Reese Witherspoon talks about new film Monsters vs Aliens

Mar 30 2009 By Chester Chronicle

Reese Witherspoon makes another foray into animation in the sci-fi adventure Monsters vs. Aliens, released on Friday April 3. She talks about the difficulties of voicing an animated action star and reveals her children's unique response to the film.

It would be too easy to dismiss Reese Witherspoon as another Hollywood blonde. While the Southern belle's impish looks could have guaranteed her a success in romantic comedies, Reese has chosen a more unconventional path.

From Pleasantville, about a pair of 1990s teenage siblings who are magically transported into 1950s, to her performance as June Carter Cash in the critically acclaimed Walk The Line, Reese has been drawn to unconventional roles.

Her latest challenge, voicing the part of Susan/Ginormica, a girl-turned-monster in new 3D animation Monsters vs Aliens, reflects her tendency not to fit in.

Susan is an ordinary girl planning her wedding when she is hit by a meteorite and turned into a giant. She is then dragged off to a secret government compound and has to fight evil aliens that are trying to take over the world.

Along the way Susan has to come to terms with who she is and accept and embrace the fact that she is different. As if that wasn't enough, Susan is locked in the compound with other monsters that the government doesn't know what to do with. At first she is repulsed but as the film goes on she learns to love them.

"Through the journey of the film, Susan starts to value and appreciate the monster crew for the support that they give her - the love, the companionship, the understanding that they have of the situation," Reese says.

"She has come to terms with the fact that she can't really go home again in the same way. She'll never be just Susan Murphy from Modesto.

"At first that kind of depresses her, but then, through the help of the Monsters, she realises it's a little awesome to be different. They all value each other for their qualities, and they kind of form this offbeat family."

The film's powerful message about being an outsider was partly what drew Reese to the role.

"I think it's great that this movie has a message that no matter how weird you feel you definitely have a place in this world and sometimes that can be your greatest benefit," she says.

"I thought it was a great evolution of a character who starts out as sort of this 1950s, very innocent, sweet girl and she has to find her inner strength to realise she has to be responsible for herself and ultimately save herself and save the world."

However much she loved the script, being a giant superhero was tough for 5ft 1in Reese, who had to channel all her efforts into sounding like she could take on an evil alien.

"That was actually the hardest part of the movie for me - trying to talk like that," she says.

"They kept on saying, 'Be more like Arnold Schwarznegger or Sylvester Stallone, say it in that tagline way - "I am Ginormica!"' and I couldn't do it, I sounded like a robot."

Reese also reveals that her two children - Ava, nine, and Deacon, five (both from her marriage to Cruel Intentions co-star Ryan Phillippe, whom she divorced in 2006) - are huge fans of the film and both had insightful interpretations of its deeper meaning.

"I was driving them home from the theatre and I said to my kids, 'So what do you guys think is the message of the movie?' And my daughter very thoughtfully said, 'I think it's a movie about never letting someone underestimate you and always living up to your true potential'. I said 'You're so astute Ava, yes that's exactly what it's about'.

"Then I said, 'Deacon what do you think this movie is about? Friendship? Being an outsider?' And he said: 'I think it's about when octopus aliens come to your planet you got to make sure you kill them'. So I think they both really understood the film and what we were trying to get at!"

Reese has not always chosen such child-friendly roles.

She received early attention in 1998's Election, as conspiring high school over-achiever Tracy Flick and a year later she took a supporting role in American Psycho, an adaptation of Brett Easton Ellis's cult novel.

In 2007 she appeared in harrowing political thriller Rendition as Isabella El-Ibrahimi, the heavily pregnant wife of a terror suspect, on the set of which she met her current boyfriend Jake Gyllenhaal.

She will, however, always be associated with the role of Elle Woods, the sorority girl-turned-Harvard law student in Legally Blonde.

The 2001 film was the turning point in Reese's career. It was a box office hit and made her a highly bankable star.

In the movie, she squeezed herself into bikinis and bunny-girl ensembles and her pet chihuahua, Bruiser, was never without a matching outfit.

In real life though, Reese likes to keep it more low-key. She says the greatest advantage of voicing an animated character is not spending hours in the make-up chair.

"It was a great relief to not brush my hair in the morning and just go in and do that, then the discovery that we were being filmed prompted me to put on some blush and some lipstick for my own vanity... and the animators," she says.

The prospect of making a film her children could enjoy was another big draw card - and she says Ava and Deacon's enthusiasm for her superhero role has made her consider more action-packed parts in the future.

"It might be fun, it actually has gotten me excited," she says.

"I have never been in an action film before so the last third of this movie is so action-packed it made me very excited. I think maybe I could do that."