Rob Minkoff Interview - Paws Of Fury: The Legend Of Hank

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Paws of Fury: The Legend of Hank is a very different kind of samurai movie. Under the direction of Rob Minkoff, Mark Koetsier, and Chris Bailey, Paws of Fury followsefforts of a dog named Hank (voiced by Michael Cera) to become a samurai. However, Hank's biggest challenge is that he's charged with protecting a village full of cats.

Hank's specifically tasked with being the new samurai protector of the village of Kakamucho. Despite the skepticism of the cats of the village, Hank trains profusely under his teacher Jimbo (voiced by Samuel L. Jackson). With the Kakamucho the new target of cat warlord Ika Chu (Ricky Gervais), Hank will need to all the samurai training he can get.

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We speak to Paws of Fury's co-director Rob Minkoff on the making of Paws of Fury, the influences upon the film, and how it was tweaked from its initial conception to the animal-driven comedy it is now.

Screen Rant: How did Paws of Fury come about for you as one of the movie's directors?

Rob Minkoff: My first conversation about the movie was with the screenwriter Ed Stone, who is a great friend and collaborator, we've worked a lot of different things together. I talked to him about the project he had been working on and he told me about it. I asked him to read the script, and it was originally envisioned as a story about humans.

I said, 'Gosh, I think there might be a better approach to take if it was done as a fable and it was a story about animals and about a dog specifically who becomes a samurai in a world of cats, and of course, they hate him because he's a dog'. So, I thought that kind of a story of prejudice would work very well in the form of a fable, because that kind of story