To become truly happy, each individual needs to realize a unique potential, find his destiny. People who have realized the true calling, not only do what they love, bring inner satisfaction, do good for others, but also, importantly, financially independent.
Lee Wannell for a long time tried to combine the three hypostases. The filmmaker realized himself as a director, scriptwriter and actor. For a long time he worked quite fruitfully with James Wang. The creative tandem created the world-famous franchises “Saw” and “Astral”. The last more notable project beyond these epics was the comedy horror Cutis, to which Warnell wrote the script. But after the release, frankly, of the weak directorial debut of the film "Astral 3", the controversial author dramatically changed his creative vector, replacing James Van with Jason Bloom and creating the sci-fi action "Upgrade". He seems to have found his calling.
Earlier creativity
Lee Wannell was born on a frosty January morning in 1977. As soon as he learned to read and write, he began to try writing. He inherited a love of literature from his mother, to cinema - from his father, who worked as a cameraman on local television. Lee wrote his first authorial story at the age of four; it was dedicated to a frog that was desperately looking for a flute after it had lost. According to the already held adult screenwriter, it was a real masterpiece. Nobody forced the child to compose; he loved to write stories on his own initiative.
Fateful meeting
In his youth, he already wrote reviews for TV, and at the age of 18 he began to attend film school classes at the University of Melbourne. While studying, Lee met another creative young man. It was James Van. Their acquaintance turned out to be truly fateful. Lee Wannell has worked as a film critic for many Australian ABC television shows for some time. After he played a cameo role in the movie "Matrix: Reloaded", he tried himself in voicing the characters of the games.
From debutants to masters
As a term paper, aspiring filmmakers Lee Wannell and James Wang presented the mentor the short film “Saw,” to which they independently wrote the script. Their teacher was so shocked by what he saw that he sent the project to Hollywood. A few months later, a creative tandem was invited to Hollywood to work on a full-length version of their student masterpiece, so “Saw: A Game for Survival” appeared. After the triumph, Lee Wannell did not want to start work on the sequel, but still succumbed to the temptation. Later, he wrote scripts only for the second and third parts, in all subsequent he acted as a producer. It is known for certain that while working on the creation of the famous project, Lee Wonnell suffered from ongoing migraine attacks, even underwent medical treatment. It is said that the transferred bouts of pain and the impressions of visiting the clinics, meeting with patients undergoing treatment with terrible diagnoses, prompted him to create the author's project “X-ray” (X-Ray).
The atmosphere of genuine horror
The undisputed hallmark of the Saw series of paintings, in which Lee Wonnell acted as a screenwriter, is the terrifyingly ingenious devices for torturing and killing the unfortunate victims of Constructor. Their diversity was one of the reasons franchise fans expected new parts to come out. The viewer, missing the atmosphere of genuine horror, singled out “Saw” from a series of other horrors for real screen brutality. The sight, of course, is not for the faint of heart. After Lee remained in the project as a producer, the films did not change the traditional plot, but with regards to “livelihood and murder,” the authors raised the bar uncompromisingly and desperately, but the success of the tandem of Wannell-Wang failed. Not without reason, according to critics, it was they who introduced a new term into the cinematic vocabulary - “torture porn”.
Between first and second
The filmography of Lee Wannell as a screenwriter in some places includes the witty comedy horror Kutis, in which he played one of the roles. The film turned out to be a decently solid horror comedy, with very nice casting and a snappy concept, which, unfortunately, was not fully realized. Almost all the characters in the film are stereotyped, but not annoying. Wonnell's hero was particularly successful. The character turned out to be frankly antisocial, with a whole bunch of all kinds of oddities.
Leaving one franchise, the scriptwriter immediately joined another, called "Astral." Starting to work on the original film, the authors hardly thought that it would start another horror epic. Between the release of the rental of the first and second parts, the gap in two years is only because Jason Bloom wanted to do a sequel only with the participation of D. Wang and L. Warnell. The creative cinematic union did not deceive the expectations of the filmmaker, despite the PG-13 rating, without the bloodshed and gutted entrails, both Astrals can easily make any adult audience stutter.
As a director
As a director, Lee Wonnell is known for two projects - Astral 3 (2015) and Upgrade (2018).
The first is a prequel to the picture of 2010, telling details about the medium Alice Rainier, who helped in two parts of the Lambert family cope with evil spirits and demons. Although many movie experts have stated that the part directed by Wannell is weaker than the previous ones, the film works as it should. It scares at the right moments, reveals details in the characteristics of the main character and guarantees a boring view. It’s not in vain that the director used the automobile horn to achieve naturalness in the reactions of the heroes. And Stephanie Scott, who played Queen Brenner, not only forced to listen to gloomy music, but also periodically locked in the pantry.
In the recent premiere of Astral 4: The Last Key, Adam Robitel took the director's chair, and Lee Wannell returned to work on the script.
The best author's project
In March of this year, a photo of Lee Wonnell adorned the title poster of Upgrade. The author’s project of the artisan is an inventive fantastic action, once again convincing that even in 2018, genre films can amaze.
Wannell, having secondary plot moves in his possession, put together a story that did not evoke an unfortunate sense of deja vu. On the plot surface of the project is revenge, conspiracies and aggressive corporate policies, but it’s curious how the director builds intrigue from them.
Neither the modest budget, nor the meager scenery prevented the quality of the film, its external ingenuity. In this project, Lee Wonnell fully realizes her creative potential, without shyness, dilutes fights with episodes of operational cruelty, but unlike all the parts of “Saw”, during which the viewer developed immunity to scattered limbs from flying guts, she’s great in this film hits the nerves of the beholder.
Actor and family man
Having tried to realize himself in the acting field in The Matrix and Saw, Lee Wonnell adorned the films “Dog Paradise”, “Endangered Breed”, “Forgive”, “Death Sentence” and all “Astral” with his presence.
In 2009, Wonnell led the beauty actress Corbett So, who appeared in the first "Astral" and then starred in her third part. The married couple brings up the daughter of Sabin and the twins Jones Gray and Ren River.