Angelina Jolie, Jack Black on Finding Inner Peace in 'Kung Fu Panda 2' (Cannes)
"I don’t think inner peace exists at the Cannes Film Festival," jokes Dustin Hoffman.
CANNES -- “I don’t think inner peace exists at the Cannes Film Festival,” Dustin Hoffman said, offering his deadpan assessment of the scene as DreamWorks Animations Kung Fu Panda 2 express rolled into town.
DWA, which makes it an annual habit of grabbing the attention of the international press assembled in Cannes, held its own screening Tuesday night of the new sequel to the original Kung Fu Panda, which collected $632 million in grosses worldwide when it was released in 2008.
It followed up with a press conference Thursday morning at the Carlton Hotel that included Jack Black, who plays the reluctant panda warrior Po, Angelina Jolie, who voices Po’s comrade-in-arms Tigress, Hoffman, who lends his voice to kung fu master Shifu and the movie’s director Jennifer Yuh Nelson.
The new movie revolves around Po’s search for inner peace even as he battles a new villain, the peacock Lord Shen, who’s voiced by Gary Oldman.
And so one of the first questions tossed at the actors was what they themselves consider inner peace.
“My inner peace is in pieces,” Black joked, while Jolie, showing a kind of radiant graciousness as she put up with the often off-the-wall questions, responded more seriously, saying, “Especially for people who have children, you wake up and they’re healthy, you know that’s the most important thing, so you have that peace. But I think we’re all searching for it as part of the human journey. We all have moments of inner peace, then we lose it, then we look for it again.”
It remained for Hoffman -- who at one point announced, “It’s tough to get laughs in this room” -- to turn the question on the questioners as he added, “I have never had as much inner peace as I have at the moment, being infront of all these cameras and sitting next to Angelina. It doesn’t get anymore inner than that.”
The new movie also follows Po’s search for his birth parents -- the panda has been brought up by a goose, a fact that went unexplained in the first movie. So the press naturally wanted to know of Jolie, how her six kids, who included three adopted children, reacted to that aspect of the film.
Smiling easily, Jolie said, “I brought my children to see the movie and they absolutely loved the movie and laughed though the whole thing.”Although she admitted she wondered if they would have questions, the issue never came up. “They just felt that much more proud that they were a little more like Po,” she added.
Nelson, the movie’s director, also talked about the role that Guillermo Del Toro, who is credited as creative consultant, played on the film. “It was a very long process, three years, and he came in right in the middle, when things were the messiest and pointed out all the things in the movie that we really should believe in and he helped us come up with some really great ideas,” she explained. “Part of what he did was try to make Shen even cooler. He came in and cracked a lot of jokes and really cheered us on. He was just an inspiration to work with.”
The trio, along with debut director Jennifer Yuh, made their way into a packed press conference after the usual posing-with-a-cuddly-panda photo duties.
Jolie was classy and charming, Black was typically boisterous and Hoffman kept himself amused by offering some hilariously sardonic responses to some of the sillier questions.
The film picks up the story of titular warrior Po (Black), who sets out to defeat evil peacock Lord Shen (Gary Oldman) with the help of fellow ‘Furious Five’ fighter Tigress (Jolie) and red panda master Shifu (Hoffman).
“The trick with sequels is you have to make it better than the first one, and I think we’ve pulled it off,” said Jolie.
“It was more fun the second time around because we’d all gotten to know each other [on the press tour for the first movie] and our characters had history, so it was fun to jump in.”
When asked why he’d signed on for a sequel, Hoffman quipped: “At my age I have no short-term memory, so I can’t answer that…”
Being serious for a moment, he added: “I think we’re in a golden age of animation and I think this is as good as it gets.
“It’s very difficult to make any sequel as good if not better than the first and I do think my colleagues have made a deeper, more emotional film.”
Black, meanwhile, applauded the film’s anti-weapon stance, albeit in his own unique style.
“The Furious Five never use actual weapons. It’s all kung fu, so in a way it’s a non-violent film – it discourages weaponry!” he said.
“I don’t like guns. I like laser blasters, but that’s where I draw the line.”
Amid all the craziness, first-time director Yuh hardly got a look-in, although she did manage to applaud the involvement of exec producer Guillermo del Toro.
“It’s a very long process,” she explained of the film’s three-year production. “Guillermo came in right in the middle and helped us come up with some really great ideas, like making Shen even cooler.
“He cracked a lot of jokes and really cheered us up in the middle of a really long project. He was just an inspiration to work with.”
Kung Fu Panda 2 opens on 10 June.
