Latest / Exploring Humanity Through Sci-Fi / Ji: Love and Duty Across Ruins

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Ji: Love and Duty Across Ruins · Exploring Humanity Through Sci-Fi

• 0:00
  I revisit a film called G, a visually striking sci-fi romance short that imagines a future where humanity has fractured across worlds.
• 0:10
  After centuries of pollution, war, and collapse, Earth is left in ruins.
• 0:16
  The East escapes to build a pristine off-world colony called Nilo, while the West seals itself behind fortified walls.
• 0:26
  This is exploring humanity through sci-fi. This continues my mission to get a better understanding of ourselves through sci-fi, fantasy, horror, and comics as our mode of exploration.
• 0:38
  From this emerges G, a disciplined neo-general played by Louis Tan.
• 0:44
  Rumors swirl on Nilo that life exists on Earth, a claim their government denies.
• 0:50
  G risks everything to descend to the planet of his ancestors, only to discover Tiffany, a resilient Earth survivor portrayed by Eva Domenici.
• 1:01
  Their connection forces G into a choice that could reshape both worlds.
• 1:07
  I chatted with Ben Griffin, the film's director, to explore the film's emotional core, its world-building, and the timeless tension between duty and love.
• 1:19
  And I can't say what a great home it is to have, or a showcase to have this on Dust.
• 1:26
  They're a terrific group, and they love films like this.
• 1:31
  Oh, yeah. I mean, they're an amazing channel, and I love the content they put out.
• 1:37
  I mean, everything is just great and awesome, you know, especially if you love sci-fi stuff.
• 1:42
  I mean, they have some really, really great projects on there for sure.
• 1:46
  Let's talk about this cast. Eva Domenici is just absolutely stunning.
• 1:53
  I get the impression she's done only a few English-speaking films. Is that right?
• 1:58
  Yeah. My casting directors brought her over to me because, actually, we were having a difficult time casting that character.
• 2:06
  I didn't really know what I wanted, and I wasn't seeing it in everything they were sending.
• 2:10
  And then they sent me her. And, yeah, she pretty much only done Spanish films.
• 2:15
  She's from Argentina, and she's actually really popular over there.
• 2:20
  She does a lot of stuff in the Latin market.
• 2:24
  And, yeah, I think at the time she'd only done one American film.
• 2:29
  But the weird thing is she was actually in the running to do a movie with Leonardo DiCaprio at the time.
• 2:36
  They're like, yeah, she's getting a lot of buzz and everything, and they're like, check her out.
• 2:42
  Of course, just her look. Yeah, like you said, she's stunning.
• 2:46
  But she's a great actress as well.
• 2:49
  I watched some of her Spanish films, and she has so much emotion and the way she delivers everything.
• 2:56
  The character she brings to her role was great.
• 3:00
  And in the beginning, it's not exactly like I wanted someone to have a Spanish accent in it.
• 3:06
  But in a way, I kind of liked her natural accent versus her trying to put on an American accent, which she can.
• 3:14
  And they sent me examples of that, too.
• 3:16
  But I just felt like, you know, her acting just came across as more authentic and real when it was just her natural accent.
• 3:23
  And she's amazing. And I was just so happy that she was excited to do the project.
• 3:28
  And, you know, she had the time to do it when we were filming, for sure.
• 3:32
  More on the film G in just a moment.
• 3:39
  As a Cuban-American with relatives in Argentina, I can only say that I'm very fond of accents, so I'm glad you kept it in.
• 3:47
  Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 3:50
  So the male lead is Peter.
• 3:52
  Peter Adrian Sudu, I can't pronounce his last name.
• 3:56
  Sudarso, is that right?
• 3:58
  No, no, the male lead is actually, it's Lewis Tan.
• 4:01
  Lewis Tan. Yeah, OK.
• 4:03
  Peter's the villain. Peter's the villain.
• 4:05
  Oh, he is? OK.
• 4:07
  Yeah, but Lewis also produced this, too.
• 4:09
  Yeah, Lewis came on as a producer.
