David Cronenberg is the brilliant auteur behind such films as The Fly, Naked Lunch, Crash and Spider. His latest film, A History of Violence, may finally be the one that takes him to the Academy Awards. Based on the graphic novel by John Wagner and Vince Locke it stars Viggo Mortensen as a pillar of a small town community who runs a diner and lives a happy and quiet life with his wife [Maria Bello] and two children. But their lives are forever changed when Mortensen thwarts an attempted robbery and is lauded as a hero by the media, attracting the attention of some mobsters (Ed Harris) who believe he is someone else.
Check out the official site for A History of Violence
Daniel Robert Epstein: A History of Violence didnt have a credit sequence like your past films.
David Cronenberg: Thats true. I guess it goes with my feeling that you dont impose something on a movie just because conceptually it pleases you. Ive said in the past I like to do a credit sequence that segues the audience from their real life into the life of the movie. But in this case I realized the opening sequence worked very well as one shot and had that particularly languidly sinister rhythm to it with a lot of spaces. I gradually started to feel that this could work very well as an opening title sequence on its own. When that happens, you dont fight it. Its basically the movie telling me what it wants and it told me that it wanted this so I went with it.
DRE: Except for Rabid you havent had a female character as the central figure in the movie. You always have strong female roles though.
DC: Well, I think Genevieve Bujolds character is quite strong in Dead Ringers and there are some quite strong female characters in Spider actually.
DRE: Absolutely, but not as the central figure.
DC: Lets put it this way, when I was casting, I cast Viggo first and then found someone who could play his wife, rather than the other way around. So for me hes still the lead character. Certainly though, we often said that you could almost call it Scenes from a Marriage and in that sense it is sort of an equal partnership because it is a story about a couple and a family after that, rather than just about one person, so there is some truth in what youre saying but I wouldnt say that Maria Bello was the lead in the way that Marilyn Chambers is the lead in Rabid.
DRE: Is your process directing women any different from men since you have such strong sexual scenes in your films?
DC: Its the same in that you tailor your directing to the individual. It doesnt break down by gender. It breaks down further into who is it youre actually directing. For example I dont work with William Hurt the same way that I will work with Viggo. Theyre different guys and they work in different ways. So a good sensitive director has his general style and technique and personality that he uses but you dont impose that on the actors. You really need to find out how the actor works, what he needs or doesnt need and then you give that to the actor.
DRE: How was it directing young people like Ashton Holmes and Heidi Hayes in A History of Violence?
DC: Its exactly the same. Each kid has a different level of expertise and some of them are very raw and inexperienced and some are incredibly mature and experienced. So you just have to go with what they are rather than have some abstract technique that youre going to try to apply to them.
DRE: I was lucking enough to speak to Holly Hunter a couple years ago and she said, that the set of Crash wasnt the kind of place where people would relax, sit down, and read Variety. But then Im watching a behind the scenes of A History of Violence on HBO and they had a very funny piece of you jumping into bed with Viggo and Maria joking around, was this a more relaxed set?
DC: No I think there was a lot of joking around on Crash but it was a tighter schedule. I think Holly was really talking about what can happen in Hollywood when you have too much time and the crew kind of loses momentum and you do find that lacuna of energy. That doesnt happen on my sets in general but I think if there had been a making of a documentary of Crash I think you would see a lot of joking and a lot of humor but not time wasting. We werent wasting time in A History of Violence either. But the other thing is that moment youre talking about came at the end of the shoot. Our shoot was only 53 days which for an independent film would be a lot but for a movie of this scope is really not a heck of a lot.
DRE: I saw that you had a video blog on the History of Violence website. How was that process for you?
DC: Its interesting but time consuming. The process of making a movie has expanded in terms of effort and time for the director, doing commentaries for the DVD for example, finishing deleted scenes so they could be on the DVD, and doing things like a web blog. Of course for many years directors have had to go on the road with their movies and promote them and Ive done that since the beginning. So thats not new but the forms of it are different such as with the internet. I dont mind writing so I didnt find that difficult, its just a question of finding the time to do it. I kind of like the direct connection with the fans actually, its pretty neat.
DRE: Do you find it odd that people are calling this very violent movie, with strong scenes of sexuality, your most mainstream film?
