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Your new movie Downriver
- in a few words, what is it about?
Downriver is
about a young ex-con who was charged with a murder when he was a kid. The
body of the child who died was never recovered from the river and so the
wound remains open for so many involved. In the film, the lead character
returns to the river to try and solve the mystery. Coming face to face
with his own actions, however, is what the film is really about. It asks
whether actions committed as a child can and should define you always? Can
you find redemption? It also asks moral questions about whether someone is
deserving of love and how evil can continue being perpetrated in silence.
What were your sources of inspiration when writing Downriver,
and is any of this based on personal experiences?
I was inspired by conversations I had around these
questions. People came down so definitively in their responses to moral
debates around nature and nurture, which is really at the heart of the
discussion when a child commits a crime. So it was a very explosive
question for me to begin writing from and I wrote to even challenge my
intuitions. I question everything. I question even what I believe. I
wanted to be the prosecutor and defense counsel of every character, but
ultimately let the audience be the jury. I deliberately made the
narrative and characterization very complex because these are complex
issues. I also deliberately left ambiguities in the facts because as I
said, I want to empower the audience to be the jury. I respect then that
responses to my film are varied and I say to everyone who questions what
they make of it that their impression is valid.
I grew up in a small town by a river much like the
one in the story. There were always myths around the river and I
definitely took on a kind of spiritual connection to rivers as sources
of life and death. When I was about twelve a tragedy occurred in my
otherwise pretty good world when my neighbor’s mother went missing –
presumed murdered – and her body was never found. That’s the first
moment where evil really came close to me and I definitely think that
kind of thing haunts a writer for life. To a large degree, Downriver is
my personal answer to that confusing and scary time.
How
easy or hard was it to get the project off the ground in the first place? Extremely
difficult, mainly because we were first timers, but also because of the
choice of protagonist. You’ve got films like We Need To Talk
About Kevin which examine similar terrain, but the POV is not the
perpetrator. Our lead character is a convicted killer and so many people
were nervous that the audience would struggle to empathize with him. I
guess that was a valid concern, although I think the film definitely
proves that concern wrong. I just stuck to some cinematic touchstones like
Taxi
Driver or The Woodsman and this belief that if
you walk long enough in the shoes of any character you will come to
understand them. What I think was wrong and an unfortunate
reason why we struggled to get the film off the ground in the first place
was the numerous times I had to fight to maintain the fluid approach to
sexuality. People thought there were “too many gay people in this
town” or that the audience would fear more for the character more “if
he was a girl, not a gay guy.” Quite hideous and homophobic really. It
has become very hard to pigeonhole our film as queer because it was “not
queer enough” to neatly fit into people’s conceptions of that genre,
but was “too queer” to be something else. At best, the discussions
were around representation. Could you have the killer as the only queer?
What would that say about being queer? I also felt I couldn’t just have
the boy in peril as the queer, because that suggests that queers are weak
or something. Also it was a cliché to have the bad guy as the queer and
so what did I do? I made them all queer. All of them. But that certainly
didn’t help get the film made! You
of course have to talk about your wonderful locations for a bit, and what
was it like filming there? Oh well I’m
sure Tourism Australia is very upset with me because I didn’t paint our
rural towns in a very nice light! But we shot in a town called Warrandyte,
which is on the Yarra, a river which ultimately flows through the centre
of Melbourne. Warrandyte is a beautiful town and the people who live there
are really very nice! It is a sleepy town and quite untouched really. Some
of the houses used in the film belong to locals and I chose them because
they gave me a skin-tingling impression. Often we did very little to these
wonderful locations and just let them be. A good majority of the film is
set in a tourist caravan park by the river. This is a very Australian kind
of holiday, something I did a lot of as a child. They were very
accommodating because we were a small crew and provided some amusement for
the tourists who were actually staying on the park. The bush locations
were very wild and gnarly. They were dangerous at times because of tiger snakes. These are aggressive and territorial animals and I don’t think a
single crew member didn’t have some kind of brush with one. We also
battled ducks, but they’re not as interesting to talk about unless
you’re a duck hunter.
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Do talk about your overall
directorial approach to your story at hand for a bit!
I use a lot of metaphors when I make films and the
one I use with directing is this: a film is a wild beast that you are
trying to tame. You need to put your hands down on it and try to calm
it. The harder you grip, the more it will panic, so you must press and
hold but don’t make too hard an impression. This translates as thus: I
try and be gentle and collaborative. I put around me extremely talented
people and simply try and steer them towards their best work. I try and
bring the film and the character to them, rather than force them over to
some locked off vision I have for it. That approach of letting things be
discovered, making decisions that aren’t black or white, allowing
aspects to become personal to the actor and celebrating the strengths of
your particular crew members allows for a space where I can be
surprised. And that’s what I’m always looking for.
