Todd Solondz: Dark Horse
Tags: film, Welcome To The Dollhouse, todd solondz, Dark Horse, director
Todd Solondz had to leave the Toronto International Film Festival early to return to one of his international teaching engagements. I saw his latest film, Dark Horse, on the second to last day of the festival, so was not able to get a Q&A in person. However, he was happy to make time to speak by phone. Across a 15 hour time difference, his distinct voice came on the line via a clear connection to Singapore where he was teaching a film class.
Given the subjects he often deals with, Solondz has a surprisingly warm and soft spoken voice. He had a sympathetic child molester character in Happiness, and in Palindromes a group of religious fundamentalist killing abortion doctors, and their families in the crossfire.
Dark Horse is a comparatively less volatile film, though still deals with characters consistent with Solondz’ ouvre. Abe (Jordan Gelber) lives with his parents, collects toys and slacks off at the office job his father (Christopher Walken) gave him. Abe meets Miranda (Selma Blair) at a wedding and proposes to her after a week of awkward non-dating. He is unshakable despite Miranda’s morose apathy, not just towards him but towards life.
It’s a comedy, by the way. Those awkward interactions between Miranda and Abe, Abe’s total confidence in his lifestyle and his contentious relationships with coworkers and families remind one of Solondz’ breakthrough film Welcome to the Dollhouse. Hopefully Dark Horse will secure distribution soon so everyone can experience what Toronto got to preview at the festival.
SuicideGirls: I’m sorry I missed you in Toronto.
Todd Solondz: Ah well, but here we are. I hope the hour wasn’t too inconvenient for you.
SG:
Is Dark Horse a milder film for you?
TS:
Milder, I don’t know. I guess in the sense that it doesn’t contain any of the overtly controversial subject matter that many of my other films do. I guess one could characterize it that way, although I’m not sure that that’s the impression that people ultimately feel after seeing the movie.
SG:
Was that your goal, to take a somewhat different approach to subject matter?
TS:
Well, I just wanted to remove I think some of the kinds of so-called taboos that I’ve been associated with and felt that would feel fresh for me.
SG:
Did it feel fresh in the end?
TS:
Yes, I’m very pleased with the film. You always want your movie to feel fresh. It’s just at a certain point, because I realized how much controversial material had been addressed in my previous work, it got to a point where this was another way of approaching story.
SG:
What do you think of this idea that in our culture today, nerds and geeks are considered cool?
TS:
Well, it really depends on who’s using the word and the context in which it’s used. It can be used as a compliment of cool or it can be used derisively and disparagingly. So it really depends on from whose mouth it comes and so forth. Certainly what you’re describing is not a new phenomenon. I think they said the same thing years ago when Welcome to the Dollhouse came out.
SG:
Do you think Abe mistakenly takes being a nerd as a compliment when he has some problems he’s not dealing with?
TS:
Well, no one certainly calls him a nerd or a geek and I don’t think he would look at himself that way. In fact, he very clearly makes a point of separating himself from what he thinks is uncool. So on the one hand there is a certain I think lack of awareness of his social status at the same time that he is only too keenly aware of it.
SG:
He has a surprising amount of confidence for someone who lives at home and isn’t very ambitious.
TS:
Sometimes that confidence also can be just a front. It’s really cockiness I think that camouflages some more internal vulnerabilities and how wounded he is.
SG:
When he goes to the toy store, the outdoor sign is blurred. Did you have to obscure the
Toys R Us logo or was that a joke?
Toys R Us logo or was that a joke?
TS:
No, it is funny but it was required to the extent that I was not allowed to use their logo. They didn’t want to be associated with a movie that I directed, but I didn’t want to create a fake name of a toy store and I felt audiences are certainly used to the blurring effect from reality TV so it lends a certain authenticity. Obviously it harkens back to the requirement that I use a red box 10 years ago on another movie, so I suppose there is a little play there. So that was the logic behind that.
SG:
It’s funny because we can obviously still tell what store it is.
TS:
Maybe just by the nature of its architecture and so forth. Probably my producer would have liked me to blur it even more.
SG:
How did you decide which toys Abe would be obsessed with? I noticed a lot of Simpsons toys but he makes it a point that he’s not interested in Star Trek.
TS:
We first had to see what we could clear and it was based on that. I think having grown up when he did grow up, the kinds of things that he would attach himself to. In fact since my actor was that age, he was very helpful in letting me know the kinds of things that would be deemed cool or not.
SG:
One thing I feel I haven’t seen on film before is hearing the noises of an online chat through a telephone. Did you want to comment on our tendency to multitask and have multiple conversations simultaneously?
TS:
I think certainly it’s an indicator of how uncompelled certainly Miranda was at that moment by the phone call that she got from Abe. But I think that this is, I imagine, a common enough aspect of living with the computer, IM, cell phone, tech system that we live in today.
SG:
And it was surreal to see Abe watching pre-movie slides in a movie theater, within a movie. What were your thoughts on including that?
