Mostly Martha: FFC Interviews Martha Coolidge

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Interviews

McoolidgeinterviewtitleApril 4, 2004|A long time has passed between big-screen assignments for filmmaker Martha Coolidge, the first woman president of the Director's Guild of America. It's been seven since her unofficial conclusion to the Grumpy Old Men franchise, Out to Sea–and thirteen years since her last good film, Rambling Rose. Making her mark in the early Eighties as a distaff John Hughes with a pair of teensploitation classics (Valley Girl and Real Genius), Ms. Coolidge, though she'll only hint at it, seems to be the victim of a particular sexism in the United States among directors (something perhaps exacerbated by her aforementioned election to the head of the DGA in 2002), a phenomenon relegating her to television projects, place-markers, and the occasional flyer on something that might actually be accidentally worth a damn with a little coaxing.

Director of the “Dead”: FFC Interviews Zack Snyder

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Interviews, Zombie

ZsnyderinterviewtitleMarch 28, 2004|Supplanting that other zombie movie (the at least twice as gory The Passion of the Christ) at the top of the box-office charts last weekend, Dawn of the Dead compelled me to request a phone interview with its director, Zack Snyder. I should amend that I was driven not by pressing questions, but by that flicker of fanboyism I'd thought long-extinguished; I was stunned to have liked the film, just as I was stunned to have enjoyed Marcus Nispel's remake of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Nevertheless, it strikes me that in a day of high production values and sophisticated action editing, the personal horror films of the Seventies are being re-imagined as self-aware takes on the slick formula and stainless steel look of Aliens from a decade later. There's even a Carter Burke character in the new Dawn of the Dead.

In Fighting Shape: FFC Interviews Omar Epps

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Interviews

OmareppsinterviewtitleOmar Epps takes the gloves off to talk about AGAINST THE ROPES and more

February 22, 2004|Just three days after a surprise blizzard shut down Denver for an evening, I met Omar Epps at the Hotel Teatro, where we chatted about how when it's above freezing in the surprisingly sunny Mile High City, there's a line around the Dairy Queen. We discussed the strange social caste system that's developed in Aspen, what with trailer parks inhabited by all the service industry workers ringing the jewel of the Rockies like a Dickensian indictment of excess, and eventually, we worked our way around to the subject of minority directors and his new film, Charles S. Dutton's Against the Ropes. In truth, I was more interested in his work with personal hero "Beat" Takeshi Kitano in Kitano's English-language debut Brother, and how an actor still somewhat on the margins of stardom (despite one of the truly memorable "ER" turns as Dr. Dennis Gant, the poor sot who throws himself under the L after half a season) has managed to assemble a filmography diverse enough to incorporate titles like Breakfast of Champions, Love and Basketball, and Dracula 2000. This is to say nothing of his extracurricular projects, such as a music production company called "BKNYC Records," which already has a few artists in its stable. Maybe the question's the answer.

The Documentarian Becomes the Documented: FFC Interviews Errol Morris

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Documentary, Interviews

EmorrisinterviewtitlerevisedThe legendary documentarian comes out from behind THE FOG OF WAR

February 8, 2004|My first was The Thin Blue Line in the winter of 1988. Working backwards, finding Errol Morris's first two films was extremely difficult in the years before DVD and the blossoming of the Internet as the world's finest rummage sale, but the picture made enough of an impression on me that I spent the next six months tracking them down. Gates of Heaven was a revelation, Vernon, Florida changed my life, and it didn't occur to me until much later that the obsessive process of finding them and the unexpected rewards of that search were similar to this filmmaker's process was, in fact, the profession (private detective) through which Morris made his living in the seven years between Vernon, Florida and The Thin Blue Line. (Vernon, Florida is just brilliant enough to be career suicide, apparently.) So while Vernon, Florida has become something of a Medium Cool for a new generation of film brats (All the Real Girls director David Gordon Green cites the work as one of his all-timers), The Thin Blue Line has become the moment that many point to as the definitive modern reintroduction to the debate about the matter of degrees that separates fiction from non-fiction cinema. The title referring to the line of law enforcement that separates civilization from chaos, The Thin Blue Line is almost better read as the line between fabulism trusted as fact, and fabulism accepted as fantasy.

The Fighting Fitzgerald: FFC Interviews Thom Fitzgerald

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Canada, Interviews

TfitzgeraldinterviewtitleJanuary 25, 2004|An unwritten policy says that before interviewing a new subject for the first time, you should see the film and log the review so that the review isn't flavoured by bias, by whether you love or hate the filmmaker. It's almost impossible, particularly for an inexperienced critic, to separate affection for a person with a more diplomatic look at the person's picture–and difficult as well to separate the persona that an artist presents to media with who the person actually is. Everybody's your friend on the junket and we need each other: I need to fill my column (and hopefully with a compelling face), they need to publicize their films, and we get famous together in our respective disciplines. The whole thing is a little parasitic.

