Writing by blake on Sunday, 18 of May , 2008 at 5:00 pm
“cease to resist, giving my goodbye
drive my car into the ocean
you’ll think i’m dead, but i sail away
on a wave of mutilation
a wave
wave”
Wave of Mutilation, Pixies (watch)
Before Reading:
Kick back, pop open your cooler and refresh with a Shiner Beer as you read this interview. Now reach over and crank up the stereo with the song Wave of Mutilation by the Pixies. If beer isn’t your thing then drink a glass of cold ice tea.
You may now proceed.
Southland Tales and Richard Kelly
Post 9/11 Anxiety, The Rock, Future for a Super Deluxe DVD and More…
In the history of film there are plenty of good films that fall through the cracks. Any number of reasons could derail them from connecting with audiences of their times. Not every film comes out in the right climate to be appreciated. Critics and audiences can lash out at a film that years or decades later re-emerges as a classic that is widely popular and praised. Richard Kelly has suffered this fate not once, but twice. Donnie Darko originally came out right after 9/11 and I was one of the few people that caught it then in movie theaters. Over the years a cult followed swelled and its director Richard Kelly immediately gained worldwide attention and a rabid cult following.
With his latest effort, Southland Tales, Mr. Kelly is once again back with a film that suffers from coming out at the wrong time and I predict one day will finally see its proper due. I’ve rarely seen a film greeted with so many people walking into seeing it already with their knives out ready to rip apart every slight blemish they find… just so damn eager to call it a mess. Who the hell went into this film with an open mind? Not many apparently. I have to say it’s a daunting and challenging film throughout, yet that has never stopped me from liking a film before. If anything, films that aren’t afraid to be different and be themselves certainly stand out to me. I may not ultimately like them or get them by any means, yet I certainly appreciate their willingness to travel down roads in cinema I haven’t been down before.
One of the main problems I think that plagues the reception of Southland Tales is that it is meant as an immediate post 9/11 film that forewarns of the world that awaits us, especially if the US invades Iraq. Unfortunately for the film its release was pushed well back after this time and so it seems so many of the things that are foreshadowed to happen in the film have already actually now happened in the world in which we all live. This makes it hard to see and experience the film within the context it was originally intended.
Here we sit now in 2008 with the upcoming US election with an America that is now deeply divided over how to face extremism, work productively with the world, while fixing issues at home and which political party to support. With all the divisions and polarization that is in the climate it’s often hard to find any common ground, yet the one thing we seem to all have in varying forms is Post 9/11 Anxiety. Some people don’t have it, but to a certain degree this is now something every person in this world now faces day in and out whether they realize it or not.
Extremism on both sides continue to push each other and push for changes to confront the other that radically effects many of us that are caught in the middle trying to get by. We are hoping for the day when we don’t have to worry about nuclear terrorism annihilating entire cities. We are hoping for the day we don’t have to worry about our children’s future. We are hoping for the day politicians use politics instead of escalating violence to deal with extremism. We are hoping for the day we foster a world that breeds peace and prosperity regardless of differences or religion. We are hoping for the day we all give a damn to put an end to the cycle of violence and start making the world sane again. Until that time we are thankful we have artists like Richard Kelly who stand up trying to make sense of all this madness and prompt us into reshaping our views of the current world in which we live, hopefully for the better and hopefully off the destructive path we all seem to continue to be on.
BLAKE: Is the character the Rock plays pretty much autobiographical for you in how you were dealing with everything post 9/11?
RICHARD KELLY: Yeah in a way. Everything changed after 9/11. The script changed after 9/11 and I think Southland Tales is me with a paintbrush painting my anxiety on celluloid onto the big screen.
You wake up everyday and there is more of this madness in Iraq, talk of global warming and you can deal with the anxiety it creates in multiple ways. For me making this film was the best outlet for it.
My thing is if your going to talk about religion and politics in a film, try to do it with a sense of humor. Have comedy be your delivery mechanism for talking about all this stuff.
My cast was my partner in this effort. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson in particular has been an amazing partner and he’s a phenomenal guy. He’s an American icon, especially in middle America. If he were to walk into the Mall of America in Minnesota or wherever that gigantic mall is, people would swarm him, which they already seem to do everywhere. I love that we have this icon that is also a terrific actor in this film. He is the ground and center of the film that allows all the other actors to swirl around him.
