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Danny Boyle Surprises with Millions
There are several images that spring immediately to mind when discussing director Danny Boyle’s filmography—scheming flatmates, jaded junkies, rampaging zombies. Kids, however, are not his typical subject matter. When children show up in Boyle’s movies, you tend to find them climbing the walls during a detox hallucination or fending off hordes of the undead. So when news spread that the man who helped to revive the moribund British film industry with Trainspotting (1996) and revitalize the apocalyptic-horror genre with 28 Days Later (2002) was working on a sweet-natured kid’s film, you could hear the sounds of jaws dropping from across the Atlantic. Millions, Boyle’s new family-friendly film, showcases a kinder, gentler version of the 48-year-old director best known for filming Ewan McGregor plunging headfirst into the world’s foulest toilet, but maintains the same creative chutzpah that has thrilled critics and fans alike for more than a decade.
On its surface, Millions is a typical boys’ adventure yarn: Two lads living with their widower father have stumbled across several bags of stolen loot and must spend all of it in the last 24 hours before E-Day (a fictional holiday that will mark Britain’s turnover from its old currency to the Euro) renders the money useless. Naturally, there are some unsavory folks who’d like the money for themselves, and a comely young charity worker who would make an excellent companion for their dad. It sounds like any story you might pull off your local bookstore’s kid’s lit shelf.
But it’s Boyle’s telling that makes the film seem like such a genuine wonder, working in elements of surreal fantasy via the younger boy’s preoccupation with Catholic saints and tapping into an ability to treat children—and the fertile imaginative world of the eight-to12-year-old demographic— in a manner that leaves most of the film’s saccharine “tween” entertainment peers in the dust. The movie’s intelligence, balance of darker adult elements and sheer verve make it the rare kid’s flick that you might find yourself returning to several times to ensure you catch every joke, or simply for another dose of its infectious, energetic buzz. While it may be the last genre you would have expected this moviemaker to dabble in, Millions has all the hallmarks of Boyle’s best work (minus, of course, all the drug addicts and violent corpses). As Boyle himself says, it managed to rejuvenate his love of telling stories and remind him why he started making movies in the first place. Even if Millions doesn’t bring in box office numbers anywhere near the numeration of its title, the effect it has had on its creator is priceless.
David Fear (MM): Directing a kid’s film with religious overtones strikes many people as being an odd choice after 28 Days Later. Was this an intentional move—to pull a complete 180-degree turnaround?
Danny Boyle (DB): (laughs) You’re not the first person to say that it comes from out of left field; it’s the most shocking thing I could have done. My favorite filmmaker is Nicolas Roeg, and I remember going to see The Witches, which was his attempt to make a kid’s film. I sat there thinking, ‘What’s he done this for?’ But yeah, part of the reason I wanted to do it was that it was so contrary to what people would normally expect from me, especially something that felt completely different from 28 Days Later. But most of all, there was something in Frank Cottrell Boyce’s script, the concept of this lad and his imagination, that connected with me. I think if you analyze what you do too much, you can get caught in this hall of mirrors. This was one of those times when I just felt that I needed to follow my instinct and do it.
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This story was published in the Spring 2005 MovieMaker Magazine. The headline was:
In the Money / The always surprising Danny Boyle cashes in his chips to direct Millions, an intelligent kid's flick
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