The Fifth Element features an iconic performance from Chris Tucker,
but his part almost went to someone very different. From off-screen relationships
to thoroughly detailed design work, this is the untold truth of a 90s sci-fi classic.
Two decades before the release of The Fifth Element, director Luc Besson was already
developing the film's futuristic world when he was just 16 years old. He was bored, living outside of
Paris, without a TV or very many friends. So, as he explained in an interview with Mr. Showbiz,
"I started to invent this world where I can be a
wild cab driver. It was just a way to escape at first."
At first, Besson conceived of the story as a novel. As he explained to Nerdist in 2017,
"I never thought about making a film of it. So, it was a novel for a long time and then,
at a certain point, 10 years later, I said, 'You know what? I would love to make a film of that.'"
For the futuristic New York where much of the story takes place,
Besson wanted a mix of both past and future. The goal was to make the city look as if it
had been partially destroyed and rebuilt in some places, but intact in other spots,
similar to how European cities were devastated during the bombings of World War II.
Bruce Willis almost didn't land the lead role of cab driver Korben Dallas. As Besson revealed
in a Reddit AMA, he actually asked Mel Gibson, because their offices were next to each other
at Warner Brothers. Gibson considered it, but he eventually passed. Perhaps because of that
experience, the director opted for a different approach. As he explained to Mr. Showbiz,
"When the production began, we made the decision to not go for a big star. [...] We said, 'Let's
put the money in the sets, the costumes, the special effects. Like Star Wars 20 years ago.'"
Besson then envisioned Willis as the lead,
though he figured that he would cost too much. Fortunately,
Willis didn't care about the money and sought out Besson to make sure that he knew he'd be
willing to make a deal if he liked the project. As the actor told Entertainment Weekly in 2017,
"I just liked Luc — I liked the story,
I liked the idea. I thought it would be fun to go to France and make a movie."
"Now that's a very dangerous gun. Maybe you better let me hang on to this one for you, huh?"
The casting call for the pivotal character of the humanoid woman Leeloo included a staggering
8,000 people. Besson personally met with about 200 to 300 of them,
including Saved by the Bell and Showgirls star Elizabeth Berkley.
Milla Jovovich was only 19 when she auditioned, and it didn't exactly go well, at least not in
the first round. According to Besson, she was too nervous and wearing too much makeup. But then a
few weeks later, they met again, and he gave her another chance, and it worked out much better.
In the spontaneous screen test, the director put Jovovich through some
bizarre exercises like asking her to close her eyes and imagine that she was not from
this world. Then he observed her reaction as she acted out the prompt of seeing a common
object as if for the first time. Not only was he impressed with her ability to improvise,
he also liked her exotic look. As he put it to Mr. Showbiz,
"She can be from the past or the future. She can be an Egyptian
or a Roman. She can be Nefertiti and she can be from outer space."
"I was built to protect, not to love, so there is no use for me other than this."
"No, no, no. You're wrong, you're wrong, you're wrong."
There's no denying that The Fifth Element has its own unique look, and a big part of
that has to do with the colorful and expansive wardrobes. Costume designer Jean Paul Gaultier
proved to be an inspired choice, thanks to his ability to think outside of the box. And he
certainly brought that mentality to the film on a massive scale, as he created over 1,000 costumes.
Gaultier was well-established in the fashion world, but he was relatively new to the movie
industry, so he may not have been aware of how impressive his accomplishment was.
But others have certainly acknowledged it. During a retrospective for Gaultier
at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, curator Thierry-Maxime Loriot said,
"A thousand costumes is like 10 collections but all for one movie. It's an incredible amount of
work people don't even know about. For a thousand costumes, he may have even done
5,000 sketches before narrowing it down."
And one particular costume really stood out among the rest. You might think that
Leeloo's iconic bandage dress was designed only to show Milla Jovovich nearly nude,
but there was some reasoning behind it. As the actor explained to Vogue in 2022,
"Being in a hospital, they put a robe on you that is open in the back so they
can reach in and put injections and tubes. So, you have to have as little as possible,
but for the sake of modesty, you have to cover up. [...] And Luc and Jean
Paul talked about this bandage idea, and Jean Paul was like, 'Genius! I love it.'"
When developing Zorg, the main villain played by Gary Oldman,
Luc Besson drew from historical sources for inspiration. As he explained to Mr. Showbiz,
"You always see these Christian people, these religious people,
always fighting for the noble cause. In fact, they kill millions of people
through history. They fight for a code, but they burn everybody for years."
Besson collaborated with both Oldman and Jean Paul Gaultier to flesh the character out. The director
and the costume designer came up with key words to describe the character, such as "dandy," "nouveau
riche," and "Hitler." Basically, he was the type of person who would buy a Picasso painting
because it paired well with his couch. And furthermore, as Besson told Entertainment Weekly,
"It took some time to get the voice of the character, because he's so extreme. [...] So
finally, [Oldman] proposed this sort of half-Texan accent, and it was very funny."
Despite the care taken to develop his character, Oldman wasn't exactly pleased with his own work.