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It followed up with a press conference Thursday morning at the Carlton Hotel that included Jack Black, who plays the reluctant panda warrior Po, Angelina Jolie, who voices Po’s comrade-in-arms Tigress, Hoffman, who lends his voice to kung fu master Shifu and the movie’s director Jennifer Yuh Nelson.
The new movie revolves around Po’s search for inner peace even as he battles a new villain, the peacock Lord Shen, who’s voiced by Gary Oldman.
And so one of the first questions tossed at the actors was what they themselves consider inner peace.
“My inner peace is in pieces,” Black joked, while Jolie, showing a kind of radiant graciousness as she put up with the often off-the-wall questions, responded more seriously, saying, “Especially for people who have children, you wake up and they’re healthy, you know that’s the most important thing, so you have that peace. But I think we’re all searching for it as part of the human journey. We all have moments of inner peace, then we lose it, then we look for it again.”
It remained for Hoffman -- who at one point announced, “It’s tough to get laughs in this room” -- to turn the question on the questioners as he added, “I have never had as much inner peace as I have at the moment, being infront of all these cameras and sitting next to Angelina. It doesn’t get anymore inner than that.”
The new movie also follows Po’s search for his birth parents -- the panda has been brought up by a goose, a fact that went unexplained in the first movie. So the press naturally wanted to know of Jolie, how her six kids, who included three adopted children, reacted to that aspect of the film.
Smiling easily, Jolie said, “I brought my children to see the movie and they absolutely loved the movie and laughed though the whole thing.”Although she admitted she wondered if they would have questions, the issue never came up. “They just felt that much more proud that they were a little more like Po,” she added.
Nelson, the movie’s director, also talked about the role that Guillermo Del Toro, who is credited as creative consultant, played on the film. “It was a very long process, three years, and he came in right in the middle, when things were the messiest and pointed out all the things in the movie that we really should believe in and he helped us come up with some really great ideas,” she explained. “Part of what he did was try to make Shen even cooler. He came in and cracked a lot of jokes and really cheered us on. He was just an inspiration to work with.”
Jolie, Black seek "inner peace" in Kung Fu Panda 2
At a sometimes surreal press conference to promote the movie at the Cannes film festival on Thursday, the topics of discussion ranged from violence in film to China to adoption, although Black never allowed proceedings to get too serious.
"My inner peace is in pieces at the moment," he quipped to a large crowd of reporters in a plush hotel ballroom.
Kung Fu Panda 2 is the sequel to the successful 2008 original which earned $632 million at the international box office, and Black said there would be further sequels should the movies continue to succeed commercially.
In Kung Fu Panda 2, portly panda hero Po, voiced by Black, must find inner calm to defeat his nemesis Lord Shen, an evil peacock played by Gary Oldman who sets out to conquer China with an "unstoppable" weapon and to destroy kung fu once and for all.
He also discovers that he is adopted -- not a major surprise to movie goers considering his "father" is a goose.
Oscar-winner Jolie provides the voice for Tigress, while Dustin Hoffman portrays Master Shifu, Po's mentor in a story set in ancient China against backdrops of lush forests, towering temples and crowded cities.
Although Kung Fu Panda 2 is not in the main Cannes line-up, the festival welcomes such blockbusters because they attract A-list stars like Jolie and generate the kind of buzz among media and fans on which the annual event thrives.
Jolie is in France with her family, and partner Brad Pitt is expected on the red carpet later in the festival for his part in Terrence Malick's in-competition "The Tree of Life."
ADOPTION A "HAPPY WORD"
The actress said the fact that Po discovers he is adopted in the movie meant her three adopted children felt closer to the character. She also has three biological children.
"I brought my children to see the movie and they absolutely love the movie ... and I wondered whether they'd ask me questions about it.
"But because 'adoption' and 'birth mothers' and 'orphanage' and all that in our home these are happy words, they're used to these discussions and they just felt that much more proud that they were a little more like Po."
Asked about the violence in the film, Black replied: "It (the film) discourages weaponry. I don't like guns. I don't own one. I like laser blasters. That's where I draw the line."
Hoffman said the first movie he ever saw was the cartoon "Bambi," which contained surprisingly disturbing scenes.
"You can connect Bambi and Pinocchio to violence," said the 73-year-old Oscar winner. "In Bambi there was a big fire in the woods. I literally remember bursting out crying and leaving because all the animals were being killed by fire."
Asked whether he thought pandas had "existential moments," Black replied:
"Maybe they do for brief moments, gnawing on a bamboo shoot they think what is life all about? What is the point in this meaningless universe that goes on forever? May be all life forms have fleeting moments of existentiality. You can print that."
