- 7 weeks ago
Chloé Zhao ('Hamnet'), James Cameron ('Avatar: Fire and Ash'), Joachim Trier ('Sentimental Value'), Kathryn Bigelow ('A House of Dynamite'), Ryan Coogler ('Sinners') and Yorgos Lanthimos ('Bugonia') join THR in our Director Roundtable.
Category
✨
PeopleTranscript
00:00Don't we all want to go to each other's sets and just be very small?
00:06I'm loving everything I'm hearing. I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, man.
00:30Hi, everyone, and thank you for joining us for The Hollywood Reporter's Director Roundtable.
00:51I'm Scott Feinberg, and I'm so thrilled and honored to be joined by six outstanding filmmakers behind 2025 Masterpieces.
00:58And I'd love to ask, if you had not become a filmmaker, what would you be doing today?
01:02That's an easy one for me, because I had to decide between exploration and science on the one hand and filmmaking on the other hand.
01:08And I've made that decision several times and gone back and forth.
01:11I took eight years off from Hollywood to do seven deep ocean expeditions.
01:15Catherine, you were at art school, right?
01:17Yeah, I'd be painting.
01:19Ryan, how about you? You were an athlete?
01:20I was, but I don't think I was good enough to still be doing it.
01:24So I'm actually struggling right now.
01:26So I'll probably have a coffee shop.
01:29Yeah, I got pretty good at making espresso.
01:34Yorgos, I know you've had a photography exhibition recently.
01:37Is that something that could have been a path for you?
01:39I guess. It just sounds too close to what I'm doing now.
01:44So I was thinking like a baker or something.
01:47You guys could have shops.
01:49Yeah, I could be, I could provide you with all, you know, like pastures and stuff.
01:53I would like that very much.
01:55How about you, Chloe?
01:57Private detective.
01:58And you were serious about that, right?
02:00Very serious about it.
02:01And then I realized it's actually quite dangerous.
02:03I don't know.
02:04Make believe is better.
02:05That's good.
02:06And Joachim?
02:07I don't know how to do anything else.
02:08I'm just grateful they'll let me.
02:10Skating is good.
02:10No, I don't think skating.
02:12It's a bit like Ryan.
02:12We were talking about it.
02:13I used to be a pretty good skater.
02:15I'm too old now.
02:16But I think something with people, I don't have the academic skills probably, but like
02:19to be a psychologist or help people or something, I don't know.
02:22So for each of you, if you had to point to one film above all others, which was it that
02:27kind of nudged you down this road?
02:30I would say The Wild Bunch.
02:31It's so epic and iconic.
02:33And at least it certainly impressed me.
02:36I think I saw Wild Bunch on a double bill with Main Streets.
02:40And that was just transformative.
02:42Well, I grew up in Beijing and we didn't have Hollywood movies.
02:45Since you're here, Terminator is the first film I've ever seen.
02:50And they would let one Hollywood film in per week on a Sunday.
02:54And I think that was the first time I go, holy shit.
02:59Jim, for you, I have a couple of...
03:01It's the same answer.
03:01It's 2001, A Space Odyssey.
03:03But really, not just because my mind was blown by the cinema of it and I became fascinated
03:08by Kubrick and his whole methodology, but I wanted to know how they did it.
03:14And to me, that was the leap.
03:15It's like, then I started building models and using my dad's Super 8 camera to make
03:19space shots.
03:20And once you're kind of down that path, it just gathers momentum, you know, rolling downhill.
03:26My father did sound work.
03:28He's a sound designer on an animation film called Pitchcliffe Grand Prix, which I'm sure
03:33none of you have seen.
03:34We'll try to send it to you.
03:35No, but it was made in the late 70s when I was a kid.
03:38And I went there and saw these grown-ups play with animation of dolls, you know?
03:43And it really...
03:44And also seeing the result of that and being kind of proud that my dad was a part of it.
03:47I think that really affected me.
03:49Ryan?
03:49I didn't know I was going to make movies when I saw it, but it was probably Malcolm
03:53X.
03:54And my dad took me and I remember just being kind of overwhelmed by all of it.
03:58So that was probably where it absolutely started.
04:00Yarrif?