DC: Well I dont think sex and violence have ever stopped a movie from being mainstream. But I think what theyre really noticing, is the accessibility of the characters. I think really thats the key because mostly my characters tend to be eccentric, on the margins of society and even grotesque, like the ones in Crash. People find it hard to relate because what theyre doing is so strange to them. In those movies my job is to seduce the audience into the movie and into some kind of empathy and understanding for the characters. In this movie its sort of the inside out version of that. I start with a family thats very recognizable and very accessible and a normal audience can relate to this family. However, then I take the audience into the movie and move them and the characters into a very dark and strange place. But to me that must be what people are talking about when they say this is mainstream. I dont see anything else. Its got a plot but my other movies have plots too so I dont see what theyre talking about.
DRE: To stay in tune with your other work, is the virus in History of Violence the past or is it violence itself thats the virus?
DC: I dont think that way. Youre bringing a concept, a sort of critical and analytical concept to bear on this movie. I absolutely dont mind that, some very interesting and enlightening things can come out of that process. But thats not a creative process, thats an analytical and critical process. For instance when I was making the movie that thought would never have been in my mind. There were many thoughts in my mind but I dont think about my other movies. I really take each movie on its own and try to give it what it needs individually without imposing something from the outside.
I dont deny obviously that there is a connection. The thing is that I dont have to force the connection because you literally make 2000 decisions a day as a director. There are decisions about everything from clothes to colors to walls to locations to actors and nobody else would make those same decisions. So the movie will be enough of you, you dont have to force it. I dont have to say that I have to put my thumbprint on it so the people will know its my movie
DRE: I read that after The Brood you made Scanners and that it was nice to relax and explode some heads. Did you make History of Violence after Spider to relax and kick some people in the face?
DC: [laughs] No not at all. The reaction after Spider was that I didnt make any money and I needed to do a movie that I could make some money on. In the sense that I couldnt afford to do a low budget independent film with financing that was constantly falling apart and therefore we would all have to defer our salaries and not get paid. I literally did not make any money for two years and I could not afford to do that. On the other hand, Spider was still a wonderful experience and frankly I think its the other half of this movie. It also is about identity and the construction of it and the consequences of it. In Spider you have a man who does not have the creative will for whatever reason, to hold his identity together. He keeps disintegrating and falls apart. But each movie has a family in it with a past that has a huge impact on the present. So I think they would be pretty interesting on a double bill for a certain very special audience.
DRE: Maybe in Japan.
Do you feel that when Tom Stall is leading this small town life hes hiding from who he is or hes changed who he really is?
DC: I think hes really changed. Certainly the way we played it. But he could choose to be anything. He suddenly chooses to be part of this American mythology. This ideal guy in this ideal small town with a family and hes been that way for 20 years. At that point he has really wanted to become somebody else. If he got hit by a bus before the bad guys came to town he would have been buried as Tom Stall because thats who he would have been. Tom Stall is not actually a violent person. He didnt have that incredible anger and rage.
DRE: When you showed the second sex scene you show the affect the violence had on Tom and his wife.
DC: Thats right and when you see the movie a second time it does become a different movie and only then can you really appreciate Viggos performance because we were conscious of making kind of two movies at once. For me the most violent moment of the movie is when he slaps his son. Thats a shocking moment and you definitely get the feeling that its the first time he ever laid a hand on either of his kids violently. It depresses and shocks him as well as shocking his son because the violence cat is out of the bag and its hard to put it back in. Once again its a tool, but the adrenaline is there and it comes out in the sexuality as well.
DRE: I remember after The Fly was such a success you decided to put I think like two or three years into making a project that was probably your most difficult up to that point, Dead Ringers. If A History of Violence is a success, close to that level, do you have passion project you want to do?
DC: Its not really a strategy. Its true that people did tell me in the old days if you get a hit movie, then you can get your weird movies made but that turned out to be completely untrue. Dead Ringers was completely difficult to finance even after The Fly. It was very agonizing and scary and almost falling apart all the time. What people want you to do is do another movie like The Fly. Theyre not stupid. They read Dead Ringers and they know its a difficult movie to sell, so I dont think that theres a relationship between having a success, for me anyway, and then doing a difficult film. The opportunities to do various movies come by chance.
DRE: I remember there was someone who said that your films have a weird air to them because its like America but its not.
DC: Yes, that was a producer who said many years ago, For Americans your movies are really weird. The streets are like America, but theyre not. The people are like Americans but theyre not. Its like the pod people kind of thing. Im thinking, Well thats us Canadians you know, were the American pod people. Were like American people but were not, were quite different. Ive only really set maybe three films in America. One was The Dead Zone, Fast Company and History of Violence was another one that had scenes that were set in America. But I have still never shot a foot of film in America.
DRE: How was it working with [production designer] Carol [Spier] again after you didnt work with her in Spider?
