Before Madame Webwas released earlier this year, Dakota Johnson‘s press tour was already creating quite a stir. After all, Johnson’s nonchalant attitude made some fans laugh while others couldn’t get behind her attitude.
In an interview with Bustle after the release in March, Johnson then opened up about the movie’s underwhelming reception and somewhat explained why it had been hard for her to get excited about it in the first place.
“It’s so hard to get movies made, and in these big movies that get made — and it’s even starting to happen with the little ones, which is what’s really freaking me out — decisions are being made by committees, and art does not do well when it’s made by committee,” Johnson told the outlet. “Films are made by a filmmaker and a team of artists around them.”
“You cannot make art based on numbers and algorithms,” she continued. “My feeling has been for a long time that audiences are extremely smart, and executives have started to believe that they’re not. Audiences will always be able to sniff out b—.”
And while a lot of what Johnson’s saying could be true, and reflect on the movie in theaters today, fellow DC and Marvel star Russell Crowe recently shared his two cents. “I don’t want to make any comments to what anybody else might have said or what their experience is, but… you’re bringing out the impish quality of my humor,” Crowe first said when asked about her comments by GQ UK.
Crowe then continued, talking about how Johnson’s expectations might’ve been unrealistic to begin with. “You’re telling me you signed up for a Marvel movie, and some f— universe for cartoon characters… and you didn’t get enough pathos?” Crowe questioned. “Not quite sure how I can make this better for you. It’s a gigantic machine, and they make movies at a certain size.”
“I’ve experienced that on the DC side with Man of Steel, Zack Snyder, and I’ve experienced it on the Marvel side via Disney with Thor: Love and Thunder. And I’ve also experienced the [Sony-produced] Marvel dark universe with Kraven the Hunter. These are jobs,” Crowe added. “You know: here’s your role, play the role.”
“If you’re expecting this to be some kind of life-changing event, I just think you’re here for the wrong reasons,” Crowe added, serving a major mic-drop moment.
Crowe then reflected on his experience, adding that Marvel movies like theirs are indeed quite different than any other movie set, be it good or bad.
“It can be challenging, working in a blue-screen world, when you have to convince yourself of a lot more than just the internal machinations of your character,” Crowe said, relating to Johnson. “But for anything to be… and you can’t make this a direct comment on her because I don’t know her and I don’t know what she went through, and the fact that you can have a s– experience on a film… Yeah, you can. But is that the Marvel process? I’m not sure you can say that.”
“I haven’t had a bad experience, he added. “I mean [on Thor], OK, it’s a Marvel movie, but it’s Taika Waititi’s world, and it was just a gas every day, being silly.”
The same can be said about his experiences with director JC Chandor on Kraven. “You know, so many of these directors have a certain skill level – freaking genius people,” he said. “Think about what’s required, right? It’s everything: the composition, the framing, the color, the music, what’s left outside the camera.”
Looks like Crowe’s got much more appreciation of what goes on behind the scenes in a Marvel/DC movie than Johnson. Maybe she’ll do some reflecting?
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