Django chained up....

[Chris James]

Okay, the good news: the film Django Unchained is now back in Chinese theaters after the censors had their makeover. The bad news: they removed the N word in the dialogue and the film is now 14 minutes long. (Just joking). http://movies.msn.com/movies/article.aspx?news=807258

[The Pecman]

Somebody counted and said there are about 110 "N-words" in the entire movie. But the movie is absolutely fantastic. And from a race standpoint, I don't think there's a single white character left alive by the end. [uh, spoiler alert.]

I think I've told this story before, but in October last year, I worked on a shoot at Melody Ranch, which is a permanent Western town set about 10 miles from my house, out in Valencia. In late December, when we watched Django, they got to the town scene where Cristof Waltz shoots the sheriff and I thought, "man, that bar looks familiar." And of course, it was the same bar in which I had spent 3 days shooting that little October project.

It's amazing how great that town looks in the movie, particularly when you fill the streets with 200 extras, horses, lots of props, signs, and so on. Just walking around those sets (which you can see in great detail in the TV show Deadwood made me appreciate what it must have been like to be alive in the 1800s, and what the sidewalks and ground felt like under your feet, the muddy texture of the streets, the doors, the walls, and so on. Amazing experience.