Dito Montiel

Nov 2, 2011

Tags: filmmaker, Dito Montiel, The Son of No One

I first learned about Dito Montiel when his first film, A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints came out. It was notable for a cast including Robert Downey Jr., Shia Labeouf and Channing Tatum before they broke out, and Rosario Dawson who was already a star. Based on Montiel’s own book about growing up in and leaving New York, it introduced Montiel’s voice to Hollywood, particularly in dialogue that’s more like real people who have trouble articulating, rather than polished Hollywood screenplay.

His next movie was the studio action movie Fighting, also starring Tatum as an underground street fighter. Now that I knew who Montiel was, I stopped when I saw a Dito Montiel CD in a bin at the massive used record store Amoeba. The album had sophisticated music, layering different instruments with harmony and telling stories about, again, growing up. Montiel is also a painter. Tatum again stars in Montiel’s third film, The Son of No One. He plays a cop who gets assigned to the precinct of the housing project where he grew up. Tracy Morgan plays a stark, dramatic role as his childhood friend, now in rough shape from a traumatic childhood of abuse. Al Pacino plays police chief with ties to the old case.

Montiel is now a west coaster like me. This is the third film I’ve had the opportunity to interview him for. Despite the serious subjects of his films and the raw style in which he portrays them, he always seems like lovable friendly guy. He even got a bit shy when I started asking about his music this time.

Suicide Girls: What is the idea behind your “A movie by Dito Montiel” credit?

Dito Montiel: It always says that on my movies. I like movies. “Film” feels a little corny for me.

SG:

If I watched all three back to back I’d notice that. I didn’t remember.

DM:

It’s okay. I like movies. I’m so uptight, it’s like “film” I feel like ughhh. Like a "novel." It’s a book!

SG:

What is your unique vision for stories?

DM:

I don’t feel like any of my movies are particularly unique. Maybe the characters are a little more real than we’re used to seeing, in my opinion. One of my favorite movies is 25th Hour. I love it so much. When I saw that movie, and I’ve yet to sit in a room with three people that agree with me, but I love it and I thought that’s a movie where Ed Norton in it is going away to jail for five years or something. He’s totally slowly having a terrible time. I see movies all the time where people say, “I’m going to do 10 years. I can do that standing on my head.” I don’t know who does one day standing on their head. If I were going to prison for a day, I’d be devastated. Jake, my editor, said we should have made this movie about garbagemen because then people wouldn’t throw the cop thriller into it, but that is very cliché in a way. This is really just the story of a bunch of people that really wish they could push everything right back into the closet and life could be good again. That was the realness that I was trying to make.

SG:

Was it really that good for them before?

DM:

It was better than this, which is the way I see life sometimes. As long as something terrible isn’t happening, something terrible isn’t happening.

SG:

If this is based on people you knew growing up, was there also a murder in your community?

DM:

Yeah, there were a few but in particular, the thing that sparked this story, of course it’s fiction, but in my real life, I used to hang out at the Ravenswood Projects which is right next to Queensbridge Projects. We filmed in Queensbridge. Ravenswood is not as picaresque. We used to hang out in a guy’s apartment there, a kid, we were all 14, him and his grandmother. It was a weird situation. This one guy used to come in and terrorize us a lot. He was 18, a crackhead named Hanky in real life, like in the movie this guy Hanky. He used to come in and one day he got killed. Not by us, someone killed him and he was just dead in the hallway and I remember the police were out there eating sandwiches, smoking, joking and taking him away. My friend Vinny at the time looked at me and said, “Nobody cares. Nobody cares about anybody here.” That strange notion stuck with me. It just stayed with me and I thought this is a little world where we really believed no one cared inside these walls what happened. So in the movie there’s a kid Vinny who says, “Nobody cares, just throw him in the garbage.” There’s a cop who says, “Nobody cares, not a single fucking person.” In the end, “No one cares about an old cop.” That notion was the seed for the movie.

SG:

And you feel it’s gotten worse, if things were better then?

DM:

In real life? Well, that’s interesting because when I first came to Los Angeles, a friend of mine that I grew up with was on skid row out here, funny enough, living there. I went down there and I thought well, skid row in L.A. sounds better than the hard times in New York because there’s no winter. But when I saw skid row out here, I thought, “Oh my God, there’s about 20 blocks in downtown Los Angeles no one cares about.” I’m thinking people are probably getting raped, murdered, robbed and we don’t hear about it. Meanwhile someone gets robbed somewhere else, it’s headline news. I’m not trying to make a big political statement but there are pockets of the world. Maybe now it’s a little more broadcast, or less, or people are a little bit aware of what’s going on, with this Occupy thing. But there are a lot of people that believe that no one cares about them and they might be right.

SG:

How was this Sundance different for you than 2006?