The Drama King: FFC Interviews Campbell Scott

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Interviews

Campbellscottinterviewtitle

January 11, 2004|I reread Richard Henry Dana, Jr.'s Two Years Before the Mast in the days leading up to a chat with Campbell Scott regarding his new film as director, Off the Map. It is the book that Off the Map's matriarch (Joan Allen) reads by lamplight throughout the picture, one that transfers its philosophy of nautical reflection to not only the picture's rhythms but also a visual scheme that re-imagines Dana's vast deeps as the smothering doldrums of the New Mexico desert. Scott's fourth film behind the camera, Off the Map is surprisingly sticky, offering up echoes for days after a viewing and displaying a confidence of voice and purity of spirit of an artist hitting his stride in the last couple of years as actor, director, and sometime producer. So I went to the underground grotto of Denver's Magnolia Hotel with the intention to talk to the generous Mr. Scott about tranquility, Zen and the art of filmmaking if you will–to take a peak into that treasure chest that has offered forth, in addition to Off the Map, one of this year's best films in The Secret Lives of Dentists, and one of last's, Rodger Dodger.

28 Movies Later…: FFC Interviews Brendan Gleeson

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Interviews, Ireland

BgleesoninterviewtitleDecember 28, 2003|On the telephone from the Cold Mountain junket in San Diego, on the afternoon of the announcement that the film had garnered an extravagant eight Golden Globe nominations, I was honoured to speak with the marvellous Brendan Gleeson–the best thing about Cold Mountain, as it happens, and the best thing about a great many films. The star of John Boorman's criminally underestimated The General, Gleeson has found himself of late cast in the role of patriarch or mentor and, more fascinatingly, providing both the moral and metaphorical centre of his films, often in just a supporting role. For Gleeson to be routinely overlooked come awards season says a great deal about awards season and the extent to which showy performances–performances that the layperson swiftly identifies as performances–overshadow the sort of bedrock naturalism and presence of a character actor like Gleeson.

Real Perelman: FFC Interviews Vadim Perelman

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Interviews

VperelmaninterviewtitleDecember 21, 2003|Long story short, a few years ago as I was applying for a life insurance policy, I got to know an ex-paramedic who told me that he once answered a call to Denver’s beautiful Brown Palace Hotel. One of its maids had just been let go after working there for decades, whereupon she proceeded to take the elevator to the top floor and jump to her death several stories into the central dining area. “Her face was perfectly preserved, perfectly peaceful,” he said. “When I got there it looked as though she were standing in a hole in the floor, looking up with something like wonder at the ceiling.” I think about this story a lot, it sticks with me for some reason; it has elements of betrayal, death with symbolic meaning, the grotesque–the sort of high human drama at extremis that leaves an indelible imprint on my imagination.

And the Geeks Shall Inherit the Earth: FFC Interviews Paul Feig

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Interviews

PaulfeiginterviewtitleDecember 14, 2003|Sitting conspicuously on a prominent LoDo street corner, Denver's Nuevo-Mexican restaurant Tamayo is the epitome of hip–so while I was thrilled to be meeting Paul Feig, co-creator of television's "Freaks and Geeks" and "Undeclared", the eatery seemed a little incongruous a setting for a man who's made his mark as champion of the sensitive uncool. Natty in suit and tie and fresh from an introduction (to a group of high-schoolers, natch) of his new film I Am David, Feig impresses with an open intelligence, an engaging charisma, and what appears to be a genuine appreciation for where he is in his career and life. The author of the heartbreaking/hilarious Kick Me: Adventures in Adolescence, Feig is one of our most vital chroniclers of the heartache of youth and the angst of being intelligent in an anti-intellectual world. He stands with the bright lights of the American letter, folks such as Sarah Vowell, Dave Eggers, and David Sedaris, in defining a new collective voice in our popular discourse. The of-the-moment setting didn't seem as incongruous after meeting the wise, funny, and engaging Feig.

Macy’s Day: FFC Interviews William H. Macy

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Interviews

WilliamhmacyinterviewtitleNovember 23, 2003|Backstage at the Auraria Campus of the University of Colorado's newly refurbished King Center is a network of hallways and dressing rooms that remind a little of that part in This is Spinal Tap where the boys get lost on their way to the stage. William H. Macy, taller than I expected and with a force of personality at odds with his milquetoast screen persona, makes a comment about this in a dead-on Nigel Tufnel ("We've got armadillos in our trousers") as we usher the actor to a clips show and awards ceremony at the 26th Denver International Film Festival, which is honouring him with the event's John Cassavetes Award for contributions to independent cinema. Gracious, humble, genuinely gratified by the tribute, Macy, in a light mood, tells a story about an actor friend who got lost in the tunnels backstage en route to his entrance in a play, erupting triumphantly at last stage left, but alas in the wrong production. "But how was the performance?" I asked. "Compromised," Macy deadpanned.

