 2022. Meeting with a man who drew his inspiration from both sides of the Atlantic.
AlloCiné: This is your first feature film, how do you find yourself at the head of such a production from DreamWorks studios?
Pierre Perifel: In fact, I pretty much spent my entire career in animation at DreamWorks. I’ve been there since 2008 and I started as an animator, which I had done a bit in France before. Things happened little by little. From animator I became supervisor then animation director. I was also a storyboarder and designer.
In 2018, I made a short film, Bilby. I really found myself on this short as a director. Suddenly, I then asked DreamWorks to make a feature film and they gave me their trust. I then came across the Bad Guys project from a series of Australian books by Aaron Blabey. When I saw the cover of the first book with the 5 villainous animals it made me think of Reservoir Dogs. Tarantino for children!
It’s an ultra strong concept with 5 iconic animals and I immediately had a vision of what it could be in a feature film. So the pitch was to make a Tarantino film but for children. Or an Ocean’s Eleven for the kids. I immediately made a trailer in the form of a storyboard to better show my vision of the thing. I also made a detailed presentation and the studio then gave me the green light to launch the production of the feature film. That was 3 years ago and now we are almost done with this amazing experience. I really had a blast and the movie is super cool.
What made you want to come and settle in the United States rather than stay in France?
I come from the Gobelins school in France and there were several French animators who left for the USA and made me dream. And I wanted to learn all the magic of animation from them. At the end of my studies at Les Gobelins, I made a short that caught the attention of DreamWorks and they contacted me.
So I grabbed the opportunity even though it was a bit difficult to leave at first because I had just got married and had a little baby. But after two years I adapted well to this new life. It is a wonderful experience to live abroad and to discover the American system. We left to stay for 2 years and we are still here, 14 years later!
They give you all your chances if you know how to seize them.
What’s great about DreamWorks is that you can progress quickly and earn promotion quickly based on your performance. Internal promotion works well and they really give you all your chances if you know how to seize them. I’m someone who gets frustrated quickly if I don’t learn more, whereas at DreamWorks this was not the case and I always have to learn something new and progress.
It’s a dynamic that allows you to show what you are capable of and to prove that you want to grow. The studio regularly does what it can to promote people. In any case, I’m still highly motivated and I’m really lucky to be able to touch everything and work with a whole bunch of talented artists.
How did you adapt this series of books, The Bad Guys, to “DreamWorks sauce”?
In fact, the goal was not to totally do “DreamWorks sauce”. Aaron Blabey, the writer, was not originally a cartoonist and so his illustrations are very simple. We couldn’t adapt them as they were. And so I set to work to find a style of animated illustration that was not classic and not in line with what we see at Disney or Pixar or even at DreamWorks.
As a result, the influence, in terms of design, is rather French. With influences from Uderzo or Franquin. But there is also the influence of Akira Toriyama and Dragon Ball! For me it was to bring back a much more illustrative imagery. There are no straight lines in our film, it’s like a painting: it’s totally unstructured. We mixed 2D with 3D, making things visually simple and clear. This fits the style of the story very well. For me, 3D is too ultra-realistic and that’s not what interests me in animation anymore.
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Can you tell us a bit about the history of these five “Bad Guys”?
Gladly. This is the story of these 5 legendary animals: a big bad wolf, a snake, a piranha, a shark and a tarantula. They are the only animals, or almost, that evolve in a world of humans. In fact, these animals are a representation of our fears. They grew up being the number one enemies of humans. And they have that label there, from Bad Guys.
One day they are arrested but the wolf decides to make a deal with a sort of mentor, Professor Marmalade, and ask him to train them to become good guys, Good Guys. It starts out as a scam since they actually want to stay Bad Guys. However, despite themselves, they will start to change, especially the wolf who is tired of always being the “big bad wolf” in all children’s stories.
The trailer shows it moving quite a bit with plenty of action. Does this make the work more complex these action scenes?
Yes, the action in animation is complex because there are a lot of sets and different camera movements. And you have to choreograph everything. At the same time it’s fun and a great pleasure to stage. We have a lot of car chases and hold-ups. We were strongly influenced by the cinema of Soderbergh, Guy Ritchie or Tarantino, of which I am a complete fan. There is even a touch of Luc Besson! It was an opportunity to pay tribute to this cinema. And to introduce children to the cinema of these great directors. It’s “cool” animated cinema where the music has a big role.
A team a la Guardians of the Galaxy.
I also took the composer Daniel Pemberton to whom we owe Spider-Man: New Generation, Venom, Ocean’s Eight and Birds of Prey. He’s a very cool Englishman. I also assembled, for this film, a mixture of American and European artists so that it gives another kind of rather hybrid film, with a different look inspired both by manga and by the directors I have mentioned.
Not to mention that the dialogues are of great finesse and a very black humor. This makes these characters endearing, they form a crazy outfit a bit like Guardians of the Galaxy. Especially since the big bad wolf does not believe in his wickedness and thinks that our actions speak louder than the face that we can have. There is therefore a social purpose in our film with the question of “difference” which is addressed there. How we perceive the other. How to learn not to judge “a book by its cover” and that therefore, “the dress does not make the monk”.
The “humanization” of animals is often present in animated films such as Zootopia. Why do you think?
This allows us to put a slight distance when we actually talk about our problems as human beings. On the animation level, humanizing them allows us to animate them in a more advanced and caricatural way, it really frees up our animation. This brings out even stronger emotions. What we did with Les Bad Guys is really a mix between the world of humans and the world of these animals. These animals are a metaphor for the bad guy who isn’t really bad.
Interview by Didier Allouch in Los Angeles on December 10, 2021.