DM:

I don’t know, less free stuff. [Laughs] Look, I wouldn’t be doing this stuff if it wasn’t for Sundance. They took me into the labs back then for my first movie. It sounds corny and I’m not trying to be an advocate for it, but I can’t not be. To this day, I contact Michelle Satter who runs it about anything, from “do you know a good DP” to “I need a cool actor that does this” to “hey, will you get someone to read my script?” Within four hours, Frank Pierson who wrote Dog Day Afternoon or someone of that caliber will write me back because Michelle contacted them. He’s like, “I’ll read your script, I’ll give you some notes this week.” It’s like wow, what a beautiful family. It is Wonkaville so I’m a big fan. It was just as fun.

SG:

What about being a closing night film as opposed to your debut five years ago?

DM:

It’s all nuts. I get more time to screw around I guess.

SG:

But are there higher expectations the second time you’re there?

DM:

You know, I think the only thing that is a little scary is I think independent films are really hard, getting harder and harder. From what little I know, I don’t know much about movies, but it’s tough to make a movie. Even five years ago, I think if you had the cast that I have, everyone would think you made at least a $25 million movie. They don’t believe we made a $5 million movie with this cast but we did. And it took this cast to make a $5 million movie because it doesn’t have explosions and it doesn’t have chase scenes or supernatural. It’s very honest and real. It’s the kind of movie I love. So I think sometimes maybe people aren’t ready for that yet. They think, “Oh, what’s this independent movie doing here with this cast?” Maybe that’s a little different when you’re the closing night film with this. The expectations are “what kind of movie is this?”

SG:

You do music also.

DM:

Well, I used to.

SG:

Not anymore?

DM:

I mean, I’ll pick up a guitar here and there.

SG:

I have one of your albums. Was your music also autobiographical?

DM:

Yeah, of course. That’s funny.

SG:

How did you learn the layers of sounds and harmonies and different instruments?

DM:

I learned from friends, feelings, the same way. It’s all art. Writing movies is not that different.

SG:

You’ve said that before, “It’s all art.”

DM:

It is. More musicians should make movies and more movie guys should make music.

SG:

Whenever a big musician comes into movies, they get a lot of shit for it. Madonna still can’t get taken seriously.

DM:

Right, well, because you’re lucky enough to be a superstar, that’s a good problem. Don’t worry, when you keep failing at things like I have, nobody knows you’re reinventing yourself.

SG:

Is it all movies and books for you now?

DM:

That keeps me occupied and I like it. I love to write and it all stems from that. Music was always writing to me. I was not a good singer. I was a writer.

SG:

Maybe I enjoy hearing singers who aren’t perfect. Like on The Sing-Off, the ones who get kicked off are the ones I like.

DM:

Oh, me too.

SG:

Because they don’t sound like everyone else!

DM:

I’m with you all the way. I’ll always be like, “I love that guy.” And everyone’s like, “He was bad.” I’m like, “But everyone else is perfect.” In movies too. Acting, I love the imperfections.

SG:

Is the internet a good thing for art? What would you have done if you’d been exposed to something this massive growing up?

DM:

Boy, it’s gotta be scary. It’s scary now. I don’t know. It’s a weird thing. It’s so odd, I’m glued to it like everyone else. It’s a strange thing because it’s really great that you can do anything and put it out there, and people will see it. I started playing in a band when I was 14 years old. We had no dreams of anything. Nothing. We used to play at a club called the A7, Avenue A and 7th Street downtown in New York. That was it. I’d never even think we’d play anything bigger than that and we didn’t aspire to do anything bigger than that. There was something really beautiful and pure about that. Maybe the internet changes that because I don’t even go to Yahoo or CNN.com anymore. You go to Facebook and you find out how everything pertains to you. “Hey Dito, there was a hurricane today in Miami.” Oh wow, there was a hurricane today. So it’s odd but in a way I guess it’s the way it is. Look, it’s the most powerful thing in the world.

SG:

You talk about the A7 club, theoretically now someone in California could see your performance at the A7. But maybe because of all that access, someone in New York wouldn’t have wandered into the A7 and seen you live.

DM:

Yeah. I’m really happy I grew up the way I grew up, as crazy and wacky as some of it was. I like it. But it’s impossible. People 30 years older than me when I was a kid would say the same things about the ‘50s or the ‘60s. That’s just the way of the world.

SG:

What is your creative life like now?

DM:

I write all the time, same as always. No one’s ever handed me anything so I never think anyone’s going to hand me anything so I just write because boy, would I love somebody to give me Indiana Jones 4, but they’re not gonna. So I better write my thing and somehow my stuff always brings me right back to the place I grew up in.

SG:

Well, they brought you Fighting. Do studios still come to you?

DM:

Yeah, of course. I’m talking with a couple now about some things. I know that making a movie is at least a year of my life. I obsess to a point of craziness. Every musical note, every edit, me and my editor literally sit and I don’t leave. I go to extras casting, I’m just kind of nuts about it and I love it. You’ve got to find something that you really feel like I can do a really good job at this, or I’m going to love it. This movie, The Son of No One, I don’t imagine it’ll make $100 million at the box office but I love it and I will always be able to feel good about making this movie. That’s what I hope to keep being able to do.