04:00You know, remembering back what was like cinema for me when I was growing up was like, you
04:07know, Spielberg films like Indiana Jones and Jaws.
04:10And, you know, those films were like an out-of-the-world experience for me when I was growing up.
04:16Diving into these specific projects, Catherine, I'd love to start with you.
04:20And I think just to kind of set up the origin story, if we can, I think it was exactly 50
04:27years ago that you made a short film called Psychological Operations in Support of Unconventional
04:33Warfare.
04:33Years later, in 2002, was K-19, The Widowmaker, about a nuclear sub that began to melt down.
04:39And now on the heels of The Hurt Locker and Zero Dark Thirty, we have A House of Dynamite
04:44about America's response to a nuclear attack.
04:47What is at the root of your interest in this subject matter?
04:51And how did it lead to this particular film at this particular moment?
04:54I'm curious about the military-industrial complex and foreign policy and how we are sort of
05:00at the mercy of it.
05:02And it's always been intriguing to me, you know, and trying to understand it, trying to
05:08unpack it, trying to decipher it, and also how we're sort of made vulnerable by it.
05:13And in the case of this current one, an interest, obviously, in the prospect of nuclear war and
05:20how sort of it's become normalized.
05:24I mean, I grew up at a time when we had to, we were in the duck and cover era.
05:28We had to hide under our desk in case of an atomic blast.
05:31And now it feels like the specter of it has kind of returned with a lot of various saber
05:38rattling around the world.
05:40And here we are.
05:41And I think it's a worthy conversation.
05:43Let's put it that way.
05:44Absolutely.
05:45And I know that is something that was on your mind from a young age too, Jim, the president,
05:51right?
05:51Sure.
05:51I bought a book, you know, Ghosts of Hiroshima, which I want to make at some point.
05:56And I share Catherine's, you know, generational perspective on it, you know, being a kid in
06:01the 60s was to have the Cold War be real for you, you know, and realize that you're powerless,
06:09that other people are in command of this thing.
06:12And I think the big takeaway from your movie should be that it boils down to one guy.
06:16In the United States, the president is the only person who has the power to launch a
06:21retaliatory strike or to even launch an offensive strike.
06:24And people need to think about that when they vote next time.
06:27I want to talk about Avatar now because pre-associating a connection here, Vicarious Experience is something
06:33that I think was at the center of a film that, Jim, you co-wrote and produced and Catherine
06:38directed 30 years ago.
06:39That was Strange Days, film in which technology makes that Vicarious Experience possible.
06:45And around that same time, I believe you're thinking for the first time about Avatar, where
06:49of course technology makes it possible for a disabled human to...
06:53It was almost the opposite.
06:54It was collecting sensory data from another person and then playing it back.
06:58And then this was your consciousness being projected into another body and acting through that body.
07:05And we were developing those actually at the same time.
07:07It was in 90...
07:09I think we were doing it in 93?
07:1193.
07:1293, yeah.
07:12Avatar came a little later.
07:14I wrote that in 95.
07:14What was the initial impetus for Avatar and the idea that you would spend, here we are more
07:20than three decades later, leading up to this latest installment, which is looking at the
07:24aftermath of the familial loss that happens in the way of water.
07:29Just what set you on this path?
07:31Well, the technology or the science fiction idea of the technology that you could project
07:35your mind into an alien body was more of a means to an end to get you into a world and
07:41to place a character into a world and into a culture.
07:43So it was looking at indigenous culture through the lens of science fiction and the way that
07:48their values might be very different.
07:51And actually, Avatar sort of gets a human audience to vote against themselves, not against themselves
07:59by the end of the movie.
08:00But I don't think it's that simple.
08:02I think it's the aspirational value of the Na'vi is we want to go back to that version
08:08of ourselves that was connected with nature and that still cared about these things.
08:13And we all carry around this guilt that we've moved away from that in our urbanized technological
08:18society.
08:19And I think that's why that film resonated.
08:21I think that's why the second film resonated.
08:23And we'll see what happens next.
08:25You never know until you put it out there.
08:27What's going to happen?
08:28Well, Ryan, you have made films of all sorts and sizes, from low-budget indies to giant
08:34studio films.
08:35And I don't think you've ever quite blended genres as much as you have in Sinners.