My style flows on from this, the camera is never
particularly flashy or showing off. The camera works in synergy with the
actor, which at times is very beautiful. I also have a very quiet
approach to sound design and music. While there are moments that hero
music and some unusual sound design, I wanted the film to be very quiet
and pragmatic so that the content could be wild and chaotic. I also
wanted to hero the performances and so everything was channeled towards
allowing for that.
What
can you tell us about your key cast, and why exactly these people?
Reef Ireland and I have worked together on my short
film The Wilding, which precedes the story of Downriver
and
will hopefully be on the DVD in America. Reef is so emotionally
intelligent and he also has such a compelling and strong face. Any
concerns that the audience would not empathize with his character are
dashed in his first close up. Reef is going to have a long and healthy
career. His talents are so varied, from emotional material like ours, to
comedy, to action.
Kerry Fox who plays his mother is a very well known
actor who seems to have worked with every indie auteur around,
especially from Australia/NZ or Europe, so therefore I’ve seen a lot
of her work and have loved her a long time. I think she’s exceptional
and always surprising and fascinating to watch. She was so earthy and
honest on set and so experienced.
Thom Green plays opposite Reef in the antagonist
role. He came to acting via many talents, one of which is dancing.
I’ve never seen an actor who is in more command, or perhaps is
completely unconscious to, the language of his body. He undercuts what
he says with a gesture. He speaks with his body in silences. He is also
highly intellectual and curious, so he was illuminating to discuss his
character with because he had ideas that only a very smart actor could
generate. Thom is a heartthrob sure, but he’s not just a pretty face,
he’s an actor’s actor and going to go far.
A
few words about the shoot as such, and the on-set atmosphere?
My sets are calm and quiet. I sound like an old man
but I can’t hear myself think if people are panicking or stressed. So
I try and set the tone and have it trickle down that the best work is
completed gently and methodically. Having said that, we had very little
in the way of money, which means very little in the way of time. It was
a fast shoot and the days were limited in that we could not go into
overtime. If we did, some crew members would have had to be let go. I
didn’t want that! So I needed to be clear and we all needed to be
smart about our work. I certainly felt these time constrictions but I
tried my best to keep my stress from affecting the actors.
On Downriver there was a lot of
confronting material and we were working with young actors. So I always
tried to ensure that they felt heard and safe to perform. But that goes
with how I felt for every crew member. The shoot was challenging, but I
speak for almost all who worked on it, that it was a very rewarding
experience. More times than that, every one would walk from set each day
having felt like they contributed.
Anything
you can tell us about critical reception of
Downriver?
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Critics
and audiences alike seem to mostly go for it. We’ve had very strong
reviews in Australia and got a glowing review from Margaret Pomeranz, who
is La Grand Dame of Film Criticism here, which personally meant a lot. The
LA Times wrote us up nicely just recently too. These critics are all
praising the strong performances and the technical achievements of the
cinematography and sound design. Incidentally, it is the refreshing take
on sexuality that I had to fight so hard for that is often most alluded to
as a compelling aspect of the film. The divisive aspects of the film are
in its screenplay, which is a slow burn and is, as I said earlier, not a
script that spoon-feeds you. So a few lazy critics have lampooned me for
not wrapping everything up in a way that would save them from the need to
employ their own intelligence. Ultimately, there are critics who see their
job as writing about film and there are critics who see themselves as the
arbiter of taste and review films. I want more of the former and less
emphasis on how many stars a reviewer gives something. Any
future projects you'd like to share? I
really want to make this gangster romance film called Pig’s
Blood. It’s very darkly funny, pretty bloody but also very sad. In
it this young gangster needs to do a job on someone in order to lift
himself from poverty in Naples but he falls in love with this girl in
Australia and becomes torn. He’s torn between a life he has bought into
since he was a kid and this trashy waif who just wants to have fun and be
free. Once again I’m having trouble with people who are worried about
morality and although this one isn’t queer, the honest approach to
sexuality is once again raising the concern of the vice squad. God, it’s
like a broken record but it’ll probably always be like this for me. What got you into
filmmaking in the first place, and did you receive any formal training on
the subject?
I was always interested in stories. I read from a
very early age and even wrote short stories at a precociously young age.
When I was about 9 or 10, my boy scout hall was used as a location for
an Australian film and we were allowed to watch. It was a period drama
film by a very famous icon called Bob Ellis who sadly passed away just
this year, but I remember watching all these actors dressed up in 1940s
garb and there was Bob weaving together this beautiful synergy between
two young lovers at a ball and his slow-roving camera. All the while he
never left his chair and just drank cups of tea. I thought that was
marvelous! I should really find a metaphor between boy scouting and
filmmaking… how we pretend to be little cub bears who promise to do
the right thing perhaps. Sorry, I got sidetracked.
