James Wan
Biography
James Wan (born 26 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 (2007), Death Sentence (2007), Insidious (2010), The Conjuring (2013) and Furious 7 (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) in 2000.
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Trivia
Met fellow collaborator and friend Leigh Whannell at film school in Australia.
Comes from Melbourne, Australia.
Attended the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology along with close friend Leigh Whannell
Member of the unofficial "Splat Pack," a term coined by film historian Alan Jones in Total Film magazine for the modern wave of directors making brutally violent horror films. The other "Splat Pack" members are Alexandre Aja, Darren Lynn Bousman, Neil Marshall, Greg McLean, Eli Roth, Leigh Whannell & Rob Zombie.
His father passed away when he was 14 years of age.
His overall deal at New Line includes an option to develop and produce modest budget science fiction, horror and comedy films via his Atomic Monster production company.
[on 'Saw'] That was part of my aesthetic that I was going for. I wanted to make the film really claustrophobic, and one way I was going to do that was, every time we go to a new location, I'm not going to set it up using an establishing shot. You don't see a house, and then cut to the inside of the house. You cut to inside, to inside, to inside.
When we handed in our first cut, the Sundance version, we were essentially told the film was too intense. Really? I'm going to be penalized for doing what I'm supposed to do as a director? I think they have a problem with the 'tone' as well. How do you cut 'tone'? How do you censor 'tone'?
I can't point anything specific out, but I'm a big David Lynch fan, he's a big influence on Saw, and another director I truly admire as well, is an Italian, Dario Argento? These two guys have a big impact on us, Deep Red, Lost Highway.
We think craft is important, and the irony has always been that horror may be disregarded by critics, but often they are the best-made movies you're going to find in terms of craft. You can't scare people if they see the seams.