DC: It was fine. You have to remember that Howard Shore didnt do the music for the Dead Zone and thats about the only one he hasnt done. Every once in a while there are circumstances and in the case of Spider, Carol was doing Blade II in Prague. She was there for nine months so she couldnt do Spider.
DRE: What is your working relationship with Howard Shore?
DC: Hes done just about every one of my movies and weve known each other for 30 years. When were working we have 100 percent interaction. Any script that Im considering to do, I send it to a group of people. Carol Spier, Peter Suschitzky my director of photography, Howard and my editor Ron Sanders who Ive worked with for 35 years. I just want feedback from them and get them started thinking about it even before weve shot a foot of film. So the discussions begin very early on and get more intense and Howard sends me synthesized possibilities and themes and ideas and we discuss that. In the case of History of Violence we certainly discussed the American-ness of the movie and the western tone of it. He started to look at John Ford movies and stuff like that to get a feel for the American landscape musically. A little Aaron Copland and a little western.
DRE: One of the things that makes History of Violence so profound is that youre Canadian making an essay about the history of violence in America.
DC: Yeah, its a tendency I have and I relate it somewhat weirdly to Samuel Beckett. There are very easy things that you can do in films, especially now, to disguise yourself and make things easy and protect yourself. Im as vulnerable as my actors, maybe more so when I direct a movie. Maybe not in the same physical way but its very tempting to hide behind stuff. But I try not to do it; I try not to get overly technique-y. Theres a raw simplicity thats if you can do it right, its incredibly powerful because theres a certain truth thats right there. But if you blow it, theres nothing to hide behind. Thats why you get guys that do jittery camera stuff when its just a guy sitting in a room talking. Ive cast this guy for his face, for his voice, for his acting so I just want you to see that. Lets just trust all that youve done and lets look at this guy talking. I dont need to do fancy, silly stuff that has no meaning or artistic purpose.
DRE: A History of Violence, is a real commentary on whats going on in America right now with what President Bush has helped bring about, this Christian Right push. How has directing scenes of sexuality changed for you over the years?
DC: Nobody asked me to do anything different. There were no sex scenes in the script that I got originally and I did ask for these to be written but I had more to do with the characters and an examination of the marriage. I didnt really think you could examine a marriage without alluding to its sexuality. But I dont feel any outside pressure one way or the other. Actually it really only has to do with the movie and the particular people youre making the movie with. I dont feel that my approach to it is any different that it ever was. Its always just a question of what the movie wants and what does the movie need to work. Each movie is its own little universe with its own separate eco-system. Youre making a big mistake if you try to force some outside abstract structure on it so I dont really think in those terms. I really just think okay what do I want to happen here. Then if there are battles to be fought after that, then thats a different thing, you fight those battles. In this case there were no battles over the sex scenes; I mean the MPAA didnt ask me to cut anything so there just hasnt been a problem.
DRE: I saw a still photograph that you took of a chair by Lake Ontario and you just did some still pictures for Premiere Magazine; are you getting more into photography?
DC: I actually did my first professional photo shoot for French Premiere Magazine which I was very proud of. But I had always avoided still photography. If youve ever seen my short film Camera you would know why. But with digital I came back to still photography. It was always frustrating doing film, especially when youre doing color because youve got a lab with a guy who does your color timing and you dont know who he is. Your pictures come back, the colors wrong, the contrast is wrong. But with digital you have such fine control. So I really came back to still photography after having abandoned it for many years. I decided at Cannes to have some fun by shooting photos of the photographers. They loved it. People asked me if I thought they would be offended but they adored it because I was one of them. They actually asked me to sit down with them on their raised tiers. It was really sweet.
DRE: Did you see your actors in a different light?
DC: No but its very good rehearsal for when youre actually on the set shooting. Its a different act but its connected.
DRE: eXistenZ was adapted into a graphic novel; do you have any interest in doing comic books yourself?
DC: I was interested in being involved in the graphic novel that was made out of eXistenZ so it was a collaboration with me. But its not my art form.
DRE: I got to speak to Albert Brooks a few years ago and the DVDs of his films are very spare. I asked him about that and he said The DVD is a garbage can now. Everything that used to go in the trash goes on the DVD. Criterion Collection has made some great DVDs out of three of your films. For your other films that arent treated as well do you want to get more involved with making those DVDs?
DC: Ive always been as involved as I possibly could be because I always knew right from the beginning, even before there were DVDs, that my movies would be seen by more people on a TV screen than they would in the theaters. Thats why I never have done a really widescreen movie. In fact, I came up with an aspect ratio that would work for my movies right from the beginning because I knew that it would fit on movie screens in America and in Europe where the aspect ratios are different. It turned out that I accidentally came upon the formula that has now become this standard TV widescreen. So all of my movies, even the earliest ones will fit beautifully there.
