MVFF34 2011—Michael Hawley Previews the Line-up

The 34th Mill Valley Film Festival (MVFF) gets underway this Thursday, October 6 with Glenn Close's gender-bending turn as a 19th century Irish butler in Albert Nobbs. Close will attend the screening with director Rodrigo Garcia, and then reappear the following night for her own festival tribute and reception.

Sharing opening night duties at a separate venue will be Jay and Mark Duplass' Jeff Who Lives at Home (see review below), starring Jason Segel and Susan Sarandon. The film is scheduled for a March 2012 release, making it an unusual choice for a MVFF opener. Both Duplass brothers are confirmed guests.

Closing out the fest on Sunday, October 16 will be the film I'm most anticipating this autumn, Michel Hazanavicius' The Artist. This silent, B&W French homage to 1927 Hollywood won a Best Actor prize at Cannes for Jean Dujardin, best known in these parts for his lead performances in Hazanavicius' OSS117 spy spoofs. It's recently been confirmed that Dujardin, along with co-star Bérénice Bejo (who is also the director's wife), will be joining Hazanavicius for the evening's festivities. It kills me that I'll have to miss it.

In addition to Glenn Close, MFFF34 hosts a tribute to Burkina Faso's director Gaston Kaboré, one of the greats of African cinema. His debut film, 1982's Wend Kuuni (God's Gift) will screen at the tribute, and 1997's Buud Yam will be shown two days later.

Three actors get the MVFF Spotlight treatment this year, most notably Hong Kong actress Michelle Yeoh. She'll be here along with French action director Luc Besson, both promoting The Lady, which examines the life of Burmese prodemocracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi. The remaining Spotlights are for young actors Ezra Miller (Lynne Ramsay's We Need to Talk About Kevin co-starring Tilda Swinton) and Elizabeth Olsen (Martha Marcy May Marlene).

MVFF34's Centerpiece Film will be Simon Curtis' My Week with Marilyn (starring Michelle Williams as Monroe) and for the fest's Special Premiere they'll be screening Stephan Elliott's (The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert) latest, A Few Best Men. Both directors are confirmed to attend their respective screenings.

Regrettably, I'll be out of town for most of this year's festival. Were I around, here are some films I'd be making an effort to see (none were available to preview on DVD screener). At the top is Gerardo Naranjo's Miss Bala, which eyes Mexico's drug wars from the perspective of a kidnapped beauty pageant contestant. The film was highly praised when it premiered in Cannes' Un Certain Regard sidebar and it's just been chosen as Mexico's 2011 Oscar® submission. Also from Cannes, but from the main competition, is The Conquest (La conquête), a thinly veiled look at the political machinations of French president Nicolas Sarkozy. Making its U.S. premiere at MVFF34 is actor Ralph Fiennes' directorial debut Coriolanus, which resets Shakespeare's play in war-torn Bosnia. Shame, director Steve McQueen's acclaimed follow-up to 2008's Hunger, once again stars Michael Fassbender, this time as a Manhattan sex addict. Albania-set The Forgiveness of Blood comes from Joshua Marston, the same American director as 2004's Maria, Full of Grace. This tale of a Balkan blood feud has, with some controversy, been submitted as Albania's 2011 Oscar® submission. Speaking of Oscar®, Germany has entered Pina into the race, Wim Wenders' 3-D look at legendary choreographer Pina Bausch. This is one of more than two dozen feature documentaries contained in MVFF34's Valley of the Docs sidebar.

Below are capsule reviews of 10 MVFF34 films I have had the chance to preview, all on DVD screener except where noted.

Circus Columbia (Cirkus Columbia) (Bosnia / Herzegovina, dir Danis Tanović)—Nearly 10 years after snatching the Golden Globe and Oscar® right out of Amélie's hands with No Man's Land, Danis Tanović returns with this near-perfect yarn about one town's drift toward civil war. After earning his fortune abroad, prodigal husband and father Divko returns to his Bosnian birthplace with new mistress in tow, promptly evicting his wife and teenage son from the family domicile. Divko's redemption drives this bittersweet, rollicking film. But in the background, hints of a dark future intensify, culminating in Tanović's unforgettable final shot which announces the start of war. Reviews from last year's Venice Film Festival were very mixed, but the director's impeccable pacing, balance of conflicting tones and direction of actors, all convinced me I was in the hands of a master filmmaker. Certain to be one of my Ten Favorite Films of 2011. As seen at the 2011 Palm Springs International Film Festival.

Hello! How Are You? (Buna! Se faci?) (Romania, dir Alexandru Maftei)—We've had almost five years of admiring Romania's prodigious output of dour, bleakly funny human dramas. What we haven't seen is a Romanian rom-com, which is what we get with this genial comedy of errors. Gabi and Gabi are husband and wife in a loving, but lackluster marriage. One day they spring to life after simultaneously engaging in clandestine correspondence with an online admirer (and you can certainly guess who those admirers will turn out to be). While the film initially struggles to make this tired premise fresh, the director gradually steps up his game and scores some original moves. It doesn't hurt that the main subplot follows their hunky son as he auditions for porn and constantly updates an audio diary of his sexploits. The fun, tropicalia-flavored music score is a revelation. As seen at the 2011 Palm Springs International Film Festival.

Silence of Love (Tous les soleils) (France, dir Philippe Claudel)—Director Claudel follows his 2008 psychological shocker I've Loved You So Long with something completely different—a gently humorous portrait of a single Italian-French father opening himself to the possibilities of love. Stefano Accorsi (Ferzan Ozpetek's Saturn in Opposition and His Secret Life) stars as a Strasbourg music professor who lives with a smart, rebellious teenage daughter he overprotects, and an agoraphobic, anarchist brother. While it gets a bit corny in places and the screaming, emotive Italian stereotypes can wear thin, the film is overall quite winning. Anouk Aimée shows up in a memorable supporting role and Strasbourg looks even lovelier than it did in José Luis Guerín's In the City of Sylvia. For what it's worth, I doubt the distributor could have come up with a lousier English title than Silence of Love.

