'Finding Dory' Voice Actor Willem Dafoe Excited for 'Finding Nemo 2', Unimpressed by 'Amazing Spider-Man' Reboot
Willem Dafoe was not impressed by 2012's The Amazing Spider-Man. According to the actor, fans already got the picture from 2002's Spider-Man trilogy.
The Amazing Spider-Man is a 2012 reboot of the Spider-Man franchise. It came just ten years after the first major Spider-Man motion picture, directed by Sam Raimi. The last movie of Raimi's trilogy was released in 2007.
Dafoe played a major part in the successful trilogy, portraying Norman Osborn and his alter ego the Green Goblin.
"I saw a trailer for the first Spider-Man reboot, and I thought, 'This is crazy!' It's not shot for shot, but it's the same story,'" Dafoe said in an interview with Total Film. "I thought, 'This is sort of a cynical approach to making money!'"
Dafoe portrayed the main villain in the first Spider-Man and then a haunting reminder to Harry Osborn, played by James Franco (Oz the Great and Powerful), to keep the villain in the Osbourn name in the sequels.
"I like Spider-Man, the first one that I was involved in, because although you can argue all sorts of things, from my perspective it was very pure," Dafoe said. "It really was. The way Sam Raimi approached it, it was pure in its intentions, and I think he captured, particularly, Tobey [Maguire] at that particular moment."
Dafoe also believes that his Spider-Man trilogy had a special innocence about it.
"This real, genuine innocence; it wasn't indicated," he said. "Then after that it became more difficult because it's hard to achieve that when it's gotten some kind of attention and a certain level of success."
As for Marc Webb's The Amazing Spider-Man reboot, Dafoe will not be watching the film anytime soon.
"Not so much," Dafoe said when asked if he was in a hurry to watch the film. "The older I get, I don't have the time to do everything that I want to do."
Dafoe has no negative words for Chris Cooper, however, who took over Dafoe's role in the reboot and its 2014 sequel.
"You know, in the theatre, people play the same role all the time. I don't know anything about it, really," Dafoe said.
Meanwhile, Dafoe is excited for a different sequel. Finding Dory, the sequel to 2003's Disney and Pixar film Finding Nemo will feature Dafoe reprising his role of the moorish Gill.
"Yeah I've already started," Dafoe told Total Film. "It's even better than the first. It's fantastic. It's good to say I think it's going to be better than the first; that's good advertising!"
Finding Dory will be released June 17, 2016.
"It's difficult to repeat a success and so many years afterwards, but it's really cool," Dafoe said. "I've done one session so far, and I just am going to have such a good time."