08:39I wonder where the inspiration for it came from.
08:43I think you've said that you don't make films unless there's a personal connection.
08:46Yeah, for me, it all starts with my uncle, my uncle James Edmondson, who was for a long
08:52time like that eldest male family member I had.
08:55And he was from Mississippi, moved to Oakland when he was like 20 years old.
08:59And I was born and raised in Oakland.
09:01That's all I ever knew for a long time.
09:04And I used to just love spending time with him at his house, hanging out.
09:09If he had enough whiskey, he'll tell me a story about Mississippi.
09:11But the blues was always on around him.
09:14And for me, the blues music was his.
09:16It didn't belong to me.
09:17You know, it was kind of music for my uncle, music for older people.
09:20And I started making movies, moved away from home.
09:24And in 2015, he got very sick.
09:27And, you know, I wanted to be there, be around him.
09:29But I was in Philadelphia making Creed and in LA finishing it up.
09:32And he was such a hard-working guy.
09:33He would always call me on the phone, don't worry about me, man.
09:35Handle your business.
09:36He ended up passing away while I was in post-production.
09:38And I wasn't there.
09:39I had a lot of guilt around it.
09:41But what I would do when I think about him is I would put on those old songs that he would have playing when we hung out.
09:49And I just got obsessed with it, you know, and started to listen to it with a different ear and started to study it, you know.
09:56And that's kind of where the idea came from.
09:59And one day I was listening to one of his old songs, a song called Wang Dang Doodle.
10:02It just hit me like a lightning bolt, like, oh, this could be a movie.
10:04And I love genre cinema, too, so, you know, nobody knew that about me.
10:09So I thought it would be fun to make something a little more personal, a little more special and pull from some of my favorite influences.
10:16And, you know, that's how we got the movie.
10:18That's great.
10:19Yorgos, begonia is a reimagining, I guess, is a word we could use for a 2003 Korean film, Save the Green Planet, that also somehow speaks maybe even more to our current moment 20-plus years later.
10:32It seems like it came together faster than some of your other projects have.
10:36Is that true?
10:36And where did it start?
10:38Yeah, because I guess because I wasn't involved from the beginning, that's why for me it was faster.
10:43But Will Tracy, who wrote the script, started working with Lars Knudsen and Ari Aster, developing the script.
10:50And it came to me at one point.
10:52They thought that I'd be interested in it, and obviously they were right.
10:57Yeah, it was the first film that I haven't developed myself for many years.
11:01And I read the script, and I, you know, it was the first time that I read the script, and I feel like it's almost ready to make because of the reasons you mentioned.
11:11But it was also, like, extremely funny and complex and, yeah, relevant and different, I think, in a way, to the stuff that I've done.
11:20But it made absolute sense to me why they would think of me for this film.
11:25And it was a quick process.
11:28I worked with Will a little bit on the script just to make it more my own and bring in my own sensibilities.
11:34But it was, yeah, like a couple of passes on the script with Will, and then, you know, off we went.
11:40Yeah, yeah.
11:41Well, Chloe, you have said that even after Steven Spielberg and Sam Mendes, two major filmmakers in their own right,
11:47even after they approached you about directing Hamnet, even after that, you hesitated quite a bit about saying yes to directing this.
11:54What were your reasons for having pause, and what got you to reconsider?
11:59When they told me the log line is about focusing on a mother losing a child,
12:05just hearing that was quite triggering because the character of a mother did not exist in my films before because, like many, I carry a quite deep mother wound.
12:18And I think in your film, you know, your avatar explores that in a universal way.
12:25But it is the greatest wound a person can carry and probably the hardest one to heal.
12:31And so the idea of making a film about that and then be swimming in that river, I was like, hmm, I don't think so.
12:38But I did go through a midlife crisis for four years and realized that if you don't deal with it, it's going to come get you.
12:44So I thought maybe now is the time.
12:46Wow.
12:47Okay.
12:48Was it cathartic for you to make the film?
12:50Yes.
12:50Yes, because just like in Sentimental Value as well, I knew I could hold on to Will Shakespeare
12:58because I know that person who is afraid out of that and escaping to a fantasy world.
13:03I can, when in doubt, I can run into his world and knowing that the power of art and storytelling is going to carry me through this process
13:14the way it had carried him through his experience.