The Piece Maker: FFC Interviews Peter Hedges

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Interviews

PhedgesinterviewtitleNovember 9, 2003|It's one of the horrible ironies of the profession that often the people I like the most during the interview process are the ones who have made the films I find significantly problematic. By writing a review before interviewing someone for the first time, I can safeguard against the tendency to reward, or punish, the film for my relationship with my subjects; if I had my druthers, after meeting Peter Hedges, writer-director of Pieces of April, I would have declined to comment on his film. See, with my wife going into false labour, I stood Mr. Hedges up, but he agreed to reschedule, greeting me with words of encouragement about my impending fatherhood and then, as we were packing up, commiserating with me about the pain of losing a parent. In between, I broached the topic of race in his film, the element of Pieces of April that causes me the most pause, knowing as I did so that Mr. Hedges was probably mistaking our affinity for one another for affection for his film. It's a hard job sometimes, and while I'm under no illusions that I'm friends with, or run in the same circles as, the people with whom I occasionally rub elbows, it still pains me to think that I might wound someone I genuinely like with a review that's more criticism than congratulation.

Miller’s Crossing: FFC Interviews Wentworth Miller

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, DIFF/SDFF, Film Festivals, Interviews

WmillerinterviewtitleNovember 2, 2003|Over a thousand people packed into The Rise nightclub for the 26th Starz Denver International Film Festival's opening-night gala reception. A cavernous space with booming music, the venue was a drastic departure from last year's sedate to-do at the DCPA's Temple Buell Theater, and it was in one of the upstairs rooms that I first met Wentworth Miller, the tall, handsome, calm, and extremely courteous young star of–and, lucky for me, the best thing about–Robert Benton's pretty awful The Human Stain. I met him again the next morning for official purposes at Denver's also surprisingly tall Mag Hotel, plopped in the middle of the busy intersection of 19th and Stout along Banker's Row in lower downtown Denver. Best known for his guest appearances on television shows like "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and "Popular" (and as an athlete with a literal bleeding heart in the seventh season premiere of "ER") as well as for the "Luke Skywalker" role in the unfortunate Dinotopia, Miller is receiving what could potentially be his big break, stealing the show from Anthony Hopkins, Nicole Kidman, and Gary Sinise playing a role that's surprisingly close to home.

Tough Enough: FFC Interviews Wes Studi

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, DIFF/SDFF, Film Festivals, Interviews

WesstudiinterviewtitleOctober 26, 2003|For all the praise afforded it in recent years, Michael Mann's 1992 The Last of the Mohicans is still an undervalued film of big emotions, boasting of a macho sensibility more bracing than any number of post-modern ruminations on the cult of manhood. Above all its technical achievements and ecstatic scripting, it offers Magua, perhaps the most important modern depiction of any minority character and one that arguably, single-handedly, made the casting of the Native American as the impossibly noble Child of the Earth suddenly déclassé. Wes Studi is much of the reason for the success of Mohicans, his portrayal of Magua revealing depths that reverberate with me still, offering hope that Asians in American cinema might one day be as difficult to minimize as Native Americans have become. Tied in with that respect, however, is of course the reality that roles for Indians have become relatively scarce in recent years.

Wrath of Caan: FFC Interviews Scott Caan

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, DIFF/SDFF, Film Festivals, Interviews

ScaaninterviewtitleOctober 19, 2003|It's in a subterranean hotel breakfast nook with fountains and a tiny little glassed-in room for God knows what that I meet the manic Scott Caan, who wears a tight baseball t-shirt and demonstrates yo-yo tricks to the slight consternation of a publicist eyeing the glass enclosure, I thought, a little nervously. After showing me a trick of his own devising, the Caan Machine Gun, I asked him to repeat it so that I could photograph it:

Bobby Darin’: FFC Interviews Bobby Cannavale

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, DIFF/SDFF, Film Festivals, Interviews

BcannavaleinterviewtitleOctober 12, 2003|Talking with actors, especially young actors, is always an iffy proposition: the craft of acting is a difficult one to articulate, its choices obscure or instinctual, ideally, and in the case of a fresh talent, anecdotes are fewer and of less interest. So you find yourself, often, repeating the junket line: How'd you get started? What was it like working with X? Who are your influences? What's your next project? Questions, all, that only really need to be asked once in this day of fast, permanent information.

