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Exclusive Passion
Interviews:
Brian De Palma
Karoline Herfurth
Leila Rozario
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A 70mm print of The Untouchables will also screen at the Somerville Theatre in Boston on Monday, June 13th (7:30pm). This will kick off a four-day series called "The World Is Yours: Brian De Palma on Film," which is presented by the Independent Film Festival Boston in partnership with A24, and ends with a free screening of the De Palma documentary.
When asked if Francis Ford Coppola ever wanted De Palma to get involved with Zoetrope, De Palma replies, "Marty and I went and saw Zoetrope. I remember seeing the flatbed editing machines. Marty and I went because Marcia Lucas was editing Marty's movie. She edited Taxi Driver. So we went up and stayed with George. But what Francis was doing wasn't for me."
Late in the interview, De Palma explains why he wished he hadn't gone forward with Wise Guys: "The studio changed their minds and didn't want to make it. They just wanted us to go away. I should have just taken my money and walked instead of dealing with a studio that didn’t want to make the movie."
And then the interview ends with this excerpt:
BI: Legend has it you were very hard on George the first time he showed you guys "Star Wars."De Palma: That is not correct. [Laughs] I am sarcastic. I am considered the class clown, but a sarcastic clown. So I would make fun of certain things. Because everyone would take this stuff too seriously.
BI: So you were just messing with him about not liking the opening crawl?
De Palma: No, the crawl didn't make any sense at all. And I kept kidding him about the Force. I was like, "What is the Force?" [Laughs] But you have to understand, we used to look at each other's movies in order to be helpful. We might say some things that weren’t nice. You know, I remember reading an account where Marcia [Lucas] was very upset with me. And I don't remember this, but there was an account where Marcia told me, "You've hurt George's feelings and you should be gentle with him." I don't remember that. I really don't know what they're talking about. I was basically myself. The thing the guys could always count on with me is I would say what I thought. I wasn't holding back. I remember having a big discussion with Steven about “Close Encounters.” There were some sections I thought didn't work. And this was considered a crowning success of his career. And I was like, "I don't know, this doesn't really work for me." [Laughs]
BI: Do you remember a part that didn't work for you?
De Palma: I don't remember. But I remember going to a screening up on 55th street and afterward going to him and saying, "I don't know, Steven." But I think we have to do that, and I do it with Noah and Jake and these directors. If they are going to show me something or I'm going to show something to them, I want them to say what they think and not what will make me feel better.
And in this final excerpt, De Palma talks about seeing a movie with his father, which leads into a question about Home Movies:
BI: One thing that grabbed me in the documentary was your openness about your relationship with your father. [Who was never around during De Palma's youth and, the director says, cheated on his mother with other women.] Do you think the stories you tell are based on your feelings toward him?De Palma: Well, we're all a product of our upbringing to some extent. But my older brother was very influential too because he sort of represents that egomaniac that appears in many of my movies. My father was basically a very hardworking orthopedic surgeon, very much involved in his work. Whatever happened between he and my mother by the time I was born, they were at odds with each other and just hung in there until I went to college, basically. So it's interesting, the times I spent with my father I can count on one hand. I remember going to see a John Wayne Western with him.
BI: Which one?
De Palma: “The Horse Soldiers.” That's about it.
BI: But in “Home Movies,” the character Denis peeps on his father, which you say is based on you confronting your father with a knife and accusing him of adultery. Did doing that scene close a chapter in your relationship with him?
De Palma: I actually approached it as a comedy. A bizarre comedy. It all happened, but by the time I made the movie I saw the absurd aspects to it.
Meanwhile, IndieWire's Eric Kohn posted an interview with the headline, "Brian De Palma: Why He’ll Never Work in Hollywood Or on Television Again." When Kohn asks De Palma is he's done with the Hollywood system for good, De Palma replies, "I can’t imagine making a studio movie now. The whole system’s changed so much because of the effect of cable television and all the cable stations making their own series. They’re really into writers and producers, which is like the old studio system. The directors came in, directed, and were sent off. That’s what you’re getting with all these television projects."
Kohn follows up by asking about the Joe Paterno movie:
We couldn’t get it set up as a movie and it was finally set up at HBO. But I’ve never seen such studio interference. I mean, I would get stacks of notes, over and over again, from multiple sources. It’s changed. They want to be included on everything. I remember throwing executives out of the room during a reading for “Bonfire of the Vanities.” Are you kidding? I can’t have these actors performing in front of studio executives during the first reading! They claimed they wouldn’t say anything, which was nonsense. I had the same thing with the Paterno project. I said, “This is the first time Al has heard this material. I can’t have executives sitting here.” They were offended beyond belief — sulking, tense. I finally walked away from it.If you’ve seen HBO’s “Project Greenlight,” the HBO executive on that show, Len Amato — that was the guy I was dealing with. On the show, there’s Len in the editing room, making suggestions. That’s like my worst nightmare. I have never dealt with a producer in the editing room. And you can’t get final cut on television. Can you believe that Martin Scorsese doesn’t have final cut on television? I’m going to ask Marty if he does.