• 4:11
  Actually, Lewis is someone I was looking for the lead role.
• 4:15
  I wanted someone, you know, kind of a Euro-Asian mix.
• 4:19
  You know, I wanted someone that had that look.
• 4:21
  That's what I wanted for the character, but I also needed someone who could fight.
• 4:24
  There's not a lot of actors like that out there.
• 4:26
  So when I was searching, I came across Lewis, and it just so happened that my stunt coordinator knew him personally and reached out.
• 4:35
  It was a little difficult at first because he was working on a lot of projects at the time.
• 4:39
  He was shooting Deadpool 2 when we first reached out, and then he came back to work on another TV show.
• 4:45
  And then he was about to go to another one, but I was able to meet with him and talk with him.
• 4:50
  And, you know, he really liked the project.
• 4:53
  I mean, he really took to it.
• 4:54
  And, you know, so when we did the, you know, I don't want to just act in this.
• 5:00
  I want to be a producer.
• 5:01
  I want to help, you know, kind of put it together and make this happen.
• 5:05
  And I was like, I mean, man, that's awesome.
• 5:07
  You know, I'm all for it.
• 5:09
  And I was just really happy to have him, you know, so all in with the project like that, for sure.
• 5:15
  That's awesome.
• 5:16
  Yeah, I mean, you potentially have two people in this movie that could literally explode career-wise coming up.
• 5:23
  Oh, yeah.
• 5:24
  Yeah.
• 5:25
  And they have been, you know, since we filmed.
• 5:28
  After we filmed more, Lewis just did the new Mortal Kombat film that Warner Brothers did.
• 5:33
  There you go.
• 5:34
  He's like the lead character in there.
• 5:36
  And Ava just did a big sci-fi film with Bruce Willis.
• 5:40
  It's coming out later this year.
• 5:42
  So, yeah, they've all just been, yeah, just moved on to, you know, a really great project.
• 5:47
  So I'm really happy for them, you know, and I think it'll also help with the future prospects of G and, you know, expanding it into like a long-form series for sure.
• 5:58
  That'd be nice.
• 5:59
  That'd be real nice.
• 6:00
  Yeah, that's great.
• 6:01
  You know, and A plus for diversity.
• 6:04
  Obviously, in both your leads, you have, you know, he's mixed.
• 6:09
  And I mean, I have two nieces that are half Chinese.
• 6:14
  And so, I mean, it's part of my family.
• 6:17
  So it reflects what's going on in the world.
• 6:20
  And Latina as a female lead, I mean, that just, I'm thrilled to death.
• 6:25
  I think this is awesome.
• 6:26
  Yeah.
• 6:27
  I mean, and for me personally, that's a very important part of all the narrative stories that I want to tell.
• 6:35
  You know, because me, myself, I'm mixed ethnicity.
• 6:38
  I'm black, white, and Native American.
• 6:41
  And I grew up in a very diverse area.
• 6:44
  You know, there was a lot of like Asian and Indian and Latin and white.
• 6:49
  It was pretty much everything.
• 6:50
  And I had a lot of friends who were mixed race as well, you know.
• 6:53
  And so, I think it's kind of a big part of our nation.
• 6:59
  Like, I feel like our nation is very kind of mixed up in general.
• 7:02
  And a lot of times, like, we don't really tell those stories, you know.
• 7:07
  And not necessarily that this is a mixed race story at all.
• 7:10
  But I like to incorporate those types of characters and, you know, unique and diverse characters.
• 7:15
  Because to me, that's the world that I've experienced for the most part and the world that I've lived in.
• 7:20
  So I want to, you know, have those types of characters at the forefront of most of the stories that I want to tell.
• 7:27
  I've been around diversity all my life, really.
• 7:30
  So, I'd like to see that in my entertainment.
• 7:34
  And the 60s, most of the TV shows, mostly people that were just white.
• 7:39
  White Anglo-Saxon types.
• 7:41
  And the Latinos were butlers and maids and gardeners.