(Reporting by Mike Collett-White, editing by Paul Casciato)
"My inner peace is in pieces at the moment," he quipped to a large crowd of reporters in a plush hotel ballroom.
Kung Fu Panda 2 is the sequel to the successful 2008 original which earned $632 million at the international box office, and Black said there would be further sequels should the movies continue to succeed commercially.
In Kung Fu Panda 2, portly panda hero Po, voiced by Black, must find inner calm to defeat his nemesis Lord Shen, an evil peacock played by Gary Oldman who sets out to conquer China with an "unstoppable" weapon and to destroy kung fu once and for all.
He also discovers that he is adopted -- not a major surprise to movie goers considering his "father" is a goose.
Oscar-winner Jolie provides the voice for Tigress, while Dustin Hoffman portrays Master Shifu, Po's mentor in a story set in ancient China against backdrops of lush forests, towering temples and crowded cities.
Although Kung Fu Panda 2 is not in the main Cannes line-up, the festival welcomes such blockbusters because they attract A-list stars like Jolie and generate the kind of buzz among media and fans on which the annual event thrives.
Jolie is in France with her family, and partner Brad Pitt is expected on the red carpet later in the festival for his part in Terrence Malick's in-competition "The Tree of Life."
ADOPTION A "HAPPY WORD"
The actress said the fact that Po discovers he is adopted in the movie meant her three adopted children felt closer to the character. She also has three biological children.
"I brought my children to see the movie and they absolutely love the movie ... and I wondered whether they'd ask me questions about it.
"But because 'adoption' and 'birth mothers' and 'orphanage' and all that in our home these are happy words, they're used to these discussions and they just felt that much more proud that they were a little more like Po."
Asked about the violence in the film, Black replied: "It (the film) discourages weaponry. I don't like guns. I don't own one. I like laser blasters. That's where I draw the line."
Hoffman said the first movie he ever saw was the cartoon "Bambi," which contained surprisingly disturbing scenes.
"You can connect Bambi and Pinocchio to violence," said the 73-year-old Oscar winner. "In Bambi there was a big fire in the woods. I literally remember bursting out crying and leaving because all the animals were being killed by fire."
Asked whether he thought pandas had "existential moments," Black replied:
"Maybe they do for brief moments, gnawing on a bamboo shoot they think what is life all about? What is the point in this meaningless universe that goes on forever? May be all life forms have fleeting moments of existentiality. You can print that."
(Reporting by Mike Collett-White, editing by Paul Casciato)
Cannes 2011: Kung Fu Panda returns to the Riviera
Jolie, Black and Hoffman bring A-list glitz to the fest.
Hollywood hit the Croisette in force this morning as Jack Black, Angelina Jolie and Dustin Hoffman turned up to promote animated sequel Kung Fu Panda 2.The trio, along with debut director Jennifer Yuh, made their way into a packed press conference after the usual posing-with-a-cuddly-panda photo duties.
Jolie was classy and charming, Black was typically boisterous and Hoffman kept himself amused by offering some hilariously sardonic responses to some of the sillier questions.
The film picks up the story of titular warrior Po (Black), who sets out to defeat evil peacock Lord Shen (Gary Oldman) with the help of fellow ‘Furious Five’ fighter Tigress (Jolie) and red panda master Shifu (Hoffman).
“The trick with sequels is you have to make it better than the first one, and I think we’ve pulled it off,” said Jolie.
“It was more fun the second time around because we’d all gotten to know each other [on the press tour for the first movie] and our characters had history, so it was fun to jump in.”
When asked why he’d signed on for a sequel, Hoffman quipped: “At my age I have no short-term memory, so I can’t answer that…”
Being serious for a moment, he added: “I think we’re in a golden age of animation and I think this is as good as it gets.
“It’s very difficult to make any sequel as good if not better than the first and I do think my colleagues have made a deeper, more emotional film.”
Black, meanwhile, applauded the film’s anti-weapon stance, albeit in his own unique style.
“The Furious Five never use actual weapons. It’s all kung fu, so in a way it’s a non-violent film – it discourages weaponry!” he said.
“I don’t like guns. I like laser blasters, but that’s where I draw the line.”
Amid all the craziness, first-time director Yuh hardly got a look-in, although she did manage to applaud the involvement of exec producer Guillermo del Toro.
“It’s a very long process,” she explained of the film’s three-year production. “Guillermo came in right in the middle and helped us come up with some really great ideas, like making Shen even cooler.
“He cracked a lot of jokes and really cheered us up in the middle of a really long project. He was just an inspiration to work with.”
Kung Fu Panda 2 opens on 10 June.