SG:

How much time do you have to see movies, music and exhibits and experience art?

DM:

Oh, I see a lot of movies and I watch a lot of reality TV if that’s art. I don’t know if that’s art but I love it. It’s so real. Even if it’s not real, it’s real. You always find time. Remember, when you get to make a movie, you’re surrounded by artists all day long. It’s nuts. You have a DP and camera guys and you have electricians. I’m learning from everybody all day long. I’m more interested in what movie craft service was on last and what the actors were like than going to an exhibit. That’s my exhibit, living life. It’s a really nice world to be in because the art comes to you while you’re working. Pretty cool.

SG:

What would you do if you had a movie and Channing Tatum wasn’t available?

DM:

[Laughs] I don’t know. We’re friends. I started writing this halfway through our last movie. I looked at him, he did a scene and he was really good and I said, “Man, you can really act.” He kind of laughed. I said, “I’ve got a movie. It’s a little movie. It’s very subtle. No big things blowing up, nothing crazy and I think it’ll be really fun.” So he said, “Let’s do it.”

SG:

Would Tracy Morgan go back to joking around in between takes?

DM:

No, anything but. He was very remarkably serious. I forget what projects he grew up in, but he was almost going too far into the role. I think it was touching on strange spots in him but he still is Tracy. I was very happy about him. It was strange casting but I’m very happy we did it.

SG:

Do you give someone like Al Pacino directions?

DM:

Well, direction is the script. You write it and you write it as good as you possibly can and you pray somebody likes it. In this case I got really lucky because the top of the heap liked it. He shows up and we do a rehearsal and I’m a fan first. I don’t pretend to be anything but that. I’m a fan and of course I’ll give some thoughts. That’s all a director really does, give thoughts. That’s the way I work. I pretty much look in awe. He’s that good. He was doing us, he was doing Shakespeare in the Park at night, he’s Al Pacino. That’s Michael Jordan. Yeah, Phil Jackson did do something with him, but he’s Michael Jordan.

SG:

Did you shoot on film?

DM:

Yeah, 35mm.

SG:

Is that getting lost these days, especially in indie film?

DM:

It’s getting harder, understandably. You can’t stop the future. It will be gone, I know. I’m holding on because I love it. There’s something strange about it that is magical. I don’t know how much longer. That may be the last one. It’s getting hard. It’s like shooting stills on film. I don’t know anyone that does that anymore.

SG:

What does it give your film that is has a grainy look?

DM:

I don’t know. I try really hard to write complete and utter honesty even at the cost of the movie being more exciting. I try to push the acting to be as honest as humanly possible. My editor does the same with editing. Film somehow brings a touch of something, even though video sometimes looks more real. It looks too real. Film still feels like a movie. I want it to still have that thing.

SG:

It’s also different watching film in a movie theater. It’s meant to be projected. Digital looks the same on a big screen or a TV set.

DM:

Right, and film sometimes looks weird on your TV which is getting really odd.

SG:

Do the folks from home still keep in touch?

DM:

Of course. Oh yeah, Nerf was literally just here. He left two days ago. He was staying with me out here. He’s in

The Son of No One for one second. He’s an ambulance driver because he drives an ambulance. He’s in the background with Pacino. When I go to New York, I go to where I grew up and I stay there all the time. I’m actually going next week. Of course, home is always home. That’s kind of the way it is.

SG:

What are you doing next?

DM:

Just writing now so we’ll see. Hopefully something cool.

SG:

The two films based on your experiences growing up were difficult experiences. Do you have some joyous experiences you can make a film about?

DM:

Oh, it was all joyous. This movie is particularly hard. Saints I thought was kind of joyous. There are some parts but it was kind of fun. The kids are so goofy and crazy but this was a hard movie, I know. Of course. I wrote this book called The Clapper and that’s a movie I want to do really bad. That actually all takes place here in L.A. Hopefully I’ll get to make that. It’ll be another very difficult movie to make but it’s purely fun.

SG:

Is that like the guy on the film set who claps the board for sound?

DM:

No, no, no. It’s about a guy who’s a paid audience member. When I first came out here, I did it for a little with my friend over at Gower. They pay you 50 bucks to sit in the audience of horrible shows and pretend they’re funny when it says “applause.” So hopefully we’ll make that.

SG:

I knew about seat fillers, but actually paying for clapping?

DM:

Oh no, it says “applause” and you applaud, laugh, laugh, clap, clap. Then you do the next show. Judge Judy…

SG:

I’ve been to tapings. I just thought they were tourists who are all happy to get a free ticket.

DM:

Well, you do get the tourists on some but the really bad shows, the REALLY bad ones.

SG:

Did any of those shows make it several years to become hits?

DM:

A lot of infomercials. We did some infomercials and we did Judge Judy a few times.

The Son of No One opens November 4.