The Mosque (A Jamaâ) (Morocco, dir Daoud Aoulad-Syad)—In 2007's Waiting for Pasolini (which opened our 2008 Arab Film Festival), giddy chaos overtook a Moroccan village with the arrival of an Italian film crew. Now Pasolini's director has made a sequel of sorts, whereby a poor farmer is forbidden from dismantling the film's fake mosque, which sits on his land and has been appropriated as a real place of worship. Unable to support his family, he's told by the mosque's fake imam that his rewards lie in the next life. While initially a tad plodding and one-note, The Mosque improves as complex layers are added to the farmer's predicament. The result is a worthy allegory assailing religious hypocrisy, corruption and authoritarianism.

Busong (Palawan Fate) (Palawan Destin) (Philippines, dir Auraeus Solito)—Director Solito, best known for his LGBT-themed films like The Blossoming of Maximo Oliveros and Boy, returns to his southern Philippines roots. In this dreamy meditation steeped in Palawan island culture, indigenous folklore and healing arts are revealed to us through a half dozen loosely connected storylines. In the costumes and art direction, Busong maintains a timelessness into which modernity only occasionally intrudes—the distant sound of a chainsaw, a wisp of poisonous smoke from a nickel mine, and a somewhat heavy-handed story of a fisherman's humiliating encounter with a white landowner. All of this—the pristine beaches, jungles, unending skies and underwater life—is sumptuously photographed. Solito's now familiar homoerotic gaze is also in full evidence.

Beyond the Road (Por el camino) (Brazil / Uruguay, dir Charly Braun)—A youngish, Argentine ex-investment banker arrives in Montevideo, Uruguay and sets off to see some rural property left by his deceased parents. Along for the ride is a Belgian tourist, with whom he begins an uneasy fling. Considerably more interesting than their oscillating relationship are the stops they make en route; from a chic Punta del Este art gallery to a country horse fair, and from a rich uncle's estancia to a hippie commune in the boonies. First-time director Braun's talent lies in conveying a rich sense of place and populating his film with compellingly watchable "real" types. Even Naomi Campbell has a wistful cameo that's not out of place in this charmingly meandering, melancholy journey. Director Braun will attend both MVFF screenings.

The Prize (El premio) (Mexico, dir Paula Markovitch)—At the height of Argentina's Dirty War, a mother and 7-year-old daughter hide from authorities in a remote, ramshackle beach hut. Their tenuously safe existence is threatened when the girl starts school and enters an essay contest meant to extol the virtues of the country's military. Markovich is best known as co-screenwriter of Fernando Eimbcke's Duck Season and Lake Tahoe, but her feature directorial debut contains none of the absurdist humor of those remarkable films. Her subject matter is certainly vital (and from what I've read, closely autobiographical), but the film is sabotaged by extremely slow pacing. Scenes of wind-whipped beach wandering alternate with long stretches of mother and daughter cooped up in their shack (where oddly enough, we never once observe them cooking or eating), to the point of grossly overstating the characters' anxiety, boredom and isolation. This dampens the potency of an otherwise absorbing work containing superb performances and distinctive mise-en-scène. Director Markovitch will attend the October 16 MVFF screening.

Jeff Who Lives at Home (USA, dir Jay and Mark Duplass)—The Duplass brothers deliver their most mainstream film to date, which could put off fans of edgier works like Baghead and Cyrus. Jason Segel plays Jeff, a stoner whose begrudging errand for Mom (Susan Sarandon) sets off a day-long, follow-your-bliss-y search for signs of life in the universe. A cleverly crafted story rubs uncomfortably against too much strained poignancy. Still, highly recommended for those who think Segel is the most adorable schlub in the universe. As seen at a MVFF34 press screening.

Pegasus (Pégase) (Morocco, dir Mohamed Mouftakir)—Somewhere in a vague dystopia, a crazy woman raves about "The Lord of the Horse" who's coming to get her. It's up to comely mental institution psychologist Zineb to get to the bottom of it all. I won't elaborate further on the plot, which rolls insanity, rape, transexualism, incest and creepy folklore into one big convoluted and culturally abstruse psycho-thriller. Still, the film is extremely well made, with arresting imagery and shifting color palettes matching the temperament of any given scene. Amazingly, Pegasus was the top prize winner at this year's FESPACO, Africa's most important film festival. Popular Moroccan actor Anas El Baz (Casanegra) will attend both MVFF screenings.

Holidays by the Sea (Ni à vendre ni à louer) (France, dir Pascal Rabaté)—Graphic novelist turned film director Rabaté updates Jacques Tati with this homage to 1953's beloved comedy, Mr. Hulot's Holiday. Once again we're at a seaside resort, observing the droll antics of tourists and year-round denizens alike. But this isn't your grandfather's Tati, with subplots involving BDSM and a nudist camp. Rabaté conjures a few interesting visual ideas, but overall the film lacks cohesion and punch. And while comic mileage will always vary, this not painfully-unfunny frolic failed to elicit a single laugh out me. Points are given for top-notch production design, a cast of recognizable French character actors (including Jean-Pierre Jeunet regular Dominique Pinon) and an effectively whimsical, Theremin-heavy score (the film contains no dialogue to speak of).

Cross-published on film-415.

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Michael Hawley, MVFF34,

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TIFF 2011: THE ARTIST—The Evening Class Interview With Michel Hazavanicius

Michel Hazavinicius and I first met when he accompanied OSS 117: Lost In Rio to the San Francisco Film Society's 2009 French Cinema Now series. It was Halloween and we dashed across the street to La Mediterranee so that he could catch a bit to eat before returning to the theater for his Q&A. He revealed that he was working on a new project with Jean Dujardin, his lead actor in the OSS 117 films. The new project didn't have a working title yet, but it was going to be a silent movie "with some music and eventual sound", less a comedy and more "a melodrama with some funny situations."