• 7:46
  So, it was kind of like, that's not the world I see.
• 7:49
  What's going on here?
• 7:51
  Yeah, exactly.
• 7:53
  So, I think we've turned a corner, hopefully, in that direction.
• 7:56
  And for people like you that have that experience as well is only going to move it in the right direction.
• 8:02
  So, kudos for that.
• 8:04
  So, you wrote and directed this.
• 8:08
  There's obviously a Romeo and Juliet kind of, you know, aspect to that.
• 8:14
  When you were writing this, and even when you got on set and were directing the actors,
• 8:19
  how did you kind of give it something fresh to it so that it wouldn't fall into that trope?
• 8:27
  One thing that I kind of look at storytelling and filmmaking like is, it's kind of like making gumbo.
• 8:36
  Right?
• 8:37
  That's right.
• 8:38
  You know, it's like, there's only so many stories, right?
• 8:41
  That's right.
• 8:42
  There's only seven stories in the whole world, right?
• 8:44
  Basically, all you can do is just mix a whole bunch of different ingredients together and hope that you come out with a new mix that's great or amazing, you know?
• 8:54
  And that's kind of what I tried to do here.
• 8:56
  Like, yes, I mean, there are a lot of elements in this that aren't other things.
• 9:00
  But you've never seen all of these different elements that I have mixed together in this certain way, you know?
• 9:06
  And now we're kind of, my idea of this is to take all these things that people are familiar with, whether it's future and aliens or human augmentation,
• 9:17
  or the post-apocalyptic Earth and kung fu and fighting and swords and ships and all these things, and then romance.
• 9:31
  Because a lot of times you don't see, and it's strange for a lot of people to tell them, oh yeah, it's a sci-fi romance action film.
• 9:38
  And a lot of times you don't hear those three things together.
• 9:41
  No.
• 9:42
  You definitely don't hear sci-fi romance.
• 9:45
  Definitely not.
• 9:46
  You know, you hear sci-fi action all the time, you know, or maybe your sci-fi film has a love story in it, but that's not the crux of it, you know?
• 9:58
  And that's kind of what I wanted to do that was different here.
• 10:01
  I wanted to make something that was, it's a romance film for the most part, you know?
• 10:05
  I was trying to go full on, you know, the notebook with it, but it's also sci-fi and it also has action in it.
• 10:13
  And that was kind of like my mix that I wanted to put together that I've never seen really done before.
• 10:20
  And that was kind of the new angle that I was trying to put on, you know, my story and the whole genre and everything.
• 10:27
  I'm kind of asking your opinion.
• 10:29
  I kind of believe in this, that if you take one element of a story that even could be, well, it is a main plot, but it is, it could stand on its own.
• 10:40
  So, in other words, if the love story is good enough to stand on its own, then, you know, you can add the action and the sci-fi elements and it's all going to work because you have that core story that is going to ground the film.
• 10:55
  Exactly. Exactly. You know, and it's, it's so important that that, that core story touches you or makes sense because once that does, then it makes everything else that much better.
• 11:07
  Like when, then the action has more stakes, right?
• 11:10
  Like if you're invested in the characters and that action actually means something, it's not mindless stuff, you know?
• 11:17
  And then even the sci-fi elements of it kind of drive the reasoning behind the love and the emotions in there, in the film.
• 11:25
  Like everything kind of feeds off of each other.
• 11:28
  Yeah. So it's a short, I'm sure there were, there were challenges.
• 11:34
  The story has to move along a little quicker than it would in a feature, obviously.
• 11:40
  So I guess, was there elements that you had to leave out as you were writing this?
• 11:45
  I mean, yeah, of course. You know, cause initially, even though it's a short, in all reality, it's a proof of concept.
• 11:52
  So it's a proof of concept for, at first we were looking at as a longer feature, but then as we got to developing it, we feel that it would be better served as a long form series.
• 12:04
  And so it was a proof of concept for that.
• 12:07
  So we were just trying to get across the basis of the story and the characters of the world in a way that you could understand to where you'd be excited to see more of it.