The Brood Makes Good: FFC Interviews Aaron Woodley

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Canada, Interviews

AwoodleyinterviewtitleOctober 5, 2003|Madstone Theaters has a workshop that pays aspiring filmmakers a salary, complete with retirement plan, for two years with the hope that at the end of their tenure, they will have produced a script that can flower into a feature-length film. Something that's ambitious and noble in a climate dominated by boutique moviehouses preaching indie while stroking mainstream, Madstone's fledgling community of filmmakers seems suspiciously Zoetrope-ian in its mandate–and the first product, Aaron Woodley's Rhinoceros Eyes, is so assured and engaging that it feels like a revelation. For its humour, and its faithfulness to the darker aspects of the quixotic fairytale dreamscapes of The Brothers Quay and their winsome heroes, Rhinoceros Eyes is a stupendous debut, mirroring the freshman amazement of Richard Kelly's Donnie Darko (if truthfully in no other substantive way) and establishing both Woodley as a talent to watch and Madstone as having vision and integrity.

Andrei the Giant: FFC Interviews Andrei Codrescu

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Documentary, Interviews, Romania

AcodrescuinterviewtitleSeptember 21, 2003|The Rattlebrain Theater Company resides at a bustling intersection of Denver's 16th Street Mall in the basement of what appears to have once been a church. Backstage, with a little kid functioning as the company's receptionist for some reason that will best remain a mystery to me, I sat on a tatty sofa in what's essentially a catacomb, the "blue room," to meet NPR regular, Louisiana State English Professor, and founder of EXQUISITE CORPSE alternative literary magazine, Andrei Codrescu. An exile of Ceausescu's Romania, Codrescu found refuge in among the thinkers and bohemians of the American Sixties: William Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg his spiritual and literary advisors in the new world, Codrescu sought with his life and career to redefine what Transylvanian poet and philosopher Lucien Blaga called "Mioritic Space"–an idea taken from Romanian folklore about the Romanian character defined by his geography, distilled by Codrescu into the idea that thought is its own nation and the poet, forever in exile, the only creator of its shifting borders.

Virginie Speaks (sorta): FFC Interviews Virginie Ledoyen

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Film Festivals, France, Interviews, TIFF

VledoyentitleSeptember 15, 2003|Gallic ingenue Virginie Ledoyen strides confidently into the room, and the second she spots me we say a grinny "Hi!" in unison. Alas, the communication breakdown commences shortly thereafter: I was diagnosed with a swollen eardrum a few days before, and I lead our interview with a pre-emptive apology for any struggle I might encounter trying to hear her, which I think–combined with my being her last in a morning brimming over with interviews and the usual language-barrier issues–caused her to be a tad…brusque in her responses.

Cabin Boy: FFC Interviews Eli Roth

Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Horror, Interviews

ErothinterviewtitleSeptember 14, 2003|Debuting with a splash at the 2002 Toronto International Film Festival, Eli Roth’s zero-budgeted Cabin Fever sparked a bidding war won by Lions Gate Entertainment to the tune of $3.5M. A throwback to the Spam-in-a-cabin flicks of the early 1980s, the picture, for all its references and debts to films like The Evil Dead, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, and John Carpenter’s The Thing, bears the unmistakable mark of a young Joe Dante: equal parts Roger Corman and cartoons. Cabin Fever is energetic and puerile, best when it apes Dante’s energy and sense of humour, worst when it takes on Dante’s occasional sloppiness and lack of cohesion. It’s dedicated, in either case, to providing a nostalgic glut of gratuitous nudity and gore while offering something I’ve been missing for a while now: a special-effects movie reliant on Karo syrup, KY jelly, and imagination uncorrupted by the perfect lines of a mainframe. That there is the possibility for a deeper analysis of the picture, centring on menstrual anxieties and banning rituals, is almost beside the point when the picture boasts of a scene involving a lady Bic, a bathtub, and a girl infected by a flesh-eating virus.

There’s Only One Sharif in This Town: FFC Interviews Omar Sharif

Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Egypt, Film Festivals, Interviews, TIFF

OmarshariftitleSeptember 7, 2003|He made one of the cinema's greatest (and lengthiest) entrances in Lawrence of Arabia, appearing as a heat-obscured speck of dust that gradually adopts the form of a black-swathed man on horseback, one Sherif Ali ibn el Kharish. Omar Sharif's regal stride into our appointed meeting place, a third-floor room within Toronto's Hotel Intercontinental, felt almost as dramatic to me, for his every step is weighted with a half-century of fame. Mr. Sharif is at the Toronto International Film Festival promoting a delicate French film in which he stars opposite young Pierre Boulanger, François Dupeyron's Monsieur Ibrahim et les fleurs du Coran. The picture works largely because of the legend-in-his-own-time baggage the actor brings to the title role of a neighbourhood grocer yearning to pass his considerable wisdom on. When I interviewed him, Mr. Sharif was, like his alter ego Ibrahim, pensive and forthcoming, with little patience for subtext. I found him both gracious and melancholy, and was heartbroken when our all-too-brief time together ran out.