Fast forward to May 2011 and The Artist scored Dujardin the Prix d'interprétation masculine award at the Cannes Film Festival (not to be undone by Uggy, his canine accomplice, who received the special Jury Prize, the Palm Dog Award). I was delighted when The Artist was programmed as a Special Presentation at the 2011 Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) and noted that it was the only film I heard applauded by the international press during its festival P&I screening.

As Michèle Maheux wrote in her program notes for TIFF: "A love letter to 1920s Hollywood, Michel Hazanavicius' The Artist resurrects silent cinema as a powerful and complex storytelling medium. Shot entirely in black and white, without dialogue and in a traditional 1.33 aspect ratio, the film remains faithful to the period it represents, avoiding the trap of pastiche through a sincere appreciation of the cinematic possibilities offered by classic silent film.

"Jean Dujardin plays George Valentin, whose matinee-idol good looks and arrogant but good-natured charm evoke Douglas Fairbanks at his best. George is at the height of his career in 1927 when The Artist begins. While working the premiere of his new film, he accidentally bumps into a beautiful unknown, Peppy Miller (Bérénice Bejo), and the ensuing photo op sets her on the path to unexpected fame.

"George, however, quickly finds himself on the opposite track, as sound begins to dominate the screens. Refusing to accept this modern innovation, he finances his own silent feature in 1929 and loses it all. His wife leaves him and his fans forget him. Broken and alone, George fades into the shadows of old Hollywood.

"At the same time, new It-girl Peppy finds herself at the forefront of the sound phenomenon. As her star status rises, she never forgets the man who gave her the start she needed; she resolves to help George in any way she can.

"The Artist tells a familiar story, reminiscent of classics like Sunset Boulevard and A Star is Born, but Hazanavicius and cinematographer Guillaume Schiffman breathe new life into an old tale. Their skilful handling of a style that could easily have turned into camp enables for a newfound appreciation not only for silent cinema, but also for melodrama and the intense emotional effects the genre can deliver. Above all, The Artist offers a joyous look back to a golden age, and will leave audiences nostalgic for a cinematic form that, as Hazanavicius proves, hasn't lost its resonance."

The Artist is scheduled to make appearances at the 49th edition of the New York Film Festival (currently in progress) and as the closing night feature at the upcoming 34th edition of the Mill Valley Film Festival, running October 6-16, 2011. My thanks to Andrea Grau of Touchwood PR for setting me up to speak with Michel Hazavanicius in the mezzanine of Toronto's Park Hyatt.

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Michael Guillén: Michel, congratulations on The Artist. It's a beautiful, impeccably crafted film.

Michel Hazavanicius: Thank you very much.

Guillén: What I'd like to pursue in our conversation is an appreciation of cinematic citation. The Artist intrigued me for successfully circumventing the camp tendencies of pastiche and eliciting the depth of homage. But truthfully, it even goes past homage and is more accurately a silent film intact on its own terms.

Hazavanicius: That's right.

Guillén: Why were you attracted to making a silent film? It's quite a departure from the OSS 117 spoofs.

Hazavanicius: I wanted to do something completely different from the OSS 117 films. In a way, The Artist is very different from those films but it's also close to them, in the sense of taking a certain kind of cinema and making it modern. To take the spy movies, the James Bond movies, and make comedies that skewer racism was the thrust of the OSS 117 films. With The Artist, I wasn't trying to ape movies from the silent era. What intrigued me was that there was no more irony. I wasn't mocking the silent era. As you say, it wasn't that I wanted to do an homage per se; I just wanted to make a silent movie.

At the beginning, I wasn't sure if it would be a movie about a silent film actor or if the subject of the film would be about silent movies. I was primarily interested in the format. I ended up choosing this story of a silent movie actor because I thought it would be easier for the audience to accept watching a silent movie. That made sense. I felt audiences needed a justification to accept watching a movie in such an unusual format.

I had many deep motivations for wanting to make a silent film. As a member of the audience, I absolutely love the way stories are told to me in a silent movie. It's not a cerebral response. It's more a child-like response. Because there's no spoken language, the way the story engages your heart is special. It's hypnotic, sensual, not at all cerebral, and I love that sensation as an audience member. My motivations as a director were much more selfish. For me, it was a great experience. It's what cinema is about, in my opinion. I'm telling a story with images and music. With images, you have the actors, you have the sets, you have the costumes, the lights, everything, and that's how you're telling the story. You don't need words for that. It's the ultimate experience for a director to make a silent movie. I really wanted to try to do it.

The opportunity to do so I owe to the producer Thomas Langmann who gave me permission. It was a fantasy that he helped come true. Also, the two lead actors—Jean Dujardin and Bérénice Bejo—thoroughly inspired the characters. They were actors I felt could make a silent film because their faces and their styles of acting—since it's not just about their faces—aren't really modern and I felt they were suited to a silent film. All of the crew, my cinematographer Guillaume Schiffman, my composer Ludovic Bource, were involved early in the project. I invited them to come with me into the immersion process of trying to understand what kind of movie we could make.

So making The Artist has been a very long process that started from a desire deep in my soul mingled with my selfishness and involving meeting the right people at the right time. Of course, the success of the OSS 117 films helped me a lot because—when I first talked about this story—nobody was interested in making a black and white silent movie. It was too much out of the market.

Guillén: You might know that in San Francisco we have one of the world's leading forums for silent cinema—the San Francisco Silent Film Festival—who have been wholly instrumental in educating my appreciation of the medium. I have to presume that you've had a lot of exposure yourself to silent cinema? You've utilized the conventions so masterfully that I presume you've attended Pordenone?