• 12:15
  So, and then also, of course, there was also budgetary concerns. There was only so much budget we had to do it.
• 12:21
  So there were certain things we couldn't show or couldn't do.
• 12:24
  So we were trying to be very, you know, just mindful of what we showed, making sure that it was enough to tell a story,
• 12:32
  but it was also enough to give you a taste of the world that you kind of understood it.
• 12:37
  You know, in the end, there might be like a little bit of kind of the backstory of everything that we kind of had to like cram a little bit into the beginning of the show.
• 12:46
  You know, and especially if people later go to watch it, once it comes out on the website, on the G from Nilo website, we do have a little more backstory of the universe on there that kind of helps you grasp it a little more.
• 13:00
  I mean, so if there was anything I wish we could add, it would be more of the backstory.
• 13:05
  But since it was so short, we didn't want to front load it too heavy with like all this stuff you're trying to learn, you know, before you get into the short thing, you know, we tried to keep it as concise as possible.
• 13:18
  So you it doesn't take you out. Right.
• 13:21
  Yeah.
• 13:22
  Oh, that's that's cool.
• 13:24
  Why don't we take a short break?
• 13:26
  We're talking to Ben Griffin. He is the writer and director of the new film G short film that you'll be able to see on Dustin.
• 13:34
  We will be right back.
• 13:49
  It sounds like your goal, if it does well, is to do this as a series rather than a feature film.
• 13:57
  Yes, that is correct. I mean, honestly, we have both written.
• 14:01
  We do have a feature version of it written and we do have the long form series written as well.
• 14:07
  But preferable to me at this point would be the series for sure.
• 14:11
  That's a lot of pre planning ahead of time.
• 14:13
  Yeah. I mean, it's something I do.
• 14:15
  I write a lot. I've been writing a lot, you know, for a while because I'm also developing like a few graphic novels.
• 14:21
  So I'm always thinking ideas. I'm writing stuff down.
• 14:25
  I try and, you know, every day, you know, at least a few times a week, just sit down and write some things.
• 14:31
  You know, I have a wealth of things written that are ready to go because it's just something I like to do.
• 14:38
  You know, yeah.
• 14:41
  So special effects wise, you are limited in time and budget.
• 14:45
  So how did you approach that?
• 14:47
  Did you try to do as much on the set or in camera as opposed to going totally digital?
• 14:55
  Yes. I mean, and that's something like no matter what the budget, at least in my filmmaking career,
• 15:02
  I found that the more you can do on set and the more that you have live and tangible on set,
• 15:08
  the better your final shot is going to look when you add effects to it.
• 15:12
  It's like when something is 100 percent digital, it's just hard to like make it look convincing.
• 15:18
  So that's something that like no matter what the budget, I'll always try to have as much physical items on set as possible,
• 15:25
  even if we're going to just replace some of those things 100 percent.
• 15:28
  And so that was something that was really important to me.
• 15:31
  And with that sense, it was something that was just a project that I was doing.
• 15:35
  And it's not like we had a client with a release date.
• 15:38
  We were able to take our time in post, which made me be able to save money on the visual effects.
• 15:44
  That was the longest process of this whole thing was the visual effects.
• 15:48
  There's like 80 visual effects shots in there.
• 15:52
  You can't even tell it looks seamless like it was there, but it's not, you know.
• 15:58
  And so those 80 shots, it took us six months.
• 16:01
  Also, yeah, I had a company that was in the Ukraine doing it.
• 16:06
  So to help with cost. But, you know, they're a great company and they do a lot of work.
• 16:11
  So we kind of had to have them do this between their other projects and other things they have would take priority.
• 16:17
  So it was a long process, but it allowed us to do it within the budget we have, which wasn't that much.
• 16:24
  Definitely would have been doable here in the U.S. on any type of quick schedule, you know, at all.
• 16:30
  But that's how we approached that. We had time on our side.
• 16:33
  We had time on our side to do it and do it right.
• 16:36
  Cool. But you're also a cinematographer. Does that and you did it on this film as well.