The thing about The Dead Zone and The Brood DVDs is that nobody asked me to do a commentary or be involved in those.
For The Fly initially Fox said, Were coming out with a DVD of The Fly, will you do commentary? I said, Only if you let me be involved in the color timing because it has never been properly transferred to video in any form. They said no and that was a while ago. I couldnt believe that they wouldnt spend the money. So I said, Fine, Im not doing the commentary. They said Eventually well do a special edition. Well that has now happened. Ive done the commentary, I was involved in the transfer and I agreed to show some famous deleted scenes. The famous cat-monkey scene is there and some other things that the fans were clamoring for. My attitude has changed because I can see that the whole art form is shifting in an interesting way. One of the reasons that I didnt want deleted scenes on a DVD was because you never get to finish them. You cut them, you decide that you dont want them in the movie so you never get to fine cut them or do a sound mix. So if you show them, they have to be unfinished in a raw, not proper way. So strangely enough, for History of Violence, there are two deleted scenes that we did. We fine cut them, we sound mixed, got some music on them and thats the first time Ive ever done that.
DRE: Have you been in a position in which your work was impeded by someone with more power?
DC: I tend to be very Machiavellian. I would rather negotiate and talk and manipulate and be deceptive and do whatever, than have an open confrontation. That always takes it to a different level. I am essentially a non-violent person. Ive managed to be pretty successful in terms of getting what I want in a movie. I leave people very happy with what weve done, even when I end up getting what I wanted and they dont get what they wanted. I have to say that with all of my movies if theres something in them you dont like its my fault and I cant blame somebody else for recutting it. The only moments where Ive had that happen are with the MPAA, which is not technically a censor. For example, with Crash, the company Blockbuster will not stock an NC-17 film. So with Crash, which was released as an NC-17 film, in order to get it into any Blockbuster, I had to cut 10 minutes out of it to have it be an R. I wasnt very successful in stopping that from happening because I had a contract that said it had to have an R if somebody wanted it. On the other hand, when the Canadian version of Blockbuster tried to do the same, I did go very public saying, Look, thats the American ratings. In Canada, we released this film as what we call Restricted and there should not be a cut version in Canadian Blockbuster. They did back down. But you do what you can. Who knows how it was cut in Finland. Who knows where it was cut in Japan. I cant keep on top of every TV version thats around the world. So theres a point where you have to let go.
DRE: What do you think of your nephew Aaron Woodleys movie Rhinoceros Eyes?
DC: I thought it was terrific. I really liked it a lot. I thought he did a wonderful job with it. I think hes a very talented and special kid.
DRE: I know youve only produced a couple movies that arent yours like the Bruce Wagner film I'm Losing You, would you do something like that for Aaron?
DC: I think he needs a more serious producer than me frankly and I think hes working with some right now. When it came to Bruces films, if theres anything I can do to help a first time director, someone who I really admire like Bruce, Im happy to help. But Im not really the kind of producer who can go out and raise tons of money and make sure that the film is distributed properly and all that. Thats a different kind of producing and I think thats what Aaron would need. Hes doing something with Lee Daniels right now and I think thats a good thing.
DRE: I read that famous interview that you did with Salmon Rushdie, that helped inside eXistenZ where you talk about how beautiful you thought the computer game Myst was. Then I read in the New York Times Magazine that youre designing a videogame with your son.
DC: Thats right, were playing with that so well see where that goes. Its been a strange and interesting process. I dont know enough about videogames to know whether Im getting the full flower of the experience or not. Im also working a Toronto company that has not done a videogame before so its kind of a learning experience for all of us.
DRE: Do you see it as puzzle game like Myst or one with more action?
DC: This would not be an action game. Im not that interested in that particularly, just because Im not really interested in that in my movies. Its more of a suspense thriller mystery kind of game.
DRE: Ashton Holmes let it slip that you have a Ferrari movie script.
DC: I do, thats Red Cars, an old script. It was just published by in a beautiful coffee table book with many wonderful illustrations from the Ferrari archives. We previewed it at Venice and you can go to their website. Its a movie that I seem unable to get made but its nice that it got made into this book.
DRE: Were doing this interview for SuicideGirls. Many of the girls featured on SuicideGirls have tattoos and piercings. Have you ever seen any David Cronenberg related tattoos on anybody?