13:17So I thought, let's give it a go.
13:20Yeah.
13:20Barely made it out of it.
13:22But here I am.
13:24Thank you for making that decision.
13:26Yes, yes.
13:27And Joachim, Sentimental Value, which like so many of your films, was shot in the area around Oslo, right?
13:34In Oslo.
13:34In Oslo, where you also live, centers on a family of artists.
13:38There's intergenerational kind of hurt and resentments.
13:42Obviously a very specific story.
13:44But on the other hand, I wanted to ask you, I can't help but notice you come from a family of filmmakers.
13:50Your grandfather directed films that were in Cannes in 1955 and 1960.
13:54Your father was, as you mentioned, a sound designer on films.
13:57Your mother, I know, was a director at one point.
13:59You grew up, you've said, on film sets.
14:01Was your family a jumping off point for this or just coincidental?
14:06My grandfather, Erik Lööken, was in the resistance during the Second World War.
14:12And he got captured during the Nazi occupation of Norway.
14:16And he survived after imprisonment through making jazz music.
14:21And he made his first film, kind of in an environment where in Norway at the time no one made movies.
14:26So he made a film that got to Cannes in 1960 as his first time and his only time to go there.
14:32And it was a year where, you know, you had Vincent Minnelli and you had Bergman and Antonioni, everyone.
14:36And my grandfather came and they said, you made a new wave film.
14:40And he said, I call it jazz movie.
14:42You know, he was a jazz musician.
14:43So in my family, that meant a lot.
14:45But there wasn't any infrastructure to really support him.
14:48So he only made one more feature film in his life.
14:50So I think I thought a lot about him.
14:53And I also observed as a child, he passed away when I was nine years old.
14:58But I observed someone, I think, trying to survive through the creative act.
15:03And now that I'm suddenly the father of two young girls, I think this film also comes out of that conversation I'm having with Eskil Fouk, my co-writer,
15:12who I always write with about where are we in life and what does this mean, this thing we do.
15:16And I'm still struggling to understand why the hell we do what we do.
15:19But that's, I try to put that into the movie.
15:22It's therapy.
15:23Maybe it is.
15:23We work out our stuff.
15:24Yeah.
15:25Right?
15:25Sometimes in a more abstract or removed way, sometimes in a very direct way.
15:29But we're all working out our stuff.
15:31There are some of you, you know, people are studying your movies in universities.
15:36There are critics.
15:36People are writing books about you guys.
15:38They have their own theories.
15:39But I wonder in your, in your estimation.
15:41They're always wrong, by the way.
15:42They're always wrong.
15:43Well, that's why here's our chance to set the record straight.
15:45Do you guys see a connective thread that runs through all or at least most of your films?
15:51And is there any explanation for that, if there is one?
15:54Oh, minor love stories.
15:56Right.
15:56Of one form or another.
15:58Yep.
15:58Right?
15:58Either a romantic girl meets boy or, you know, a marriage that's breaking up.
16:04Or a woman creates a relationship in moments with a little girl that she feels protective of.
16:11I mean, they're all love stories in some way.
16:13So they're all kind of sappy.
16:14What would be if you were to, in front of all of us, just a small group and our viewers,
16:20why might that?
16:22Why do you think that might be, that you, that you return to love stories?
16:30I think it's in, you know, people think of me as a very technical filmmaker, and I can
16:34do that.
16:34You know, I love to do that.
16:36But for me, it's all about the heart.
16:38It's all about connecting.
16:39You know, the storytelling, first rule of storytelling is you connect with your audience.
16:43And so I guess I, I go to kind of what the universal experience of humanity is.
16:48We all want to be seen, we want to be loved, we want to feel safe in a relationship, you
16:54know, all of those things.
16:55Now, I can quantify that now, but when I started out, I didn't, I couldn't have quantified it.
17:01I was really just reacting to all my influences, the things I thought were cool.
17:05Yeah, yeah.
17:06You know, I just wanted to do cool stuff in my movies, like the cool stuff I saw in
17:09other movies.
17:10That's, that was my film school, was the drive-in movie theaters in Orange County.
17:14Right.
17:14You know, I just learned how to answer the questions better as I went along.