• 16:43
  When you wear that hat, does it kind of inform the director's side a little bit?
• 16:48
  Because obviously you can see the scene in front of you and how it's going to play out and how it's going to be lit and shot.
• 16:55
  So does that help you as a director?
• 16:58
  Yeah, I feel in some ways it does.
• 17:01
  Like most of my career, most of what I've done is like music video and kind of commercial work.
• 17:05
  And a lot of that stuff, actually not a lot, all of it I've shot as well myself.
• 17:10
  And I also DP for other directors as well. And I just kind of like working that way.
• 17:14
  I like shooting my own stuff because it kind of gives me full control over the scene as far as the look and the tone.
• 17:21
  And there's never any kind of understanding error or mistake between me and someone else.
• 17:26
  How it's supposed to be lit or how the camera's supposed to move or whatever, because I'm kind of in control of that.
• 17:32
  And I'm able to kind of change it quicker on the fly if it's not working with the scene.
• 17:36
  Like if the blocking with the actors or how they want to move or do their thing is not working with how we have it set,
• 17:42
  I'm able to just change it really quickly and make it work correctly.
• 17:46
  So I found that shooting, at least for me, shooting while directing doesn't really hinder me and it kind of helps in a way.
• 17:55
  Did you decide on a certain look or color palette for the film?
• 18:01
  That was set in a couple of ways. I mean, you know, first kind of like wardrobe and some of the set design choices.
• 18:10
  And then ultimately, like in the color grade, which I'm also very hands on with.
• 18:15
  You know, I sit in the entire time with my colorist and really kind of hone in on the final look we want to the image.
• 18:23
  So, yeah, I'm very, very involved in the overall look and color tone of the entire film.
• 18:30
  You mentioned that you worked on music videos, you work with people like Demi Lovato.
• 18:36
  What's that like? It doesn't seem like there's a lot of time that you have to do one of those.
• 18:41
  Music videos are very, very fast paced.
• 18:45
  It's like typically we usually only get the green light on a project, maybe just a week or two before we're going to shoot it.
• 18:54
  And we have to put it all together. And, you know, we're shooting in one day, maybe two days max.
• 19:00
  I mean, maybe the longest video we've ever done was three days.
• 19:04
  They're very quick. And then our turnaround is very quick.
• 19:07
  You know, a turnaround, we have to turn them around in a couple of weeks.
• 19:10
  I mean, the longest you'll ever have to post on a video is a month.
• 19:13
  And that's only a ton of visual effects.
• 19:17
  And in a way, that kind of helped me get this film made because our lead actor, once we finally got him locked in and contracted,
• 19:25
  it was like he had to leave for a show in two weeks.
• 19:28
  And so they're like, you have two weeks to film this.
• 19:30
  So we did all the pre-production for the entire film in two weeks.
• 19:35
  It was put together extremely fast.
• 19:38
  And if I didn't have the previous experience of years and years and years of music videos,
• 19:42
  of putting productions together that quickly, I don't know if we could have done it.
• 19:47
  You know, and also just long standing relationships to certain locations, rental companies and all that.
• 19:52
  We were just able to make everything happen extremely fast.
• 19:56
  And then even on the post side, I think we finished all the editing and everything within a week.
• 20:02
  Yeah, it was just the visual effects that took so long.
• 20:04
  And that was simply just because of money.
• 20:06
  Sure.
• 20:07
  We could have done it super fast.
• 20:09
  People don't realize that, you know, we just only see the finished product.
• 20:12
  There's a lot of moving parts to making a film.
• 20:16
  And as a director and also producer, you have a lot of decisions to make.
• 20:21
  Yeah, there's a lot.
• 20:23
  You know, I think on our biggest day on this film, we had like almost 75 people on set.
• 20:28
  Yeah.
• 20:29
  I mean, there's a lot of people that, especially once you get into the stunt work and with wires and fighters.
• 20:35
  I mean, there's lots of people.