Hazavanicius: I watch a lot of silent movies, yes. My biggest challenge with this movie—aside from finding the financing, which was a big challenge—was the writing. It was during the writing process that I was convinced I could make a silent movie. I actually wrote a story with no dialogue that I felt I could shoot as a director and that I felt actors would be able to tell. So I've watched a lot of silent movies, yes, primarily to know the rules of the game. What you can do. What you cannot do. What the format frees you to do. There were several oneiric sequences where I could play, like poetry—I'm not saying I'm a poet—but, there were unrealistic sequences that a director can rarely use in a realistic film. Everyone would think it was ridiculous because usually in a realistic film you strive to be naturalistic. In a black and white silent movie you are already so far from reality, which in itself is a promise to venture into another space besides realism. Once you've set up that other space, audiences will enter. Does that make sense?

Guillén: Absolutely! And I think audiences are hungry to experience these alternate spectatorial spaces. I have to mention that even the press are. The Artist has been the only press screening I've seen applauded by the press here at TIFF. And that always amuses me because it's like we slough away our professional personas and suddenly become just an audience. We all just want a real movie. We all want to be entertained and taken away into—as you say—another space. The Artist succeeds in that.

Hazavancius: Perhaps because we made the film in a classical way? It's a pleasant film. It's like a classic film but it's also modern in the sense that the pace of the film is not like a silent era film. The story itself is not complicated, it's a simple story, but it's not quite as simple as some of the narratives of silent era cinema. If you watch, for example, Murnau's City Girl (1930) or Sunrise (1927), the scripts, their stories, are very very simple. For today's audiences, they might be too simple. So I made The Artist a bit more complex. But then again, I couldn't make the story too complicated because the format doesn't allow it. At a certain point you would need words to express complex relationships. I had to strike a balance: not too simple, not too complex, only as complex as I was able.

Guillén: It could be said, perhaps, that an aspect of that just-so complexity is rendered in the film's exquisite production design. Guillaume Schiffman's cinematography captures the spirit of George Hurrell's Hollywood glamour portraiture perfectly. Can you speak a bit to what was involved in the preproduction process to achieve the look of the film?

Hazavanicius: I'm very selective about locations. When we were scouting for locations, the cinematographer and the production designer [Laurence Bennett] started off liking me but by the end they were fed up with me because I was never quite satisfied with what they found. I know that a story cannot be told in a good way without the right locations. I was the same way with the OSS 117 films and I was even worse with this film. So preproduction took a little time. We filmed The Artist in 35 days, which is short really, so the preparation wasn't as long as I would have liked but we committed ourselves to making sure that we could do the film justice on such a short schedule.

Guillén: How about post-production effects? Was a lot of time spent in post-production insuring the look of Hollywood in the '20s and '30s?

Hazavanicius: Not so much, really. The way I work is to try to do the less I can. I try to leave as much room as possible for the audience. I firmly believe that what the audience does is better than what I do because they do it in their own way. Every single viewer does the work in their own way. So my job as the filmmaker is to put as little as is necessary in each frame. So there was a little bit of post-production but mainly things that you aren't supposed to know about or notice.

For example, at that time the Hollywood sign actually read Hollywoodland. As a filmmaker I had a choice. Would I use Hollywoodland, even though most people didn't know that was the authentic sign? I chose to go with the authentic sign. But I couldn't reconstruct these huge letters on the hill so I had to effect this digitally in post-production.

Guillén: If I may single out one of my favorite images in the film? It's when Valentin, in a moment of self-loathing, pours out his whiskey on the reflective surface of the table. Stunning!

Hazavanicius: Oh, thank you! That image was not included in the print shown at Cannes.

Guillén: It was not?!

Hazavanicius: No. This was the only shot I changed between Cannes and now. I don't know why I didn't include it at first. Perhaps because I worried that as a director it would appear that I was showing off?—"Look what I can do!"—and so I didn't feel comfortable and took it out. Then when the film screened at Cannes, I felt that the story got a bit confusing without that sequence so I reinserted it, provided a date, and that helped to structure that section of the film. They loved the movie anyway at Cannes but I feel it is better now.

Guillén: Along with eliciting these marvelous performances out of Jean Dujardin and Bérénice Bejo, how in the world did you find Uggy? And what went into developing a relationship between Jean and this upstaging Jack Russell?

Hazavanicius: I was lucky. But you know, I've been lucky from the very beginning of this movie right to the present moment. I hope my luck doesn't run out! The producer always said this movie was born under a lucky star. And really, that's the truth. I wrote the script with a Jack Russell doing all these tricks that you saw in the movie. I knew it was going to be a problem finding the dog. I knew that it would take a long time to train a dog to do all these tricks and we didn't have the money or the time. I told my producer that there were two things we needed to do very quickly. One was to find a dance instructor for the actors—because they had to do a tapdancing number—and we had to find the dog, because I thought we were going to have to train it.

So when we first arrived in Los Angeles, I had to push the producer to find the money to afford the dog. Then we started looking for him. We went to the largest animal training company in Hollywood who provides all the "talent" for animal movies. They're one of the best in the world. They have horses, birds, any kind of animal you can imagine, including dozens of dogs, and they showed me the dogs they had on file. I saw some genius dogs, as smart as Einstein, cute and able to do a lot of tricks, but none of them were a Jack Russell. So they told me, "If you really want a Jack Russell, it's going to take six months to train them because we're going to have to buy six to eight Jack Russells and train them to do specific things." They said I would need at least three Jack Russells for my movie. Which, of course, was very expensive and was going to take too long.

But then they offered another option. They knew of an independent dog trainer from a small family who lived in a small house in the suburbs who—when I first visited them—I thought were going to be useless. And then the trainer introduced me to Uggy. Uggy was exactly what you see in the movie. He already knew all of the tricks and the trainer told me, "Yes, I read the script and there's no problem." Then, bam, Uggy fell down dead like he does in the movie, and he did all the tricks, even more tricks than we showed in the movie: he skates, he has a skateboard! He stands on his skateboard on two legs and curves, it's just amazing.

