127 HOURS -- Danny Boyle on luck, life, and blessings in disguise

00:00 - 00:56 Intro and first question about why he is the artistic director of the 2012 London Olympics.

00:56 - 01:29 Accepted the invitation because they asked him and he was flattered. Plus, it’s in an area near him that will benefit from the development and he’s a sports nut anyway. It’s best to make these sorts of decisions quickly, and that’s what he did.

01:34 - 02:45 His plans to de-escalate the spectacle that has grown up around the opening ceremonies since the Los Angeles Olympics in the 80s. It should be more about the spirit of the games, plus it would be obscene in these economic times to spend that kind of money, even if there were those sums of money to spend. He wants to make it a more intimate experience, though the audience in the stadium will be bigger than the on in Beijing.

03:03 - 04:32 The image that let him know he could make a film about a man trapped in a canyon. It was that of Ralston, with his hand pinned, is somehow shaking hands with that canyon. As for the key to the character, it’s a man who is the perfect specimen, but not the perfect man in the way he chooses to be solitary. The canyon with this predicament is forcing him to re-evaluate his life He praises Franco’s performance for making the film so compelling.

04:43 - 05:40 Demurs the praise for how he directed it. In the end, he says, it’s the actor who makes the film. Ninety-five percent of the people don’t care about the director. Audiences want to be able to empathize with the actor and discover something about themselves.

05:55 - 07:41 Discusses how he depicts nature as being beautiful, but indifferent to humankind. Since Ralston spends most of the film trapped, you don’t see much of it except at the beginning and end, therefore not really a wilderness film. We read things into nature, though it is indifferent. He goes on to say that the film could just as well have taken place in a corridor in a building after everyone has gone home for the weekend. Adds that Ralston had told him that he felt that he had been working up to this place and this moment. He thought he deserved it in a way in the way he had lived his life impulsively.

07:52 - 08:52 The effect on Boyle personally when Ralston entrusted to him and Franco the videos he had made while trapped and he thought he was going to die. Boyle, aside from being grateful, said it made him avaricious. Many of the messages in the video became part of the film. What was most interesting was the way Ralston tried to maintain his dignity even when he knew he was going to die to make it easier on his mother when he watched it later.

09:00 - 09:45 How organized Ralston was while he was trapped. Boyle discusses how people organize themselves as a reaction to chaos, invoking the Chilean miners when they were trapped underground.

09:59 - 11:20 Why he returned to the canyon at the same time of year that the story actually takes place. The canyon was also re-created in a warehouse in Salt Lake City partly because of the difficulty of filming everything there, plus the danger of the terrain. The location work also coincided with the seventh anniversary of Ralston’s entrapment and he was present for that.

11:26 - 11:56 Boyle discusses what Ralston has told him his reactions are to seeing the film. Parts of it leave him cold, parts of it, though, he’d suddenly be overwhelmed.

12:14 -12:50 The timing of when Ralston amputated his arm and why if he had done it sooner, he would surely have bled to death. Plus the coincidence of running into a family that could help him get out of the wilderness once he had freed himself. There was a lot of luck.

12:54 - 13:37 What Ralston knew and didn’t know about physiology. The steepness of Horseshoe Canyon and the effect on Boyle walking it without the physical stress Ralston had experience.

13:46 - 15:30 Depicting the amputation sequence. The effect of sound on an audience as opposed to the visual impact and why the former is more potent than the latter. The amputation itself presented as closely as possible to the way Ralston described it in his book. Boyle also wanted to the sequence to be not just harrowing, but the gateway to something euphoric when Ralston frees himself. And the scene of Ralston asking for help as the epiphany of the film.

15:38 - 15:59 The effect of the screening at the Toronto International Film Festival where one person had to be carried out in a faint. Boyle expected a few walk-outs during the amputation scene, but not that. He suspects that people were unprepared for it, but now that press has reported it, and audiences know what to expect, it shouldn’t happen again.

16:02 - 16:10 One of the guys who fainted, when he came round, did say, by the way, great film. Laughs. A sense of humor in the most desperate circumstances is always welcome.

16:11 - 16:16 Thank yous and outro.