‘Hallo’ is hello in Dutch, something Jerome Bosch must have said to his wife Aleid after a days work at the workshop, followed by ‘schat, ik ben thuis’ or ‘honey, I’m home’. You are reading blog number 1 about the making of the animated feature film Hieronymus. We plan to post on a reasonably frequent basis, which means every once in a while.
We can’t show much visuals yet, because we are still in pre-production. There’s a fantastic screenplay, a lot of sketches and of course the art of the master himself. These paintings serve as a basis for the fantastic medieval universe that we are about to create. For now we’d like to present a short interview with the writer and director of this project, Erik van Schaaik:
Q: Why do you want to make a movie about Bosch? Why not Van Gogh or Rembrandt?
A: Obviously because Bosch is a one of a kind artist! The first ‘heavy metal artist’. There’s nobody like Bosch. It’s a mystery why nobody ever attempted to make a movie about him. (I’m glad they didn’t, and get to do it myself!) Bosch’s world is just excellent animation-material. Also the period in which he lived appeals to the imagination: the middle ages, witch hunt, the plague, city fires, crusades, Columbus discovering the world is actually round, Vlad Tepes playing Dracula over in Transylvania. Turbulent times, I tell you.
Q: Not much is known about Bosch. How did you create the story for the movie?
A: I started with a lot of research and a lot of staring at the paintings. I’ve been doing that since I was a little boy, so I kinda feel at home in these paintings. Then I wrote tons of stuff that was no good. And finally I asked myself: What if my Jerome Bosch is a fifteen year old boy, living in these turbulent times, and he’s having all these horrible nightmares. Then somehow the nightmare creatures escape from his head and all hell breaks loose. Jerome has to set things right, and in doing so he becomes the famous painter we know today. A coming of age story that explains how he actually got away painting all these bizarre devils without ending up at the stake.
Q: Are all characters in the movie based on the paintings?
A: Almost every character is an actual historical figure or based on a character in the paintings. The same goes for the locations. You can actually visit some of the spectacular locations that are featured in this movie, like the great St. John cathedral of Den Bosch, and the river De Diese, that goes underneath the city.
Q: You finished the screenplay. What’s next?
A: I’m assisting producer Jiek Weishut with production work and I’m drawing a lot, just to create a reference of the movies universe. In the meantime I am guiding the development of technique and style, and assembling a team of artists that are going to create the moving storyboards. Finally, after some two year of writing, we get to actually see stuff. Very exciting!