17:17But isn't that interesting, though?
17:19Just what you're describing, I can also feel that you, we are all probably quite obsessed
17:24with the format of cinema, right?
17:25Like movies, right?
17:26Mm-hmm.
17:27You found the form, and then you revealed yourself through it.
17:30And I feel, I don't know how, I would love to hear how the rest of you feel about that,
17:34but I also started out just thinking I was making a movie to be allowed to make a movie.
17:38And then it turns out slowly that, wow, people are talking back to me about stuff that I care about.
17:43And that's a good thing, I think, at the end of the day, even though we can be shy about it.
17:47But I think that revelation is kind of subconscious.
17:50You know, you can't do it intentionally.
17:52It's going to happen no matter what.
17:54I mean, it's, it's like a Rorschach.
17:56I think you throw yourself into a place that feels dangerous, and then you learn to swim
18:01in that, in that pool, throw yourself into the deep end, and then you find out something
18:05about yourself.
18:05Right.
18:05You know, if you go in with such a roadmap, like everybody extolled the virtues of Hitchcock
18:10with this perfectly roadmap to film and everything, it's like, that doesn't interest me.
18:15I want to go where I don't know what to do, you know.
18:18And I don't feel safe.
18:19Yeah, exactly.
18:20Do you feel that way, guys?
18:21I mean, you're always doing crazy shit.
18:23You do stuff that would never occur to me in a million years.
18:28But they're love stories, basically.
18:32I guess, like Kim said, like, I never thought I would make a film in Greece.
18:36I just thought I'll make commercials, earn a living.
18:38And at some point it dawned on me, like, especially when I became more technically proficient
18:45through making all these commercials, I go like, why don't we just grab a camera and
18:50just go, we don't need lights, we don't need makeup, we don't need anything.
18:53Just get three actors, go somewhere with five people and just make a film.
18:58That's how I made my first film.
19:00And it was a reaction, and it was more about form.
19:05It was a reaction to the polished world that I knew.
19:09It was, in a way, form, and it was a little bit of a love story and a detective story.
19:13And then, you know, when I realized we can just make films like that, I went on to make
19:19my second film, Dogtooth, which was more about thinking more about what interests me in exploring
19:27in terms of human nature and societal structures and human behavior and coming from
19:35Greece, which is a kind of Mediterranean type of family structure, that was something that
19:43was interesting to me, and see how I can take that to extremes and expose things about that
19:51structure.
19:52But yeah, it did start out as, like you said, like I can just make a film.
19:57Take a 16-millimeter camera, go somewhere, make a film.
20:00Well, for a number of you, I know it's also place is something that runs through maybe
20:06not everyone, but many of your films.
20:08I mean, obviously, Joachim, that's Oslo for you, Ryan, Oakland, and Chloe, interestingly
20:15enough, for someone who was born in China, it seems like the American West for many of
20:21them was something that you were drawn to.
20:23So I guess coming from where you do, is there any rhyme or reason for how you've wound up
20:28where you've gone?
20:29You know, every northern Chinese person had some Mongolian blood, because, you know,
20:35the stuff happened there.
20:37So you come from a line of conquerors.
20:40Half of me.
20:41The other half is conquered.
20:44I conquered many times.
20:46So no conflict there.
20:47No conflict there.
20:48Just the inner civil war.
20:50I remember whenever I hear Mongolian music growing up, I cry.
20:55You know, so I would be yearning for the plains of Mongolia when I was in Beijing, and I was
21:00yearning for the plains when I was in New York.
21:03There's a through line to previous question.
21:07It might be a bit of a downer, but I think it's fear of death.
21:10You know, I'm terrified of death.
21:13I did not grow up in an environment where there is religion or there is a way of looking
21:19at it as a natural part of the human experience, but more as something taboo and bad and something
21:27we have to fix.
21:28So it's something to be ashamed of, and somehow it's weakness, and knowing, being deeply sensitive
21:35and knowing that I'm not really living my life if I'm so afraid to die.
21:40And so to be drawn to nature, especially the nature that has now been tamed and controlled,
21:48and once you have no choice but to be part of it, once you're forced to vibrate as part
21:54of nature, you actually become one with it.