DC: I havent but Id love to. I get quite jealous when I hear that Clive Barker gets to sign all kinds of peoples anatomy at his book signings and stuff. Ive never been asked to do that and I would be very interested to see photos of Cronenberg tattoos.
by Daniel Robert Epstein
SG Username: AndersWolleck
Check out the official site for A History of Violence
Daniel Robert Epstein: A History of Violence didnt have a credit sequence like your past films.
David Cronenberg: Thats true. I guess it goes with my feeling that you dont impose something on a movie just because conceptually it pleases you. Ive said in the past I like to do a credit sequence that segues the audience from their real life into the life of the movie. But in this case I realized the opening sequence worked very well as one shot and had that particularly languidly sinister rhythm to it with a lot of spaces. I gradually started to feel that this could work very well as an opening title sequence on its own. When that happens, you dont fight it. Its basically the movie telling me what it wants and it told me that it wanted this so I went with it.
DRE: Except for Rabid you havent had a female character as the central figure in the movie. You always have strong female roles though.
DC: Well, I think Genevieve Bujolds character is quite strong in Dead Ringers and there are some quite strong female characters in Spider actually.
DRE: Absolutely, but not as the central figure.
DC: Lets put it this way, when I was casting, I cast Viggo first and then found someone who could play his wife, rather than the other way around. So for me hes still the lead character. Certainly though, we often said that you could almost call it Scenes from a Marriage and in that sense it is sort of an equal partnership because it is a story about a couple and a family after that, rather than just about one person, so there is some truth in what youre saying but I wouldnt say that Maria Bello was the lead in the way that Marilyn Chambers is the lead in Rabid.
DRE: Is your process directing women any different from men since you have such strong sexual scenes in your films?
DC: Its the same in that you tailor your directing to the individual. It doesnt break down by gender. It breaks down further into who is it youre actually directing. For example I dont work with William Hurt the same way that I will work with Viggo. Theyre different guys and they work in different ways. So a good sensitive director has his general style and technique and personality that he uses but you dont impose that on the actors. You really need to find out how the actor works, what he needs or doesnt need and then you give that to the actor.
DRE: How was it directing young people like Ashton Holmes and Heidi Hayes in A History of Violence?
DC: Its exactly the same. Each kid has a different level of expertise and some of them are very raw and inexperienced and some are incredibly mature and experienced. So you just have to go with what they are rather than have some abstract technique that youre going to try to apply to them.
DRE: I was lucking enough to speak to Holly Hunter a couple years ago and she said, that the set of Crash wasnt the kind of place where people would relax, sit down, and read Variety. But then Im watching a behind the scenes of A History of Violence on HBO and they had a very funny piece of you jumping into bed with Viggo and Maria joking around, was this a more relaxed set?
DC: No I think there was a lot of joking around on Crash but it was a tighter schedule. I think Holly was really talking about what can happen in Hollywood when you have too much time and the crew kind of loses momentum and you do find that lacuna of energy. That doesnt happen on my sets in general but I think if there had been a making of a documentary of Crash I think you would see a lot of joking and a lot of humor but not time wasting. We werent wasting time in A History of Violence either. But the other thing is that moment youre talking about came at the end of the shoot. Our shoot was only 53 days which for an independent film would be a lot but for a movie of this scope is really not a heck of a lot.
DRE: I saw that you had a video blog on the History of Violence website. How was that process for you?
DC: Its interesting but time consuming. The process of making a movie has expanded in terms of effort and time for the director, doing commentaries for the DVD for example, finishing deleted scenes so they could be on the DVD, and doing things like a web blog. Of course for many years directors have had to go on the road with their movies and promote them and Ive done that since the beginning. So thats not new but the forms of it are different such as with the internet. I dont mind writing so I didnt find that difficult, its just a question of finding the time to do it. I kind of like the direct connection with the fans actually, its pretty neat.
DRE: Do you find it odd that people are calling this very violent movie, with strong scenes of sexuality, your most mainstream film?
DC: Well I dont think sex and violence have ever stopped a movie from being mainstream. But I think what theyre really noticing, is the accessibility of the characters. I think really thats the key because mostly my characters tend to be eccentric, on the margins of society and even grotesque, like the ones in Crash. People find it hard to relate because what theyre doing is so strange to them. In those movies my job is to seduce the audience into the movie and into some kind of empathy and understanding for the characters. In this movie its sort of the inside out version of that. I start with a family thats very recognizable and very accessible and a normal audience can relate to this family. However, then I take the audience into the movie and move them and the characters into a very dark and strange place. But to me that must be what people are talking about when they say this is mainstream. I dont see anything else. Its got a plot but my other movies have plots too so I dont see what theyre talking about.