As for his relationship with Jean, there were two things. Uggy obeyed his trainer. This was useful while making a silent movie because the trainer could yell at him during the filming. But this proved very difficult for Jean. For example, towards the end of the movie when Valentin wants to commit suicide and Uggy is tugging at the hem of his trousers because he doesn't want Valentin to commit suicide, his trainer was yelling on the set to coax him to do this and Jean was having to play the scene very sad with all this noisy distraction. So, yes, Uggy performs marvelously in that scene, but it's Jean who is the consummate performer for maintaining the sadness necessary to the scene even as the dog trainer is shouting. There were other times when Uggy was not on set but Jean had to anticipate what Uggy might do. So these scenes do not succeed just because of how well-trained the dog is but because of how Jean worked with him. There's the famous caution to an actor never to work with children or animals and, in this instance, Jean had to work to make the scenes believable. If the scenes were not believable, no one would blame the dog. They would say the actor was no good.

Guillén: To wrap up here then, being a fan of silent cinema myself, I appreciated your observance of the transnational value of silent cinema, which I've been taught is one of the reasons that silent cinema was so beloved around the world. These films were easily accommodated through translated intertitles that allowed them to traffic globally. So I'm curious if you're replicating that strategy and have various prints that are traveling with translated intertitles?

Hazavanicius: Because it's an American movie, we felt American intertitles were more authentic so we've elected to use translated subtitles for the film's international screenings. But I did try to sell the idea of providing software to foreign distributors so that they could make their own intertitles in their own languages, but we ended up not doing that. Even at Cannes, the French watched the movie with American intertitles but French subtitles.

But what remains true for me is that silent cinema is more than language. It's a utopian medium that can travel anywhere and is understandable to everyone in the exact same way, irregardless of the intertitles. Silent cinema "speaks" in a language that anyone on the Earth can understand. There's something touching about that. When we were looking for the financing, that's what I told the potential investors. I wasn't sure if I was lying or actually telling the truth, but I told them that maybe the film wouldn't be a huge success in France because it was silent and it was in black and white. But I reminded them that we were making a prestige movie that—if we made it well—we could sell to every country in the world, because the film would harken back to an era when cinema was for everyone. Cannes proved the success of the idea.

Guillén: Not only in the conventions of silent cinema as a transnational medium, but in your choice to cast the film with an international ensemble that includes American, British and French actors. It's phenomenal what you've accomplished.

Hazavanicius: Thank you very much.

Guillén: I look forward to your next project.

Hazavanicius: Me too!

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SAGEBRUSH: THE IDAHO BUCKAROO PROJECT—The Evening Class Interview With Andrea Scott

Film writing has so much to do with rhythm and timing and there's no question that the multiple disruptions in my life this year—relocating from San Francisco to Boise, Idaho (still in progress) and then attending to family emergencies once I arrived—have thrown me off schedule. I was thinking this morning that I'm feeling a bit "unstuck in time" (as Kurt Vonnegut would phrase it), having missed so many pertinent theatrical release dates and woefully behind on festival coverage, let alone on transcription of literally hundreds of recorded conversations that have (unfortunately) clustered on a back burner; but, I have to believe that it's the work that matters, however gradually it unfolds, and not so much how it serves the machinery. In fact, serving the machinery has become a low priority in my film coverage and finding ways to write about film that circumvent these marketing forces has become a daily meditation.

Perhaps the most immediate and apparent change in my film coverage is that I have gone more international even as I now strive to balance that coverage with regional coverage through a new sidebar here on The Evening Class entitled "Sagebrush", which will cover the unique regionality of film culture in Idaho. I first experienced this regional filmmaking when I accepted filmbud Bruce Fletcher's invitation to attend the 2007 Idaho International Film Festival (IIFF), which he was programming at the time. It was an eye opener to experience firsthand an enthused film scene off the beaten path. No press junkets here! Just a refreshingly collaborative ethos between aspiring filmmakers crafting films on shoestring budgets and audiences supporting them. I wrote up IIFF 2007's opening night feature The Walker, incorporated earlier coverage on Rolf De Heer's Ten Canoes, and interviewed A.J. Eaton for his short The Mix-Up and Ernesto Livon-Grosman for his documentary Cartoneros, and drafted a festival overview, all of which will be incorporated into the Sagebrush sidebar, as will my interview with Seth Randal whose film The Fall of '55 crossed state lines to screen at San Francisco's Frameline31.

But my first true interview for the new Sagebrush sidebar at The Evening Class was conducted earlier this Summer at a benefit screening of Cindy Meehl's Sundance winner Buck at Boise's art house cinema The Flicks. The benefit was for the Idaho Buckaroo Project spearheaded by photographer Andrea Scott and I felt that my conversation with her would be the perfect way to launch an ongoing series of entries on regional film production and cultural practice in Idaho. She was a genuine sweetheart in taking time from that sold-out event to sit down for a few minutes to talk to me. When I mentioned to her that I was a transplanted San Francisco journalist, she made me laugh by saying, "I've been waiting for someone sophisticated to interview me!" "Now don't get carried away," I countered.

Andrea Scott is an Idaho native who grew up on a large cattle ranch. The ranching tradition in her family dates back to the 1800s. She is currently creating a photography documentary of the West. She is known as the "Cowboy's Photographer" because she does not pose or recreate scenes, but captures them naturally as they appear. Andrea feels blessed by her friendships with the people who keep the western tradition alive and is honored to be able to capture this lifestyle in timeless images. Recently, Andrea won a photography award from Range Magazine and her other work, "Women with Scars", has been exhibited at DIA Art Foundation's Printed Matter in New York. Her photographs have also appeared in magazines and newspapers throughout the Northwest.

I'm timing the transcript of our conversation from earlier this Summer to coordinate with the unveiling of the Idaho Buckaroo Project Exhibit at the Stewart Gallery, 1100 W. Jefferson St., Boise, ID., this coming Thursday, October 6, 2011, 5:00PM to 9:00PM as part of Boise's First Thursday art walks.

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Michael Guillén: Andrea, how did the Idaho Buckaroo Project develop?

