Good news, or bad, depending if you like Alex Garland’s brand of filmmaking.
On Saturday, Garland (“Civil War“) told The Guardian that he wasn’t “planning to direct again in the foreseeable future”. He’s now clarifying with IndieWire that he meant it as only taking a break from filmmaking, and not retiring.
“I said I’m going to stop directing for the foreseeable future. Why would a statement like that be taken and picked over or interpreted to that degree?
Garland was also quick to pinpoint that just because he’s not going to be directing does not mean he won’t be writing screenplays
I also said what I’m going to do is screenwriting. Screenwriting is filmmaking. You can’t erase screenwriters, DOPs, editors, or actors from the process of screenwriting. Filmmaking is not the preserve solely of directors.
Back in 2022, Garland made similar statements about hanging up his directing gloves because he was “not temperamentally suited to being a film director.”
In The Guardian interview, Garland admitted that he’d “fallen out of love” with filmmaking. So, why was another A24 project just announced, titled “Warfare,” with Garland co-directing this time around, with Ray Mendoza?
The filmmaker, again, clarifies that he is only co-directing that film, “I respect [Mendzoa] a great deal, though we’re very different.” It sounds like his participation in “Warfare” is more about helping out Mendoza in his feature directing debut than instilling his own vision of things.
Garland will also be writing the now-confirmed “28 Days Later” sequel, which will see him reuniting with Danny Boyle. The plan is to turn it into a new trilogy of films, with Garland writing all three. He won’t be directing any of those films.