BLAKE: He also in the film has the script called the Power, which to me represented the fact artists have not only the power, but a voice in the world to stand up and bring about change or raise awareness of issues.
RICHARD KELLY: That is what I hope and I really tried to make this movie as a gift to all the people that responded to Donnie Darko. I feel that it operates in the same DNA, but in a much bigger, more complex and political realm.
The graphic novels were certainly a way to expand upon it. It was really challenging trying to do those books and the film.
BLAKE: At what point in the process did the idea to do graphic novels take shape?
RICHARD KELLY: When they were prepping the film I wrote the first script for the first book and finished it while we were shooting. I wrote full 50-60 page screenplays for each book. Once I was done with each I delivered them to the artist, Brett Weldele.
When we were editing I did books 2 and 3.
I really couldn’t solve the edit of the film until I finished writing the books. It was so challenging and overwhelming that I just couldn’t do it. Which meant I needed extra time in getting it all done. I was then lucky enough to have Sony say, “Take as much time as you need and we will see where you end up. Hopefully the movie will get a good release.”
Turns out we did get a good release and crossed the finished line. It was scary there for a while like, “Oh my God are we going to be able to finish this film, are we going to be able to pull it together?”
That was a challenge that I created for myself. I’m the one that started it and so I was the one that had to finish it.
It feels really great to have finally crossed the finish line.
BLAKE: I would be interested to hear you elaborate on your “ROAD NOT TAKEN” theme more.
RICHARD KELLY: It’s one of those much quoted Robert Frost poems that along with the T.S. Eliot poem, The Hollow Men, where we flip flopped it to be: This is the way the world ends, not with a whimper but with a bang.
Those two poems informed this project in a great way.
I think the Road Not Taken is the best way to describe this film in the theme that things can progressively get worse; we could have another terrorist attack. This is the anxiety we all live with after 9/11. I was hoping Southland Tales could be a tonic for people dealing with that anxiety.
Two roads diverged is also a way of talking about polarization and how our two political parties are so divided and the damage that has done to our country. There is a great sign post that I saw by an ad agency here in Austin that says – DividedWeFall.org (a site no longer active). It’s really a Canadian organization. The sign has an elephant and a donkey with their heads kind of stuck together up each other’s asses. This rings true because we are really divided and polarized.
BLAKE: So what it will really take is for one side to take the road not taken to move us forward instead of being more extreme as a reaction to everything going on.
RICHARD KELLY: I’m a liberal and maybe I’m a Neo-Marxist at heart. It’s a philosophical belief if you’re a Neo-Marxist and the joke in the movie is we show them as this non-violent/philosophical group but with… machine guns. (Laughs)
It’s a joke that is about the Democratic Party almost just self destructing and becoming powerless that they have to forge a revolution and start carrying weapons.
It’s a shame we have a two party that should work and be functional, but right now we are in a really precarious place. The film is a reflection of that. I had two show both sides. My critique of the extreme left is a critique done with love and affection because it’s a critique of myself essentially.
I have a machine gun at home. (Laughs) Just kidding.
BLAKE: What was this toughest challenge in crafting this latest cut of Southland Tales?
RICHARD KELLY: Shaping the film and getting it to flow was the toughest challenge.
There was a big sub plot in the film with Janeane Garofalo and Kevin Smith that unfortunately had to be cut for time. I would love to restore this at some point.
I’m very happy with this version of the film and feel very lucky I only had to cut 19 minutes overall. This was a really complex movie that people were saying was too hard to follow and too confusing. There then is a danger of people saying, “Well you have to have it in under two hours or cut an hour out.” I’m just grateful at the end of the day I only had to cut 19 minutes and it gave me more money to add more visual effects.
BLAKE: I love challenging films that make me think and don’t wrap up everything in a neat bow across the board. Donnie Darko worked very much that way with me, as did Southland Tales. There should always be films made that go against the grain and whatever the current assembly line for populist mass cinema entertainment!
RICHARD KELLY: I hope this film can connect.
I think I made a mainstream film, which people can raze me for saying that, but I think the majority of America could if it wanted to put on its thinking cap and engage in the ideas in it. I hope that they will… but you never know! It doesn’t hurt to try.
BLAKE: How did Seann William Scott get attached to this project?