Andrea Scott: About a year ago I took one photo that started this all. It got published in a magazine and the response was amazing. The response ranged from Florida to California. I come from a ranch background. I grew up for part of my life on a big cattle ranch in Montana and now have a small place outside of Boise; but, I'm urban as well. I have a Masters degree in writing and photography and have made my living as a photojournalist.

I started photographing Idaho's buckaroos and doors started opening. People from the city would look at these photographs and become excited and enthused. I received a small grant from the Humanities to continue the project. The Idaho Commission on the Arts also gave me a small grant to start studying some of the more traditional arts. As you know, a lot of money for the arts is drying up. It's very hard to travel the distances I have to travel and everything costs a lot of money. So veering away from what most writers or photographers would do, I started asking people to sponsor this project. A lot of people jumped on. They were enthused. I only heard "no" a couple of times. I remember a five-year-old boy give me 20¢ out of his pocket because his daddy was a cowboy and he wanted to be a cowboy too. The project has captured the public imagination.

I have a friend who likes to play devil's advocate with me who said, "Andrea, what folly in this time of economic depression that you're trying to generate this project." I said, "It is an uncertain time but what better time for our heroes?" Cowboys, cowgirls and buckaroos have long been the western heroes of our culture. So I started meeting buckaroo families and their generosity in letting me into their lives to document their daily work has been amazing.

When I got out into the buckaroo community, I saw a greater need. For one thing, medical services. A lot of these folks do not have medical insurance and if they're hurt on a horse—which is very apt to happen—they could be injured in serious ways and temporarily or permanently disabled. It could be the end of their careers. Then what kind of means do they have to generate income? I decided that one of my goals through the Idaho Buckaroo Project is to bring medical services to these smaller communities. We're talking Bruno, Grandview, Oreana, wherever Buckaroo families are.

I was familiar with the Idaho Commission on the Arts who do some limited apprenticeships with traditional artists. These are brilliant master artists who work in silvercraft, saddlemaking and leatherwork; arts which should not be lost. I want to create more slots through the Idaho Buckaroo Project to create opportunities for supplemental income. I pray that no one in these buckaroo families get hurt, but if they do, they will have something to fall back on if they're not able to get back on a horse again. I want to go into the schools and educate children about how important cowboys and cowgirls are to the very fabric of Idaho. We have a great resource here. We have a state horse. We have a state gem.

Guillén: So why not a state hero?

Scott: Right! I've been trying to promote that. I don't know if people are hearing that but they're going to keep hearing that. I think if you look at the range of items contributed to our silent auction tonight—everything ranging from a chichi spa gift to a discount on hay—you see the diversity of support. I want to create an understanding between rural and urban cultures. I'm fascinated by that.

Guillén: My understanding is that there are plans to publish your photographs of the Idaho buckaroos into a single volume?

Scott: We're working on that. I already have some distribution channels, which I understand is very important. A lot of the publishers are drying up. I haven't seriously launched on that part of the project because I've been so busy conducting interviews and taking photographs; but, I don't think I'm going to have any problems with publishing. There's already been so much interest.

Guillén: This specific event at The Flicks to promote The Idaho Buckaroo Project through a benefit screening of Buck, how did that come about?

Scott: I've known Carole Skinner forever from the day The Flicks opened their doors so I just said, "Hey, any chance of doing a benefit sometime down the road?" All of a sudden Carole goes, "Oh my gosh, Buck's coming!" We could call it universal synchronicity, but hey perhaps a better term would be to simply say, "It was meant to happen." I could tell a bunch of stories about how stuff is just happening. I didn't end up here because I thought, "I'm going to do anything I see." I ended up here because people opened their hearts and these are people from all wakes of life.

The other day I said to some friends, "You know what we need for the Flicks benefit? We need a fiddle player. I want a young man or woman to play the fiddle." I had a booth for the day as a bellringer at the Saturday market and this young man shows up with a case. I thought, "Oh great, with my luck he'll be playing violin." Well, Kyle Pogue is an awesome fiddler! I talked to his mom and I said, "This is the perfect example of how this stuff works. Does your son come down to play at the Market all the time?" She said, "No. It's the weirdest thing. He came up to me the other day and he said, 'Hey Mom, I just want to go downtown and open up my case and see what happens.' " I want Kyle to always open events for the Idaho Buckaroo Project.

Guillén: I'm intrigued by your earlier comment that you're fascinated with making a connection between the rural and the urban. How does this event fulfill that?

Scott: The Flicks is an art theater. Outside of Boise, most people have never heard of The Flicks. People from the farms and the ranches look at The Flicks and they say, "Well, that's kind of a strange theater but they're bringing a film I care about" and by coming tonight to support the benefit screening, they're being exposed to a whole new world. It's magical.

One final thing I want to say is that a lot of people say, "Oh, this is a disappearing way of life." But I can tell you: it's not going to disappear as long as the Idaho Buckaroo Project is here. But it's going to take all of us working together. Even if you're not a buckaroo and not on a horse day in and day out like a lot of these families are, I think a lot of us have a little buckaroo in us. That's what I hope to bring out.

Photos courtesy of Andrea Scott and Pete Grady.

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Andrea Scott, Idaho Buckaroo Project, Sagebrush,

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BLACKTHORN (2011)—The Evening Class Interview With Mateo Gil

"It's hard to be an outlaw when you're not wanted anymore."—Danny O'Keefe

Danny O'Keefe's play on the word "wanted" signifies how important it is for an outlaw to be chased in a western. If an outlaw isn't chased, then what has he become? Or what has the western become? Mateo Gil's Blackthorn (2011) poses the question: what happens if the outlaw is caught, shot, and presumed dead? But isn't really dead?

