WHAT’S UP, DOC?
Oplev reveals more about the world of Flatliners
FEMALE DRIVE
“The old film has four guys and one girl,” says Oplev, “and that kind of reflects the world of nearly 30 years ago, but we have three very strong women and two cool guys, which reflects more the world we live in today. That was part of the reason why I liked the project. I have great compassion for strong female characters and I think they’re super-interesting on screen. I suppose I was in on creating a character that put a mark on the world with Lisbeth Salander.”
MEDICAL MARVEL
A team of researchers worked hard to ensure Flatliners featured the most up-to-date medical know-how. “All the medical procedures being correct brings out drama and gives an incredible tension to the scenes where the characters are trying to get this person back to life,” reasons Oplev. “What I really wanted to do was make a super-realistic, high-credibility world around these characters, pushing the frontier of medicine, so the film has a realistic and a little bit of a sci-fi feel to it in that sense.”
PARTY ANIMAL
If Ellen Page’s Courtney is the film’s level-headed doc, James Norton’s Jamie is the loose cannon. “He’s the medical student who’s in it so he can take money out of his trust fund every month, and he’s all about partying, drugs and getting laid,” says Oplev. “He kind of goes into it for the adventure. He has that kind of recklessness at the start of the film that makes the whole thing happen. It’s him and Ellen; the combination of her seriousness and his recklessness is what makes it go off.”
COMPETITIVE SPIRIT
“I wanted the world to reflect the world of young people today,” Oplev reveals, “because they live in such a highly competitive world. When I was young, you could take a couple of years and bum around the world, right? Here, even Kiefer’s character is saying to them, we’re not here to educate country club doctors, we’re here to push the dial of human knowledge and those of you who can’t do that should just leave now. That competition is partly what drives our characters to do what they do.”