DRE: To stay in tune with your other work, is the virus in History of Violence the past or is it violence itself thats the virus?
DC: I dont think that way. Youre bringing a concept, a sort of critical and analytical concept to bear on this movie. I absolutely dont mind that, some very interesting and enlightening things can come out of that process. But thats not a creative process, thats an analytical and critical process. For instance when I was making the movie that thought would never have been in my mind. There were many thoughts in my mind but I dont think about my other movies. I really take each movie on its own and try to give it what it needs individually without imposing something from the outside.
I dont deny obviously that there is a connection. The thing is that I dont have to force the connection because you literally make 2000 decisions a day as a director. There are decisions about everything from clothes to colors to walls to locations to actors and nobody else would make those same decisions. So the movie will be enough of you, you dont have to force it. I dont have to say that I have to put my thumbprint on it so the people will know its my movie
DRE: I read that after The Brood you made Scanners and that it was nice to relax and explode some heads. Did you make History of Violence after Spider to relax and kick some people in the face?
DC: [laughs] No not at all. The reaction after Spider was that I didnt make any money and I needed to do a movie that I could make some money on. In the sense that I couldnt afford to do a low budget independent film with financing that was constantly falling apart and therefore we would all have to defer our salaries and not get paid. I literally did not make any money for two years and I could not afford to do that. On the other hand, Spider was still a wonderful experience and frankly I think its the other half of this movie. It also is about identity and the construction of it and the consequences of it. In Spider you have a man who does not have the creative will for whatever reason, to hold his identity together. He keeps disintegrating and falls apart. But each movie has a family in it with a past that has a huge impact on the present. So I think they would be pretty interesting on a double bill for a certain very special audience.
DRE: Maybe in Japan.
Do you feel that when Tom Stall is leading this small town life hes hiding from who he is or hes changed who he really is?
DC: I think hes really changed. Certainly the way we played it. But he could choose to be anything. He suddenly chooses to be part of this American mythology. This ideal guy in this ideal small town with a family and hes been that way for 20 years. At that point he has really wanted to become somebody else. If he got hit by a bus before the bad guys came to town he would have been buried as Tom Stall because thats who he would have been. Tom Stall is not actually a violent person. He didnt have that incredible anger and rage.
DRE: When you showed the second sex scene you show the affect the violence had on Tom and his wife.
DC: Thats right and when you see the movie a second time it does become a different movie and only then can you really appreciate Viggos performance because we were conscious of making kind of two movies at once. For me the most violent moment of the movie is when he slaps his son. Thats a shocking moment and you definitely get the feeling that its the first time he ever laid a hand on either of his kids violently. It depresses and shocks him as well as shocking his son because the violence cat is out of the bag and its hard to put it back in. Once again its a tool, but the adrenaline is there and it comes out in the sexuality as well.
DRE: I remember after The Fly was such a success you decided to put I think like two or three years into making a project that was probably your most difficult up to that point, Dead Ringers. If A History of Violence is a success, close to that level, do you have passion project you want to do?
DC: Its not really a strategy. Its true that people did tell me in the old days if you get a hit movie, then you can get your weird movies made but that turned out to be completely untrue. Dead Ringers was completely difficult to finance even after The Fly. It was very agonizing and scary and almost falling apart all the time. What people want you to do is do another movie like The Fly. Theyre not stupid. They read Dead Ringers and they know its a difficult movie to sell, so I dont think that theres a relationship between having a success, for me anyway, and then doing a difficult film. The opportunities to do various movies come by chance.
DRE: I remember there was someone who said that your films have a weird air to them because its like America but its not.
DC: Yes, that was a producer who said many years ago, For Americans your movies are really weird. The streets are like America, but theyre not. The people are like Americans but theyre not. Its like the pod people kind of thing. Im thinking, Well thats us Canadians you know, were the American pod people. Were like American people but were not, were quite different. Ive only really set maybe three films in America. One was The Dead Zone, Fast Company and History of Violence was another one that had scenes that were set in America. But I have still never shot a foot of film in America.
DRE: How was it working with [production designer] Carol [Spier] again after you didnt work with her in Spider?
DC: It was fine. You have to remember that Howard Shore didnt do the music for the Dead Zone and thats about the only one he hasnt done. Every once in a while there are circumstances and in the case of Spider, Carol was doing Blade II in Prague. She was there for nine months so she couldnt do Spider.
DRE: What is your working relationship with Howard Shore?