Go read the entire interview (it's great), but here's one more excerpt:
[Kohn:] Who’s going to make the great movie in response to this year’s election?[De Palma:] It’s crazy. I was watching George Clooney’s movie “Ides of March,” and it got me thinking. You have all these political people on television interviewing actors. When is George going to run for president? Is there anyone to stop him now?
He’s obviously very politically oriented, and he’s got this great wife. When you look at these movies, and the way they get George interviewed by Charlie Rose, or Chris Matthews — well, we can’t tell the difference anymore. That’s the situation with Trump. There is no difference between the theatrics of media and the movies. People ask how Trump could exist. Well, we live in a reality TV world, where if you can show juxtapositions of the guy saying opposite things right next to each other, nobody cares! He lied, so what? I remember when that was a bad thing.
Hemphill: The movie follows a very clear line from the beginning of De Palma’s career to his most recent work…was that structure there in the interviews themselves, or did you piece it together that way in the cutting room?Baumbach: It was always designed to go from beginning to end. There were digressions – we’d be talking about The Wedding Party and that would lead to a point about Mission: Impossible – but we wanted a chronological account of his career. And we didn’t want to make a movie about what other people thought of him, which is why there are no other interviews – we wanted to document Brian telling it his way. In that sense it’s not a work of journalism or even analysis – it’s just about Brian sharing his story.
Paltrow: Those kinds of decisions and selections are where what you might consider the “directing” really comes in. You have this visionary director who you happen to be friends with, so that’s what you’re trying to channel – you don’t want to affect it with other people’s opinions. That’s something else.
Hemphill: Brian, was it different being interviewed by filmmakers as opposed to journalists or critics?
De Palma: Absolutely. There’s a big difference, because they've been through the same experiences and have the same concerns and therefore have a better understanding of what you’re talking about. I would encourage other directors to always have directors conduct their interviews! [laughs]
Hemphill: Did looking back at your career while shooting the documentary, and then again when looking at the finished film, change your opinions about any of your films?
De Palma: Not really. You know, some of the ones that got really negative reviews, like Bonfire or Mission to Mars…they’re skillfully put together. Maybe they didn't fit what the critics wanted from them at the time, but they kind of stand on their own.
Baumbach: Brian’s personality is so much a part of all of his movies, so even in the less well received ones there are always amazing De Palma sequences – you can watch any of his films and find things that are exciting in them.
Hemphill: Did you find your appreciation of any of the films increasing after making the documentary?
Baumbach: I think both of us found a deeper affection for Carlito’s Way. In the documentary Brian tells a story about the movie coming out in theatres and doing okay, and then him watching it at the Berlin Film Festival and thinking, “I can’t make a better movie than this.” I know exactly what he means, because from a filmmaking standpoint that is a great director harnessing all his power in one movie. It’s remarkable that way, and undeniably impressive.
Before Nicolas Cage there was John Lithgow, whose own brand of “mega-acting” sets the tonal barometer for this demented, schlocky thriller. Raising Cain is a series of rugs being gleefully pulled out from under your feet by a filmmaker who has just made Bonfire of the Vanities and has nothing to lose. It’s brilliant.Lithgow has a ball playing a child-kidnapping madman whose evil twin is really a split personality, and whose dead father split personality is really his still-alive actual father, who’s also mad. Meanwhile Lithgow 1.0’s wife (Lolita Davidovich) has an affair with her old flame (Steven Bauer), a hunk in a sleeveless V-neck cardigan, and her vivid dreams-within-dreams give her a slippery grip on this tenth-year-of-a-soap-opera version of reality.
The climactic sequence begins with the line “You’re gonna kill somebody with that sundial!” and is structured according to the Mouse Trap formula (the board game, not the play). Disparate elements are wittily introduced – scalpel, bystanders, pram. Geography is established – motel walkway, elevator, parking lot. Characters’ objectives are set – patricide, rescue, escape. And when the trap is sprung, the perfectly choreographed chaos unfolds in glorious slow motion.
At times Raising Cain plays like a TV movie directed by its own main character(s) but that’s only to trick you into forgetting that it’s directed by Brian De Palma.
This is summarised by a four-minute Steadicam shot in which Frances Sternhagen leads a walk-and-talk through a police station – she keeps taking wrong turns while the cops steer her in the right direction. Throughout the film, De Palma points your expectations, sympathies and fears one way only to head off in another, but despite the madness on display he’s always in complete control.
By the end we’re primed for anything, and the thrill of the climax comes from De Palma’s precise timing and orchestration as he resolves the film’s myriad conflicts in a single scene.
After Casualties of War underperformed (despite critical praise) and Bonfire of the Vanities flopped (having received none), Raising Cain was De Palma’s conscious return to the twisty-turny thrillers that made his name. He did the same thing ten years later, following a lukewarm response to Snake Eyes and the summary dismissal of Mission to Mars.
2002’s Femme Fatale is Raising Cain’s sexier stepsister, sharing a delight in frustrating and subverting audience expectations, and building to a similar Mouse Trap-style showdown.