• 20:38
  There's like 10 people involved just to get those guys up on the cranes with the wires and the air and flying and stunt doubles and fight choreographers and the whole lighting crew and camera crew, sound crew, wardrobe, makeup.
• 20:51
  There's tons of people and each department has their own thing.
• 20:54
  You have to make sure each department is on the right track and everyone's on the same page.
• 20:58
  Yeah, there's a lot of planning and coordination that goes on with making stuff.
• 21:04
  Especially when you're getting into things where you have live action going on, mixing visual effects and all this type of stuff.
• 21:11
  It adds a lot to the planning of a production or something like this.
• 21:17
  Those enhanced humans, they just can't do anything simple, can they?
• 21:22
  No.
• 21:23
  No, that's great, though.
• 21:25
  It sounds like a really good deal.
• 21:32
  That aspect is appealing about improving the human beings and making us better.
• 21:39
  It could be a good and a bad thing at the same time.
• 21:43
  Yeah, it definitely can.
• 21:45
  That's some of the themes that we explore here.
• 21:49
  Ultimately, this is a sci-fi film, right?
• 21:53
  But in all reality, everything that's said in here and everything that's done could potentially happen.
• 21:59
  We're working on genetic medicines right now that actually modify our DNA.
• 22:04
  Now, we're looking at them now to modify genetic defects.
• 22:08
  But once you get past that, if you're modifying the DNA, you can start modifying it to do other things.
• 22:14
  You can start modifying not just to fix defects, but to make things better or to make things superhuman or to make things whatever.
• 22:21
  At some point, we may get to the point where we're doing that en masse.
• 22:26
  Right now, we're trying to go to Mars and colonize Mars.
• 22:29
  Eventually, we'll colonize other planets.
• 22:31
  Maybe eventually, we'll just make planets.
• 22:33
  So that was kind of the whole thing about this show is that even though a lot of it seems fantastical, it's all things.
• 22:40
  If we look at the trajectory of the science that we're doing right now, we could eventually get to all of these things and be in this place.
• 22:48
  But ultimately, there's consequences to that, right?
• 22:51
  The further you push that, the further you push us away from our natural humanity, right?
• 22:57
  Yes.
• 22:58
  That's some of the issues that we're dealing with in this film here.
• 23:02
  It sounds like if it goes to series, and I'm crossing my fingers for you, that you have a lot more to explore than just in a short.
• 23:11
  Oh, yeah. Oh, definitely.
• 23:13
  That's one thing I've definitely done is expanded out the world and these characters and the backstories and their motivations and all of these things that are real questions that we'll have moving forward.
• 23:26
  We'll really dig a lot into that and how that all plays out.
• 23:31
  I think there's just an unlimited amount of stories and things to tell in this world if we're able to really expand it.
• 23:40
  All right. Yeah, yeah, definitely keeping my fingers crossed.
• 23:44
  Great. I know Dust doesn't pick any films to put on it.
• 23:49
  So you're in a pretty nice club.
• 23:52
  They've shown some great stuff already.
• 23:54
  They've had people like Pedro Pascal already on there in a really neat short film, too.
• 24:01
  And it's just really have done some groundbreaking things.
• 24:05
  And with audio drama, too, in the sci-fi vein.
• 24:08
  So they're killing it.
• 24:10
  Congratulations. It's it's a nice it's a very nice club to belong to.
• 24:15
  You can see the film on Dust and also on my website with this podcast episode.
• 24:21
  You can listen to it and watch the film there as well.
• 24:24
  Sci-Fi Talk Plus is a premium channel.
• 24:27
  And one of the features this summer is a look at summer movies with videos and also podcasts.
• 24:33
  This includes sit down interviews.
• 24:35
  The video has clicked when available and also red carpet interviews from around the world.
• 24:41
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• 24:47
  Available now is a disclosure day video and podcast.
• 24:51
  In addition, in production is Toy Story 5.
• 24:55
  Click on the link to get started.
• 24:57
  Thanks so much for listening.
• 24:59
  I'm Tony Tellato. Until next time.