RICHARD KELLY: He was one of the first actors I’ve befriended. Over the years he has been a great friend to me and he stuck with this film even before any other actors had signed on.
At the end the film comes down to his character. I think Harry Knowles (AICN) explained it best in saying that Southland Tales was a, “Science Fiction-Religious-Noir-Thriller about the second coming of Christ.” And that really is sort of what Southland Tales is.
BLAKE: I think regardless of what one thinks about the film it features without question one of the best ensemble acting performances we have seen from a Hollywood film this decade! With Seann and all the other actors you really allow them space to let their characters breath on screen.
RICHARD KELLY: Thank you!
I was really excited for all the actors and one thing I never want to do is let the actors down. I wanted to make sure the film got finished, released and distributed. All these actors did this movie for next to nothing.
We joked that Dwayne stayed at Shutters on Santa Monica when we were shooting. We give a nod to it in the film where he says, “Okay-Jericho Kane is going to make your wish come true and turn you into a new woman. We can rent a room with shutters-that’s my favorite place.”
His hotel bill at Shutters for the duration of the shoot cost more than his salary to make the film. He got paid $60,000 dollars to make this film. I probably shouldn’t say that. (Laughs) People really did this movie for peanuts including me, but this is what you have to do when you make a crazy film!
BLAKE: In your script for Domino there is the dynamic of the TV show Beverly Hills 90210 and features its cast and references to. In Southland Tales this same dynamic appears but with Saturday Night Live.
RICHARD KELLY: It’s coincidental and I just happened to think it up. A lot of people talk about how Saturday Night Live goes up and down, but it has been around for a long time and I tell you some of the most talented comedic performers come out of that show.
I think if an actor can do comedy then they can do anything. If someone can do sketch and stand up comedy really well then they have the ability to be a brilliant actor who can also do dramatic roles really well.
It was great working with all the Saturday Night Live cast from the film as I grew up watching them on Television.
BLAKE: With the well-realized use of music in your film, do you just hear a song and a film scene just plays out in your head to such a vivid degree you already have it cut before shooting or storyboarding it?
RICHARD KELLY: A lot of time I’ll have a song in my mind beforehand. Moby did a lot of the score before we had even started shooting.
Sometimes I’ll discover a song in post.
I think about music nonstop. It’s a huge constant discussion and there is a lot of music in this film to get mixed properly and placed properly. All the artists I used in the film were very generous - The Killers, The Pixies, Janes Addiction, Radiohead and Muse.
It’s a constant and well thought out discussion that happens not only in pre-production, but even while we are shooting I’ll be playing music on the set.
BLAKE: Was their multiple shot endings or is what we see in this latest version, the one and only ending that Southland Tales has had?
RICHARD KELLY: This version has the one and only ending.
BLAKE: For the fans of Donnie Darko what would you tell them about Southland Tales?
RICHARD KELLY: With Southland Tales, fans of Donnie Darko can expect a wild, wild roller coaster ride that could be overwhelming, yet I hope they stick with it and even see it a second time and then read the books. You definitely should do both to fully get the point.
BLAKE: The current DVD release is slim on extras; can we expect a more expansive edition in the future?
RICHARD KELLY: We have a documentary on the current DVD, but I do have plans for a much bigger DVD of Southland Tales with commentaries and all sorts of stuff down the road. I didn’t have time to do a super deluxe DVD as I’m in prep for my next movie.
The movie in and of itself I cannot wait to be on Blu-ray too! Have you seen Blu-ray on the high def market? It’s insane!
Sony picked Blu-ray so hopefully there will be a Blu-ray version in the pipeline soon.
BLAKE: What can you tell us about your next film, The Box?
RICARD KELLY: The Box is still in my wheelhouse and it’s still in the same vein as what I’ve done in the first two films, it’s just a lot easier for a studio to market and put on 2,500 screens. (Laughs) It has got a much more mainstream concept at its core.
I don’t feel like I’m selling out or anything like that. I feel like I’m doing something right in my wheelhouse still.
***
Related Links:
::: Official Site
::: Southland Tales IMDb Profile
::: The Box IMDb Profile
::: Richard Kelly (View Two Pictures I Took)
via Flickr Slideshow
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Category: Interview, Film Festivals: Fantastic Fest 2007, People: Richard Kelly, Movies: Southland Tales (2007), People: Seann William Scott, People: Dwayne The Rock Johnson
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