In a 2014 interview with Playboy, he admitted that he's highly critical of nearly all of his
performances. When asked specifically about The Fifth Element, he insisted,
"Oh no. I can't bear it."
"And if there is one thing I do not like…"
"Three."
"It is to be…"
"Two."
"Disappointed."
When casting the fascinating, gender-fluid Ruby Rhod, Luc Besson met with Jamie Foxx
and Chris Tucker, the latter of whom got the part. He liked both actors,
but he ultimately decided that Tucker fit the role better since Foxx was built like
an action hero and Besson wanted to reserve that look for Bruce Willis.
But, as it turns out, Besson actually had another star in
mind entirely. That would be musician and occasional actor Prince. Alas,
the rock star proved to be a bit too elusive. As Besson recalled to Entertainment Weekly,
"It was a nightmare, because he'd give you an appointment and then he comes,
like, seven days late. And sometimes he shows up when you don't expect him. You can't grab him,
you know? He was free and he wants to stay free. But when you think
about Prince and then you watch the film, you feel there is a flavor."
One interesting aspect about the character of Leeloo is that when she speaks her divine
language, there are no subtitles. So viewers might guess that the lines delivered by Milla
Jovovich are just gibberish, but that's not the case at all. Luc Besson in fact put a lot of
work into developing the fictional language to the point that it was possible to have a
real conversation with it. As the director explained to Entertainment Weekly in 2017,
"I wrote a dictionary with 500 words. But we were the only two who spoke it on
the set. [Jovovich] had to learn it, and then we could talk to each other in it."
Besson wanted the audience to see Leeloo through the perspective of Korben Dallas. So,
just as the main character couldn't understand her, neither could viewers.
"What's she saying?" "I don't know. Activate the phonic detector."
The Fifth Element is quite the visual spectacle,
yet very little CGI technology was used to make the film, as practical effects
were mostly utilized instead. As Luc Besson explained to Entertainment Weekly in 2017,
"Technology today is so easy that you can do whatever you want. At the time
it was a nightmare. But we used, I think, only two green-screen shots in all of it."
And co-producer Iain Smith revealed that a lot was
accomplished through the use of model miniatures. As he noted,
"They're not small things — they're big, big miniatures, if you follow me."
A lot of planning went into the effects, especially for the massive explosion in
Fhloston and the large Mangalore alien suits worn by the actors.
An entire team was dedicated to making sure the people inside had enough air
and water during filming. There were also cameras in the masks so that the crew could
literally tell the performers where to go, as they were completely blind within them.
The cast members of The Fifth Element naturally grew close to each other during filming,
as they would spend a lot of time hanging out both on and off the set. Milla Jovovich and
Chris Tucker in particular partied together and bonded over the fact that they both grew up on
the West Coast. Bruce Willis wasn't as social as the rest of the cast, though his then-wife
Demi Moore did spend time with them on set. As Jovovich revealed to Entertainment Weekly,
"Demi was on set a lot, and she was rad. I would babysit for them sometimes when I
wasn't working. I was so young, I probably had more fun with his kids at that time."
While Willis may have been a little anti-social, he did throw a party for
everyone at the end of the shoot during which he played jazz for everyone.
"Yeah. Yeah."
After Milla Jovovich was hired to play Leeloo, she and Luc Besson began dating.
This was no surprise to co-producer Iain Smith, who told Entertainment Weekly,
"Luc said to me at one point, 'You realize that whoever I cast as Leeloo, I have to fall in love
with them.' And I understood what he meant by that. He didn't want just some pretty girl,
he wanted someone with that particular individual thing that Milla had."
Smith was supportive of the relationship, though,
as he believed it would improve the film. And he was far from the only one involved
in the project to notice the couple had hit it off, as Bruce Willis told EW,
"The real romance was between Luc and Milla. By the time I had
gotten to Paris they were already kind of smitten with each other."
In 1997, Jovovich and Besson married in Las Vegas. But there was a lot of controversy surrounding
their relationship, as the director was already married to Maïwenn, the actor who played the
Diva Plavalaguna in The Fifth Element. Two years later, Jovovich and Besson would split up as well.
According to Luc Besson, he'll never make The Fifth Element 2,
nor will he make a sequel to any of his other films. As he put it to Entertainment Weekly,
"No matter how much you love a film, the fun is to try something else. Otherwise
I'm going to do Fifth Element, Sixth Element, Seventh. [...] And that's not interesting."
A continuation of this particular story does not make sense to the director, because the
intergalactic entity known as the Darkness only emerges every 5,000 years. Thus, the main
characters probably wouldn't be in any potential sequel. As Besson also noted in a Reddit AMA,
"It would be hard to up the stakes after saving the universe in the first movie."
However, Besson also made it sound like he might be open to another film within the same
cinematic universe. But it wouldn't be a straight sequel, and it would have different characters. On
the other hand, he also joked about a standalone feature starring Chris Tucker as Ruby Rhod, so we
probably shouldn't hold our breaths about any sort of return to the universe of The Fifth Element.