In Gil's addition to the legacy, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid escape their ambush in a Bolivian standoff but elect to forfeit their identities to Death in exchange for some new lives. Butch changes his name to James Blackthorn and lives an exiled life in Bolivia for 20 years. But flashbacks of his youth when he and Sundance were in top form and in love with the same woman revive old feelings in him. Blackthorn longs for moments lost and longs to ward off moments he is just about to lose. The need to meet a son he has never met inspires a series of melancholic letters in which he tentatively addresses the boy as "nephew". The time has come to return "home" and set things straight.

And who better to look off to the horizon with craggy determination than Sam Shepard in a role he was born to play. More force of nature than performance, Shepard enrichens his character with a deep sense of lived experience as he works through one obstacle after another. It's inspiring to witness. Supported by a competent international cast and outstanding Bolivian locations, Blackthorn reconfigures a legend and a genre in one poignant and innovative stroke.

Mateo Gil is well known in Spain as a screenwriter. He co-wrote Alejandro Amenábar's Thesis, Open Your Eyes (later remade as Vanilla Sky), The Sea Inside, and Agora, as well as The Method for Marcelo Piñeyro. His first movie as a director was Nobody Knows Anybody in 1999. He also directed the award-winning shorts Housebreaking and Say Me.

Blackthorn premiered at La Palmas and was in the World Narrative competition at Tribeca 2011 in April. It premiered on Video on Demand on Friday, September 2, and opens in New York and Los Angeles on October 7 and in the San Francisco / Bay Area in the weeks that follow [release schedule]. My thanks to Brandon Nichols for facilitating the interview and for Mateo Gil for granting time to talk on the phone. Photos courtesy of Magnolia Pictures.

* * *

Michael Guillén: Mateo, it's my pleasure to speak with you today about your recent film Blackthorn (2011). You're the perfect person to talk to about one of my recent interests: how the international reach of genre contests the limitations of a national cinema. You started out as a screenwriter within the Spanish film infrastructure but quickly achieved an international profile through your collaborations with Alejandro Amenábar. How much do you think of yourself as a Spanish director or of Blackthorn as a Spanish film?

Mateo Gil: Yes, well, to be honest, originally I never imagined making films for an international audience. I simply had the good fortune to work on Alejandro's films, which is when I first encountered the opportunity to consider an international audience and to strive for those heights through his vision. Alejandro was the one who thought internationally.

With respect to Blackthorn, at a sincere level the film is almost entirely Spanish. Some of the financing came from France, and when we were on location in Bolivia we received some assistance from their government, but primary financing came from Spain. For a while, I thought we would find our audience in Spain but the western isn't that popular of a genre there. However, I think of the Spanish audience and the North American audience in the same sense. It isn't that I was trying to make a successful U.S. film. What I wanted was that a North American spectator would be able to watch my film and not think of it as strange or foreign (which is to say, European). But I understand that the spirit of the film is North American in the sense that the western is a genre particular to North America. But I wasn't trying to expand into North America by using the genre; I was just trying to make a film that contained the key elements of the genre. That was my primary purpose.

Guillén: In his interview for New York Mag's Vulture, Sam Shepard opined that these days the western seems best understood by foreigners. He singled out his experience working with you on Blackthorn, and another western he did with German director Uli Edel (Purgatory, 1999). Do you think that's true? What attracted you to film a western?

Gil: I've heard about this statement of Sam's and the truth is that I can't really answer your question because I don't know to what extent young directors in North America are involved with the genre. I do know that in Spain westerns are an almost forgotten genre. In Spain, or in other parts of Europe or the world, it might be true that they understand the western better; but, I don't know.

In my case at least, in my childhood I spent my time watching westerns on television. I watched a lot of westerns as a child because at that time there were a lot of westerns programmed on television, especially in the '70s and the '80s. My first time to a movie house was to see a western.

I chose to make a western because the genre—though considered to be a North American genre—is a genre that I feel is my own and part of my culture, having watched so many of them. Again, I don't know if the young directors in North America have watched as many westerns as I have or not; but, I do think that there's a general nostalgia for the western among audiences all over the world. I think they feel real pleasure when they watch a western in a movie house.

Guillén: How did you distinguish between the North American westerns that came out of Hollywood, let's say, and the spaghetti westerns that came out of Italy? How did each influence your vision of a western?

Gil: There are a lot of influences in Blackthorn. There are some of the spaghetti western influences because I watched a lot of the films of Sergio Leone. But the film has also been influenced by other types of westerns, especially from the '60s and '70s; the westerns of Sam Peckinpah, Arthur Penn, Sidney Pollack and Robert Altman. Even as I was working on the project and setting up the scenes on set, the films of John Ford were also present. It's as if the film itself did not want to exist without these influences. Thus my experience of Blackthorn is of a mixed experience, respectful of influences from the '50s, the '60s, the '70s, which were the westerns that I liked.

Guillén: Blackthorn's international cast is one of its strongest assets. You have Sam Shepard from the U.S., Stephen Rea from Ireland, Eduardo Noriega from Spain, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau from Denmark, and Magaly Solier from Peru. Was part of the rationale for casting an international cast a strategy for achieving an international audience?

Gil: No, no, no. The only thing I needed from the casting as a director and the only thing I was really strict about was that the accents needed to be accurate. So the only thing I needed out of the North American characters was that they spoke with a perfect North American accent. For the characters from Bolivia, I needed them to speak Spanish the way a Bolivian would speak Spanish. I knew that Magaly Solier would be able to speak a Bolivian Spanish, which she performed fantastically.

It was clear to me that the only person who could perfectly carry the North American accent was Sam Shepard, whereas the other characters could be cast from a European pool of talent. This was difficult because they still had to be able to carry off English, ride a horse, and—in the case of Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, who plays the young James Blackthorn—that he look like Sam. It was all very complicated but we had a marvelous casting director in whom I had complete confidence. Not only did we have good luck in securing Sam for the lead role but it turned out that Sam is a good friend of Stephen Rea and he was able to bring him into the project, which was a lucky break.

Guillén: So I imagine that being on set carried its own challenges in terms of all the different languages that were being spoken? It was a multilingual set with actors speaking English, Spanish, Aymara and Quechua. How did you negotiate direction on set?

