Flying Lotus‘ new movie “Ash,” opening in theaters Friday via RLJE Films and Shudder, is a psychedelic space odyssey that follows an amnesiac astronaut (Eiza González) who finds the rest of her crew dead, with no idea who did it. Tensions rise when a mysterious astronaut, played by Aaron Paul, shows up. The duo descends into paranoia and panic as they try to pinpoint what the deadly force is and how they can escape the dangerous planet.
Flying Lotus, who is an influential electronic musician and producer when he’s not making movies, spoke with Variety about the inspirations for his sophomore feature, how “Suspiria” shaped the visuals and why González was at the perfect point in her career to star in the film.
What about this project first captured your imagination?
There’s been a few false starts with projects at XYZ Films. We’ve been trying to get something going for a long time. They would send me some material, and oftentimes it just wouldn’t be the right thing. It was mostly because I couldn’t find what I could bring to it. Why me? You could get any person straight out of film school to do the slasher movie. When I read “Ash,” I was like, “No, no, this needs me, or else it’s going be put in the wrong hands and then it’s not going to be good for anybody.” I had that feeling that it was precious already … please don’t fuck this up. It was one of those things where I couldn’t put the script down. The typical criteria that gets a director going is you want to know what’s going to happen next. You start coming up with images and visuals in your head. But I think more than anything I saw an opportunity to experiment and try things. The script was written in a way that was like a puzzle, but at the same time it felt like more of a blueprint than a Bible. It allowed me space, and credit to the writer, Jonni Remmler, who wasn’t super precious about his contributions and would be willing to change stuff and reimagine the scene. We hammered out ideas for over a year before we even got into production.
Your star, Eiza González, does such heavy lifting as the solo lead for much of the film. Was there a performance of hers you saw, or a moment when meeting her, when you first knew she’d be a great match for the material?
I knew it was going to work right out of the gate, just because of the type of person she is. I felt like at this point in her career too she was like the character: She has something to prove, and she’s out here trying to survive. She had to bring a lot of personality to this role, and she had to just be on and be fierce and caring, carrying this movie. I saw her work, I saw what she was capable of. When we started talking, she was talking to me about “Silent Hill” and video games right out of the gate. I said, “Yep, that’s exactly what I’m thinking. We’re seeing the same thing. I think we need to do this.”
The other star of the show is the visual language — the colors and lights are very dynamic. How did you first speak with your DP about what you wanted the film to look like?
The look and vibe ultimately started with psychedelic film. I was really into “Suspiria.” Now, “Suspiria” was a huge inspiration in this because I knew we would have a lot of limitations. I knew we didn’t have a big budget. But we had whatever lights I wanted, and I wanted to take the road less traveled with sci-fi, not the usual kind of fluorescent Apple store. I wanted to try and do something a little different. I’m also a big fan of music videos from the early 2000s, from folks like Michel Gondry and Chris Cunningham. All that stuff is still hugely inspirational, and that era, like Jean-Pierre Jeunet, from “The City of Lost Children.” Those movies that he did had super strong color grades. Also Panos Cosmatos, he’s a friend of mine and we would hit him up all the time and pick his brain and complain about the process and be like, “Dude, is it always gonna be this way?” So yeah it was so nice to have him and some of my other other kind of seasoned director friends as shining lights in this. I had Neill Blomkamp as an executive producer. He was someone I would hit up all the time while he was doing “Gran Turismo.” He was super helpful in connecting me with some people and giving a bit of sage advice when I needed it.
How did you first visualize the gore in the film?
Having had so much time before we filmed, I was able to put together a strong look book and reference points of things I like. I was also just lucky enough to work with these great artists. They had just come off of “Evil Dead Rise” right before we started. So they were like, “Yeah, man, you like buckets of blood.” They were super proud of their work. I said, “Let’s do one better, bro. Let’s go!” Just being with those people who are so seasoned: They’re “Lord of the Ring” veterans, “Avatar” veterans who came and worked on this project and made it super fun and easy.
You also scored the film. When do you start to conceptualize music for a directing project?
I started writing music as soon as I was attached to the gig. I knew exactly what I wanted to soundtrack to be. I knew exactly what I wanted to score to sound like. And then when I got into the editing room, none of it worked. I thought, “Oh…so we gotta do it all over again. OK, cool.” I had this great idea, but when it came down to it, it was just not the movie that was being shown to me. It’s a cool thing when you get to listen to the movie. You’ve got to see what you’ve got and think, “OK, it wasn’t that, so let me adapt and make it what it needs to be,” versus trying to force things that it’s not meant to be.
How was the original score different?
I want to tell you so bad, but I want to save it for another day. I’ll just say as a reference point it felt like “Bitches Brew” by Miles Davis, but sci-fi.
Since you made “Ash” on a limited budget, what advice would you give filmmakers who are hoping to create their own vision on a low budget?
Fight for all the things that you love and you want, but at the same time, listen to the people around you. Be willing to take advice, be willing to take feedback. Find the best project out of your limitations. I think being able to adapt is truly the director’s call. That’s when you know the real ones from the fakes. Every day you’re going to have to compromise a little bit, so how you creatively compromise and get around is the sign right there.
For future filmmaking projects, do you see yourself staying in the genre world, or would you want to go in a radically different direction? Could we see a FlyLo rom-com someday?
I’m not ever going to say no to whatever. I don’t wanna put myself in my own box here, but I think I would prefer to stay in the places where I can bring things to the project. I don’t want to do a thing that is so tied into someone else’s concepts or another franchise where I can’t be free to play and do my thing. Even if they’re smaller projects, I think I’d much rather just focus on my ideas and the worlds I can create.
Are you hoping to focus on music next or filmmaking, or are they both intertwined so much for you that it’s hard to delineate?
I’m always at the chair to do music, the chair I sit in is the chair I make music in, so that’s always gonna be there no matter what. I would love to do another film soon if the right thing happens, but I’m definitely not in a hurry to get back into it. The pain of birth is still fresh.
Watch the “Ash” trailer below.