DC: Hes done just about every one of my movies and weve known each other for 30 years. When were working we have 100 percent interaction. Any script that Im considering to do, I send it to a group of people. Carol Spier, Peter Suschitzky my director of photography, Howard and my editor Ron Sanders who Ive worked with for 35 years. I just want feedback from them and get them started thinking about it even before weve shot a foot of film. So the discussions begin very early on and get more intense and Howard sends me synthesized possibilities and themes and ideas and we discuss that. In the case of History of Violence we certainly discussed the American-ness of the movie and the western tone of it. He started to look at John Ford movies and stuff like that to get a feel for the American landscape musically. A little Aaron Copland and a little western.
DRE: One of the things that makes History of Violence so profound is that youre Canadian making an essay about the history of violence in America.
DC: Yeah, its a tendency I have and I relate it somewhat weirdly to Samuel Beckett. There are very easy things that you can do in films, especially now, to disguise yourself and make things easy and protect yourself. Im as vulnerable as my actors, maybe more so when I direct a movie. Maybe not in the same physical way but its very tempting to hide behind stuff. But I try not to do it; I try not to get overly technique-y. Theres a raw simplicity thats if you can do it right, its incredibly powerful because theres a certain truth thats right there. But if you blow it, theres nothing to hide behind. Thats why you get guys that do jittery camera stuff when its just a guy sitting in a room talking. Ive cast this guy for his face, for his voice, for his acting so I just want you to see that. Lets just trust all that youve done and lets look at this guy talking. I dont need to do fancy, silly stuff that has no meaning or artistic purpose.
DRE: A History of Violence, is a real commentary on whats going on in America right now with what President Bush has helped bring about, this Christian Right push. How has directing scenes of sexuality changed for you over the years?
DC: Nobody asked me to do anything different. There were no sex scenes in the script that I got originally and I did ask for these to be written but I had more to do with the characters and an examination of the marriage. I didnt really think you could examine a marriage without alluding to its sexuality. But I dont feel any outside pressure one way or the other. Actually it really only has to do with the movie and the particular people youre making the movie with. I dont feel that my approach to it is any different that it ever was. Its always just a question of what the movie wants and what does the movie need to work. Each movie is its own little universe with its own separate eco-system. Youre making a big mistake if you try to force some outside abstract structure on it so I dont really think in those terms. I really just think okay what do I want to happen here. Then if there are battles to be fought after that, then thats a different thing, you fight those battles. In this case there were no battles over the sex scenes; I mean the MPAA didnt ask me to cut anything so there just hasnt been a problem.
DRE: I saw a still photograph that you took of a chair by Lake Ontario and you just did some still pictures for Premiere Magazine; are you getting more into photography?
DC: I actually did my first professional photo shoot for French Premiere Magazine which I was very proud of. But I had always avoided still photography. If youve ever seen my short film Camera you would know why. But with digital I came back to still photography. It was always frustrating doing film, especially when youre doing color because youve got a lab with a guy who does your color timing and you dont know who he is. Your pictures come back, the colors wrong, the contrast is wrong. But with digital you have such fine control. So I really came back to still photography after having abandoned it for many years. I decided at Cannes to have some fun by shooting photos of the photographers. They loved it. People asked me if I thought they would be offended but they adored it because I was one of them. They actually asked me to sit down with them on their raised tiers. It was really sweet.
DRE: Did you see your actors in a different light?
DC: No but its very good rehearsal for when youre actually on the set shooting. Its a different act but its connected.
DRE: eXistenZ was adapted into a graphic novel; do you have any interest in doing comic books yourself?
DC: I was interested in being involved in the graphic novel that was made out of eXistenZ so it was a collaboration with me. But its not my art form.
DRE: I got to speak to Albert Brooks a few years ago and the DVDs of his films are very spare. I asked him about that and he said The DVD is a garbage can now. Everything that used to go in the trash goes on the DVD. Criterion Collection has made some great DVDs out of three of your films. For your other films that arent treated as well do you want to get more involved with making those DVDs?
DC: Ive always been as involved as I possibly could be because I always knew right from the beginning, even before there were DVDs, that my movies would be seen by more people on a TV screen than they would in the theaters. Thats why I never have done a really widescreen movie. In fact, I came up with an aspect ratio that would work for my movies right from the beginning because I knew that it would fit on movie screens in America and in Europe where the aspect ratios are different. It turned out that I accidentally came upon the formula that has now become this standard TV widescreen. So all of my movies, even the earliest ones will fit beautifully there.
The thing about The Dead Zone and The Brood DVDs is that nobody asked me to do a commentary or be involved in those.