At University I did an Arts degree, which I’m so
thankful for. It introduced me to all kinds of cultural expression and I
believe that to be a filmmaker you must also appreciate all art forms. I
then studied Screenwriting more intensively although I never received
formal training as a director.
What can you tell us about your filmwork
prior to Downriver?
I began directing short films out of necessity rather
than because I wanted to. I had these scripts but no director wanted to
direct them! They all wanted to be writer/directors so in order to see
my short films get made, I was forced to become a writer/director too. I
developed my skills through various short films, some had no budgets,
like my first film, which I am only now considering I could possibly
stomach watching. Then I made a number of films with some arts grants,
all flawed but getting better, where with some money I was able to work
with professional actors and crew and learn from them. This lead up to The
Wilding, which was my most successful short film. It played at the
Berlin Film Festival and won many awards. Ultimately my final short film
was called Hurt’s Rescue, which was made on the proceeds
of a prize The Wilding won called the Iris Prize. This
is my very favorite short film although it’s obscure and strange and
not many have seen it. Sorry, I don’t think that one’s on the DVD!
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I have also written a lot of scripts that have almost
seen the light of day with other directors, mainly genre pieces like
thrillers or horrors. I love writing so much but ultimately I am being
seen more as a director and so I may turn to writing prose.
How
would you describe yourself as a director? I’m
not naturally an extrovert and so directing is a process that is quite
demanding on me internally. Which is fine. I still enjoy it, but I much
prefer the solitary aspects of the process. Writing for me is where I feel
most comfortable. The best advice I ever heard on directing was from the
great thinker and French auteur Robert Bresson who said, “Direct
yourself as you direct others.” What I take him to mean is that you
should always be judging your own work, making adjustments, finding your
strengths, working on your weaknesses as much as you are doing that with
those you work with. I believe that directing is recognizing my
limitations and maximizing my resources. It’s about inspiring others to
come along with me but it is not chucking a hissy fit when things don’t
go my way. It’s the opposite of that. It’s about making the things
that aren’t working work. So I’m always self-analyzing and very
critical of myself. I pride myself on being pragmatic and methodical. I
question everything and never trust my decisions so am always circling
around them to ensure they are the most interesting. Despite the
seriousness and darkness of this first film, I don’t want to be thought
of just serious and dark. The whole auteur theory thing is such a trap
because it can pigeonhole the content people expect from you. Maybe some
like that, but I don’t. I want to tell a great variety of stories and so
the projects I’m working on next will surprise people I hope. Filmmakers
who inspire you? My axis of awesome
arthouse is Roman Polanski, Terrence Malick and Michael Haneke. I will
rush out to see anything by them and what I love is that they are
inconsistent (although I don’t really think Haneke has made a bad film).
I also think Andrea Arnold, Gus Van Sant and Todd Haynes are very
inspirational in the indie realm, but again inconsistent, which I am
heartened by. It means they are risktakers. In terms of Australian and New
Zealand filmmakers, I think Jane Campion is a treasure of world cinema
whose work is unsurpassed by any other. I also think I walk in the
footsteps of the trail blazed by Peter Weir. Your favourite movies? Well
Polanski’s best is Chinatown, Malick’s is Days
of Heaven and Haneke’s is Amour. All these films
changed me, as have done many of their other films, and I think you can
see this in Downriver. Gus Van Sant’s
My Own Private
Idaho and Todd Haynes’ Poison really opened my
eyes to queer cinema. I think Jane Campion’s The Piano is
one of the most beautiful films every made and there’s another little
film called Wonderland by Michael Winterbottom that made
me think it possible I could one day make a film myself. It’s very
organic and its absence of bells and whistles just champions the story and
the performances. I’m not surprised we have been compared many times as
the queer modern answer to Peter Weir’s The Picnic at Hanging
Rock. But I think my guilty pleasure film I could watch over and
over and over again is not a film at all, it’s a documentary called Grey
Gardens by the Maysles brothers. I have easily seen that film 100
times and can quote every line at you. ...
and of course, films you really deplore?
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The TV remake of Grey Gardens was appalling! But anyone who
knows me knows that I value and get a great deal from all cinema, so evens
films people hate, I will find some aspect that compelled me. I know what
goes into them and I also know how easily the process can scuttle good and
interesting intentions. I think the trend to sequelise, prequelise is
generally pretty tiresome, however. Your/your
movie's website, Facebook, whatever else?
Website: downriverfilm.com
Facebook: facebook.com/downriverfilm
Twitter: @downriverfilm
Me: grantscicluna.com
Anything else
you're dying to mention and I have merely forgotten to ask? How
do I maintain such youthful good looks? Thanks
for the interview!
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find Grant Scicluna at adultvideouniverse.com
