Jonathan Mostow Talks ‘Surrogates’
To celebrate this week’s release of Surrogates on DVD, director Jonathan Mostow sat down with the press for a virtual press conference and ComicMix was in attendance. Here are highlights from that conversation. Our review of the film and DVD ran yesterday.
ComicMix: Mr. Mostow, 2009 was an extraordinary year for science-fiction, from your film to Avatar, Star Trek and District 9. Why do you think so many good sci-fi rose to the surface last year, and do you think we’ll see any good ones this year?
Jonathan Mostow: First of all, thank you for mentioning our film in the same breath as those other movies — all of which I loved. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that 2009 was a good year for sci-fi. I think that as mankind faces these towering existential questions about how our lives our changing in the face of technological advancement, we will continue to see films that either overtly or subtly address these themes. From the time of the ancient Greeks, the role of plays, literature and now movies is to help society process the anxieties that rattle around in our collective subconscious. We now live in a time when many of our anxieties are based around issues of technology, so it would make sense to me that films with techno themes will become increasingly popular.
CMIX: This isn’t your first time dealing with a high concept of man versus machine. Can you talk about why this concept intrigues you?
Mostow: It’s true that I’ve touched on this thematic material before — in fact, I think all my films in some way have dealt with the relationship between man and technology, so apparently, it’s an idea that fascinates me. I assume your question implies a relationship between the ideas in Terminator and The Surrogates , so I’ll answer accordingly… Whereas T3 posed technology as a direct threat to mankind, I see The Surrogates more as a movie that poses a question about technology — specifically, what does it cost us — in human terms — to be able to have all this advanced technology in our lives. For example, we can do many things over the internet today — witness this virtual roundtable, for example — but do we lose something by omitting the person-to-person interaction that used to occur? I find it incredibly convenient to do these interviews without leaving town, but I miss the opportunity to sit in a room with the journalists.
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