TS:
That was fun. I did want to of course by the framing and so forth give a certain kind of meta movie experience, that you’re watching a movie within a movie as if you’re in the theater watching what Abe is experiencing and make you connect in that way to it. I almost felt the shot of him rattling off the answers to these scrambled celebrity stars, I could almost have pulled that out and just extended that for a long time. It would have been very pleasurable but there was only so much I could do given the story requirements.
SG:
How did you cast Jordan Gelber?
TS:
He had auditioned for my last movie and then I’d seen him in a Mike Leigh play. So instinctively I had a strong sense that he would be most suitable for the part. The question was whether I’d be able to cast an unknown. Obviously ultimately I was able to but there was a lot of pressure on me to cast a name. The names were all very talented and so forth but I felt either too old, too young, too soft, just not quite as suitable as I felt Jordan was.
SG:
What are your distribution hopes after Toronto?
TS:
I know that as we speak, I think the producers are deciding. I don’t even know the details but something will be worked out. We’ll find out soon enough. I just haven’t been in touch with him. I know he’s e-mailed and said he’s just in the midst of negotiating with different people.
SG:
How was your experience as a filmmaker at the festival?
TS:
It’s always an honor to be part of these festivals but of course my time at these festivals is primarily solely taken up with doing interviews to help support the film. So I never really see movies at festivals. I wait until they come out in the theater.
SG:
Does that audience get you?
TS:
They seemed very responsive when I was there. It’s always hard to evaluate and gauge these things. If they didn’t like it, they certainly were very polite about it.
SG:
You’ve been able to put a lot of alternative images of women in films, whether it’s Heather Matarazzo or all the women in Palindromes. Is that something you would like to continue exploring in film?
TS:
I just take it one at a time. I see dramatically what I need and what I’m looking for. That’s what dictates the casting process. I don’t have any calculated plans as to a certain type or a style of performance.
SG:
Has Selma Blair been a kindred spirit in your films?
TS:
I love working with Selma. Of course she’s a wonderful actress with so much untapped potential that I hope audiences get to see more of. We feel very happy I think and comfortable working with each other.
SG:
Are your films still controversial?
TS:
To the extent that I always get a divided response, I suppose you could say yes. It’s just the nature of the controversy may change from film to film.
SG:
Would Happiness still be as controversial today?
TS:
All of my films have in some sense divided audiences because in some sense they’re all fraught with ambiguity. It’s a tricky line that they navigate and audiences often are on one or either side of the fence.
SG:
Do you look in the news for topics that could be interesting issues for a film?
TS:
No. I mean, I read what goes on out there on a regular basis and it’s possible that certain things may pique my interest and something may evolve from that, but I don’t look for ideas. As you get older, you seem to just get more ideas. It’s just you have to figure out how to make them compelling stories that people want to see and that people want to put money into.
SG:
As a teacher, what do you like to impart to your film students?
TS:
Gee, I try to be straightforward about my feelings about their work. Film school, like any other school, is a way of growing up and finding out who you are as a filmmaker and as a person.
SG:
Do you focus on film theory?
TS:
I don’t approach things from any theoretical standpoint. I’m much more pragmatic and approach things really from the nature of story itself.
SG:
Who are some of the new filmmakers who excite you?
TS:
New, there are so many talented filmmakers. Who’s new? I just don’t keep track who is the newest. Certainly Kelly Reichardt is not new but in the last few years she has gotten a lot more attention. I‘m of course a great admirer of hers.
SG:
How much time do you have to watch movies when you’re making movies and teaching?
TS:
Where there’s a will, there’s a way. I don’t have as much time as I did when I was younger and could spend my weekends watching double or triple bills, but I manage to keep up with what most intrigues me.
SG:
What is your writing schedule?
TS:
It’s always erratic. It doesn’t take so long to actually write it. It takes a certain amount of time to commit oneself to writing it and to puzzling it out. I don’t have any recommendation. Everyone works in his own peculiar way I suppose but in some sense they all take 30 years to write. It’s life experience that informs so much of what you do. The writing itself, not so long.
SG:
Some writers are structured 9 to 5ers and others are more free flowing.
TS:
I’ll have to be more in the latter category.
SG:
As important as life experience is, how do you spend your time when you’re not working on films or teaching films?
TS:
Well, I have family. There are always things to ponder and read and write and so forth. That fills it more beyond the brim I think.
SG:
Since you teach abroad, how do you find the filmmaking community around the world?
TS:
The nonstudio filmmakers are having a tough time of it because of not the economic turmoil which I think is global right now. It’s not that per se but living in a time when there’s the internet and cable TV and Netflix and downloading and piracy and so forth that ultimately eat into the budgets of these independently made films. So they’re grim times but somehow movies still get made. They’re just getting made for less money.
SG:
Could it be a good thing that there are more avenues for exhibiting films, whether YouTube or streaming?
TS:
There’s a plus and a minus to all of it. Certainly the technology that’s developed over the last decade or so has made making films much more economical and economically viable than they’ve been in the past. To get the kinds of distribution I think people would like to have becomes much more competitive in this economic climate.
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