THE JUNGLEÂ DOES NOT WANT YOU. He does not want you to bother among the vegetation and you step on where you should not. However, the exploratory spirit of the human being is insistent and will do everything possible to placate it. Another thing is that he manages to win the match. Percy Fawcett, an explorer of the early twentieth century, failed. Or maybe yes, more than anyone else. The fact is that, convinced of the existence of an ancient city lost in the unexplored jungle of the Amazon, disappeared looking for it. He was last seen in 1925, crossing the Xingu River.
The story of Fawcett’s expedition ended up being as fascinating as the very mystery of Z’s existence, as the British called the mythical ruined city it traced. For years, other explorers and ethnographers fueled rumors and fantastic legends about his whereabouts. In 2009, journalist David Grann told all this in a book, The Lost City of Z, which quickly became a bestseller. A year before, Brad Pitt and his awakened Plan B producers had already sent the galleries to James Gray. They wanted me to make a movie. “I did not understand why I, as nothing in my work before was related to the jungle,” says the New York filmmaker by telephone from Los Angeles. “But I soon saw the potential of history to explore ideas like obsession and class condition. At the movies I do not think it makes sense to always do the same things, so, scared to death, I accepted.”
“I wanted to tell Fawcett’s obsession by expressing all the personal cost it had for him,” explains Gray, who left the project on two occasions – half done The Immigrant 2013) – with changes in distribution until Charlie Hunnam ended up being the definitive Fawcett. A much greater challenge was to shoot in 35mm in the middle of the Colombian jungle. “The cameras ended up badly. I do not know how it is possible, but one grew a plant inside.” The jungle does not love you; Much less that you go to shoot movies to her.