The Farooqi Bros have had a chance to interview many amazing guests on their podcast but Larry Fong has been a true highlight. He spoke about his career upbringing, what made him go into filmmaking, his inspirations, fears and more. Additionally Larry spoke about his relationship with Zack Snyder, his work on films like 300, Watchmen, Batman v Superman and Kong: Skull Island.
Being as this is a comic book site, a majority of our talk concentrated on Watchmen and Batman v Superman. For Batman v Superman, we discussed the fallout and why there was a disconnect between audiences and fans.
On the topic of critical reaction and uproar, Larry said: “It kind of hurts because, you know, I put almost a year of my life, including my whole crew, you know living away from our families, making a lot of sacrifices to make a movie like that. And, everyone has their opinion. Does everyone have to love the movie? Of course not, but it’s like your baby; you put a lot of work into it.”
There is no doubt that Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice was a success at the box office and was one of the most discussed films of 2016. Larry speaks on the feeling he gets when just his side of the camera work is praised and not the rest of the crew. Even the most staunch haters of the film have admitted the film looks beautiful and is a visual treat, an attestant to Fong’s work. Larry Fong has routinely spoke on how great the environment is like on set with Zack and he didn’t want to entertain praise at the expense of tearing down Zack Snyder or others. Fong explained:
You know, visually I feel like me and my crew killed it, so when you hear things about it, it kind of hurts. But, to be honest the weirdest thing — I’ve never really talked about this — but the weirdest thing, and this has happened a lot, I’ll have a stranger come up and say, ‘You know, Batman v Superman really sucked, but don’t worry, what you did was great. It looked really good. It wasn’t your fault.’
He later continued, “And I listened to that for a while and was like, ‘K, well thanks.’ But then the more I thought about it I thought I’m not going to accept that. Because everyone’s working towards a common goal, right? And Zack’s my brother, I’m not gonna go, ‘Oh yeah, you know, he did a horrible job, but I didn’t! I just did my job. That’s right!’ I don’t accept that. If you make a baby together you’re proud of that baby. And you can’t really divide it up.”
These are just a few quotes in over an hour of discussion. We highly recommend you guys give the entire podcast a listen on iTunes, or on YouTube, where you get a full picture of Larry Fong’s illustrious career and motivations. For film geeks and purists, there is a ton of cool tidbits on Fong’s favorite cameras, his personal style and flair and why his work stands out so much in the industry.
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