For The Fly initially Fox said, Were coming out with a DVD of The Fly, will you do commentary? I said, Only if you let me be involved in the color timing because it has never been properly transferred to video in any form. They said no and that was a while ago. I couldnt believe that they wouldnt spend the money. So I said, Fine, Im not doing the commentary. They said Eventually well do a special edition. Well that has now happened. Ive done the commentary, I was involved in the transfer and I agreed to show some famous deleted scenes. The famous cat-monkey scene is there and some other things that the fans were clamoring for. My attitude has changed because I can see that the whole art form is shifting in an interesting way. One of the reasons that I didnt want deleted scenes on a DVD was because you never get to finish them. You cut them, you decide that you dont want them in the movie so you never get to fine cut them or do a sound mix. So if you show them, they have to be unfinished in a raw, not proper way. So strangely enough, for History of Violence, there are two deleted scenes that we did. We fine cut them, we sound mixed, got some music on them and thats the first time Ive ever done that.
DRE: Have you been in a position in which your work was impeded by someone with more power?
DC: I tend to be very Machiavellian. I would rather negotiate and talk and manipulate and be deceptive and do whatever, than have an open confrontation. That always takes it to a different level. I am essentially a non-violent person. Ive managed to be pretty successful in terms of getting what I want in a movie. I leave people very happy with what weve done, even when I end up getting what I wanted and they dont get what they wanted. I have to say that with all of my movies if theres something in them you dont like its my fault and I cant blame somebody else for recutting it. The only moments where Ive had that happen are with the MPAA, which is not technically a censor. For example, with Crash, the company Blockbuster will not stock an NC-17 film. So with Crash, which was released as an NC-17 film, in order to get it into any Blockbuster, I had to cut 10 minutes out of it to have it be an R. I wasnt very successful in stopping that from happening because I had a contract that said it had to have an R if somebody wanted it. On the other hand, when the Canadian version of Blockbuster tried to do the same, I did go very public saying, Look, thats the American ratings. In Canada, we released this film as what we call Restricted and there should not be a cut version in Canadian Blockbuster. They did back down. But you do what you can. Who knows how it was cut in Finland. Who knows where it was cut in Japan. I cant keep on top of every TV version thats around the world. So theres a point where you have to let go.
DRE: What do you think of your nephew Aaron Woodleys movie Rhinoceros Eyes?
DC: I thought it was terrific. I really liked it a lot. I thought he did a wonderful job with it. I think hes a very talented and special kid.
DRE: I know youve only produced a couple movies that arent yours like the Bruce Wagner film I'm Losing You, would you do something like that for Aaron?
DC: I think he needs a more serious producer than me frankly and I think hes working with some right now. When it came to Bruces films, if theres anything I can do to help a first time director, someone who I really admire like Bruce, Im happy to help. But Im not really the kind of producer who can go out and raise tons of money and make sure that the film is distributed properly and all that. Thats a different kind of producing and I think thats what Aaron would need. Hes doing something with Lee Daniels right now and I think thats a good thing.
DRE: I read that famous interview that you did with Salmon Rushdie, that helped inside eXistenZ where you talk about how beautiful you thought the computer game Myst was. Then I read in the New York Times Magazine that youre designing a videogame with your son.
DC: Thats right, were playing with that so well see where that goes. Its been a strange and interesting process. I dont know enough about videogames to know whether Im getting the full flower of the experience or not. Im also working a Toronto company that has not done a videogame before so its kind of a learning experience for all of us.
DRE: Do you see it as puzzle game like Myst or one with more action?
DC: This would not be an action game. Im not that interested in that particularly, just because Im not really interested in that in my movies. Its more of a suspense thriller mystery kind of game.
DRE: Ashton Holmes let it slip that you have a Ferrari movie script.
DC: I do, thats Red Cars, an old script. It was just published by in a beautiful coffee table book with many wonderful illustrations from the Ferrari archives. We previewed it at Venice and you can go to their website. Its a movie that I seem unable to get made but its nice that it got made into this book.
DRE: Were doing this interview for SuicideGirls. Many of the girls featured on SuicideGirls have tattoos and piercings. Have you ever seen any David Cronenberg related tattoos on anybody?
DC: I havent but Id love to. I get quite jealous when I hear that Clive Barker gets to sign all kinds of peoples anatomy at his book signings and stuff. Ive never been asked to do that and I would be very interested to see photos of Cronenberg tattoos.
by Daniel Robert Epstein
SG Username: AndersWolleck
VIEW 13 of 13 COMMENTS
soldatka:
Just seen it. Great film. Definitely worth seeing.
pauline:
Yeah, it was very good. The conversation with his brother was boring, though, and soo slow,