Gil: It wasn't difficult at all. I simply had to be clear what to say in one language and what to say in another. But I didn't have trouble communicating with anyone. I would speak to them directly. I think for everyone who worked on this multilingual set, they walked away recognizing what a special and rich experience it was for them. It was a beautiful experience. And it was also historically accurate because multilingualism was present at the time of Blackthorn's exile in Bolivia.

I would say that Spanish predominated on set. Butch Cassidy was said to live in Bolivia for at least a couple of decades and, therefore, he would have had a good working Spanish. At the start, it was difficult to figure out who would be an American actor who could speak good Spanish. I don't know who else could have done it as well as Sam, because he can actually speak Spanish.

Guillén: Mateo, you have a notable reputation as a screenwriter and Sam is well-known for being a consummate playwright as well as an actor. Now that you've had the experience of directing, can you speak to how important is it for a director to be in touch with the craft of screenwriting?

Gil: I think it's very important. It was as important for me as a director as it has been for Sam. I understand the characters, as written, in a singular and clear way. For me, writing and directing have become the same thing. The writing helps me decide what is important when the time comes to direct and film, which is an essential facet.

Guillén: Blackthorn utilizes an epistolary structure by way of narrative voice over: a father writes home to a son he's never met and who—in his old age—he longs to meet. A melancholy permeates this film. It reminds me of what the Portuguese would call saudade, something which surely speaks to you as a Spaniard? When you decided to film a western, why did you decide to do such a nostalgic western, and not more of a shoot-'em-up actioner?

Gil: In the original version of the story written by Miguel Barros, that specific sentiment was already present. The nostalgia was already in place. This sentiment had a double reading for me. It wasn't only a sentiment of nostalgia for a certain type of values that have fallen into disuse in a way, become lost or forgotten. The sentiment also placed value in the struggle against greater powers, which is a struggle that Butch Cassidy incarnates in his personality. So the sentiment is not only one of nostalgia, but also one of a certain kind of passion against great odds that nowadays one rarely sees. It involves a charged vision of what is political or moral within the cinematic. I saw this sentiment in the original script and it served to energize me to pursue this film.

Guillén: Another strength evident in Blackthorn is what is often seen in all the classic westerns: the understanding that landscape is a character. Juan Ruiz Anchía's cinematography of the Bolivian landscape is stunning. In its visual relationship between the individual and the vast expanses through which he moves, I was reminded of John Ford's classic westerns; however, Bolivia's landscapes—unquestionably as majestic as Monument Valley—remain singularly distinct, though aesthetically similar.

Gil: It's curious. Various commentators have made the same observation that Blackthorn resembles the work of John Ford a bit. I take it as a compliment because, of course, John Ford is the master of the western genre. When I was preparing for the film, and traveled to Bolivia to scout for locations, I frequently thought about how films that are spectacular with incredible scenery are, in a way, the same throughout the world and that audiences have become immunized to the strength of these images of natural beauty from different countries. If you start seeing something too beautiful too often, you stop paying attention. All the more reason to use a genre like the western, which is known for its use of landscape, but to take it away from the landscape of North America to the landscape in Bolivia, so that the landscape can express itself to the spectator in a revived way.

Guillén: In your filmmaking, how did you negotiate with the presence of George Roy Hill's 1969 classic Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid? What Shelagh M. Rowan-Legg terms Blackthorn's "spiritual cousin"?

Gil: There's no way to escape the fact that Blackthorn has many points in common with George Roy Hill because they're the same characters, and in our film that's especially apparent during the flashbacks of Butch and Sundance as young men. Other than for that, I never saw Blackthorn as a direct reference to Hill's film. It's a marvelous film and I'm one of its fans but its tone is distinctly separate from Blackthorn. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid was a western that was also a comedy. It celebrated all sorts of things. Blackthorn looks at the world with a melancholic eye. The flashbacks of youth are given all the more poignance for being seen through the senescent eye of old age.

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Alejandro Amenábar, Eduardo Noriega, Juan Ruiz Anchía, Magaly Solier, Marcelo Piñeyro, Mateo Gil, Miguel Barros, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Sam Shepard, Spanish Cinema, Stephen Rea, Uli Edel, Western,

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TIFF 2011: THE IDES OF MARCH (2011)

The opening film at the 68th Venice International Film Festival, George Clooney's The Ides of March (2011) [official website] screened as a gala presentation at the 2011 Toronto International Film Festival. It releases wide on October 7, 2011.

It's perhaps obvious to expect a dark lining to the overcoats worn by men running for political office. It's perhaps even more obvious that political corruption has long been a favored form of mainstream entertainment. Since our votes no longer seem to matter, slapping down ten bucks provides some assurance that no amount of spin will negate what we all fundamentally know about pants and their heedless zippers sheepishly strolling the corridors of power.

With an A-list cast that includes George Clooney (also directing), Ryan Gosling, Philip Seymour-Hoffman, Paul Giamatti, Marisa Tomei, Jeffrey Wright, and Evan Rachel Wood in efficient and top notch ensemble form, The Ides of March campaigns forward by the sheer volition of its undisputed talent even if it is essentially a sermon for the converted and a somewhat melodramatic and predictable one at that.

Is it just me or are Philip and Paul playing the same roles over and over and over again? Marisa gleams with malice as a conniving journalist. I have to give a heartfelt shout out to Evan Rachel Wood who has matured into one of our loveliest and most gifted actresses. She's come a long way from being a child in the ill-fated TV series American Gothic. Just you wait, she's going to do something in the future that will knock our socks off and earn her an Oscar®. This, however, is not that role but ranks her as ready and able.

Cross-published (in an earlier edit) on Twitch.

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Evan Rachel Wood, George Clooney, Jeffrey Wright, Marisa Tomei, Paul Giamatti, Philip Seymour-Hoffman, Ryan Gosling, TIFF11,

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