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This Saturday, July 2, marks the 25th anniversary of the premiere of men in black (Men in blackin the original), the film by Barry Sonnenfeld with him, for now, missing in action Will Smith Y Tommy Lee Jones.
The date for American cinema is crucial, because it is set for the 4th of July, Independence Day, and used, a quarter of a century ago, to inaugurate or mark the strong season of successful summer releases.
The film premiered the same year and had two sequels, in 2002 and 2012, as well as another titled Men in Black: International (2019), but with Chris Hemsworth and Tessa Thompson (he was Agent H and she was Agent M), and who we will see together again from Thursday 7 July, when it premieres Thor: Love and thunder.
Agent J (Will Smith). The now deceased actor did not want to act in the film. Your reasons. Clarin archive photo
Here are some anecdotes before and during the shoot.
1. A much more violent origin
In the original comic, if the Men in Black were to annihilate the aliens, they did.
It is based on the comic published in 1990 by Aircel Comics, written by Lowell Cunningham and illustrated by Sandy Carruthers. The publisher, of course, ended up being bought by Marvel.
But long before Steven Spielberg kept an eye on him and bought the rights to his film adaptation. He produced it with Amblin and Columbia Pictures, but took away much of the violence that contained his plots, although the basis was maintained: The Men in Black are an organization that stalks aliens who are on Earth and do not behave. adequately.
2. Will Smith nearly cut Spielberg out
Steven Spielberg, the film’s producer, phoned Smith to offer him “Men in Black”.
When he got the call from the manager of ETSmith didn’t think it was Spielberg. Likewise, from the beginning he didn’t agree to play Agent J – it was Sonnenfeld’s first choice -, because he had just starred in another film that battled aliens (Independence Day, 1996) and which was a great international success. But he was surprised when Steven Spielberg called him and they said she was his wife, Jada Pinkett-Smith-yeah, the one who gave him a weird look at this year’s Oscars, before he went upstairs and slapped. Chris Rock. – that. that she ended up convincing him.
Oh, and it was Sonnenfeld’s first choice, which was suggested to him by his wife, a fan of the series. The Prince of Bel Air…
3. Tommy the Difficult
Agents K and J would return in two more films, in 2002 and 2012.
And the Oscar-winning actor for The fugitivewhich came from two blockbusters like batman forever (it was Harvey Two Faces) e Volcano, started with the script did not convince him and Spielberg told him they would change it. Later, the actor screamed that director Sonnenfeld would never allow him to star in the film as a comedian.
4. Discarded options
Chris O’Donnell (left), as Robin and in her nipple costume. He told him no to being Agent J.
However, there were other names in the folder. Chris O’Donnell was offered to be J, but he was about to leave batman and robinwith George Clooney (how badly he did not accept Men in black…). And while Smith made things difficult for him, they tempted David Schwimmer, but he preferred to continue charging millions for playing Ross Geller on the series. friends. And it wasn’t bad.
For K, Clint Eastwood turned down the offer because he wanted to shoot Absolute power. And, to be Edgar, the response the production got from John Turturro was a no, with no further explanation.
5. Winning your role in poker
Truth or myth, Linda Fiorentino is said to have landed the part of Laurel by winning a poker game from Barry Sonnenfeld.
6. See the bugs
The film won an Oscar (for best makeup) and had two other nominations, one for music.
Vincent D’Onofrio (the soldier who commits suicide in Born to Kill, by Stanley Kubrick) watched insect documentaries to portray his character Edgar the Bug. And to walk like in the movie, he put on thick knee pads so he couldn’t bend his legs, and he bandaged his ankle.
Oh, and Will Smith did that by going to an alien encounter convention in Las Vegas.
7. No cockroach hurts
The American Humane Society was present on the movie sets.
The American Humane Society made sure no animals were injured during filming, including cockroaches. What Will Smith steps on are actually packets of mustard. And at the end of each day of shooting, they had to count all the cockroaches and make sure none were missing.
8. Tarantino and John Landis said no
Quentin Tarantino preferred to direct a film on a script of his own. How would you have followed your career?
Quentin had just won the Palme d’Or at Cannes with Violent timeshe refused the offer and preferred to direct Jackie Brown. And to the director of an American werewolf and from the video of thrillerby Michael Jackson, he was offered before Sonnenfeld to direct the project, but, funny, he said it was like doing it all over again The shameless brothers, with the aliens, because the characters wore black clothes. He has publicly regretted it ever since.
9. Sunglasses
Cruise and Kelly McGillis in “Top Gun”, the first to popularize Ray Ban sunglasses.
Ray Ban made a deal. Similar lenses had appeared predator 2and after the before men in black sales tripled (from $ 1.6 million to $ 5 million), similar to what happened with the aviator sunglasses worn by Tom Cruise in top Gun.
10. I know you
One of the most remembered gags was to find out in which figure in the show many aliens were hiding. The list included Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Sylvester Stallone, Danny DeVito, Dionne Warwick and even director Barry Sonnenfeld and his daughter Chloe.
Paul O. Scholz
Source: Clarin