21:57And then the illusion of separation dissolves, and then you're fearless, and then you're
22:03no longer afraid to die, and then you can live and love with your hearts open.
22:07So I think the drawn towards that landscape is for that reason.
22:12Can I ask you a quick question?
22:13I'm scared.
22:15No, no, it's beautiful.
22:16Thank you for sharing that.
22:17That's really relevant, and it makes sense in your oeuvre, in your movies.
22:21And I've seen something that occurs in your early films is very often the sole character
22:27up against the sky.
22:28But in the new one, they're engulfed by trees, and there's a different type of magic.
22:35So are you developing into less scared of the open sky?
22:39I think so.
22:41I think the midlife crisis really helped.
22:43In my 30s, it's about that, horizontal, go as far wide as possible, like the pioneers.
22:48But in my 40s, it's about containing myself in a very strong structure and stillness, and
22:56not running away from myself.
22:58So I have nowhere else to go but descend into myself.
23:01The next chapter here, if we can, I'd like to talk about how you all work with actors.
23:07And I want to establish also out of the gate here, several of you, obviously, major 2025
23:12films with repeat collaborators.
23:15Ryan, Michael B. Jordan has been in at the center of every one of your films.
23:21And it's just, it's exciting to see you guys keep coming back together and bringing out
23:25the best in each other.
23:26And I wonder, how did you first begin working together, find each other, and why do you
23:30think it is such a great work, really?
23:33Yeah, yeah.
23:33So it was like really utilitarian, man.
23:37Like I needed somebody to play this real guy who existed, who was murdered a few years
23:42before we started filming, and I was really into like the fidelity of it, you know what
23:46I mean?
23:46Because this young man was executed on camera, you know?
23:49So people knew what he looked like, where I was from.
23:50And that was really the only place I figured it would play, was in Oakland, you know?
23:54And I come from a place that's real, we got a chip on our shoulder, you know?
23:57It's like a Brooklyn to San Francisco, but it's also like a little sibling to L.A., you
24:03know what I mean, for the California situation.
24:06So like authenticity means everything to us.
24:08And if I cast somebody who didn't look like Oscar Grant, I was dead, you know, I was dead
24:11in the water, you know?
24:12So I kind of narrowed it down.
24:14And Mike was one of the guys, and I started to look at his work with a critical eye, and
24:20it was just obvious to me that this dude was like a movie star.
24:22You know, he was in movies, kind of he'll be like the third lead, or he's in a TV show,
24:26kind of in a supporting role.
24:28But he would find a way to be the person that people remembered, you know, no matter where he
24:31was at, and then I wrote the screenplay, went to the Sundance Screenwriters Labs, where
24:35I met.
24:35Same year, 2012, right?
24:36And Joachim was our advisor, so I met this genius.
24:41I was a confused kid, and you guys were so good, so how could I be an advisor?
24:45No, no, no, no, no, no.
24:45Sorry, no, that was an honor.
24:47It was an honor.
24:47They played us Oslo, and everybody was like, pfft.
24:50I remember.
24:50And like, you know, ran to him for advice.
24:52Yeah.
24:52And my movie was set over the course of 24 hours, like his movie was, so I was soaking
24:57up all the advice he gave out.
24:58And yeah, like I sat with him, we were from 3,000 miles away, you know, roughly the same
25:04age, I'm about a year older than Mike, and we just clicked, you know?
25:08And then we got on set, and he was masterful, you know, got a lot of God-given talent, and
25:13God made him look how he looks, you know what I'm saying?
25:14He can't have no control over that.
25:16He hit the lot over there, but he just works, and he's very selfless.
25:20We make a great set, you know what I mean?
25:22Everybody's going to be respected.
25:23He knows everybody's name, from the PA to the producer.
25:25You know, he's just, this is how he was raised, you know, when you find somebody and it works
25:29like that, you know, you don't want to let it go.
25:31And the story I never told anybody, for how we got linked up on Creed, it was while we
25:35were, we were doing chemistry reads for Fruitville, and I got a call to go meet with Stallone
25:40and pitch him.
25:42And, you know, Stallone's agent was like, hey, yo, you got to be here.
25:44I'm like, yo, I'm in, I'm in auditions for this movie.
25:47He's like, what's that movie?
25:47Hey, man, you got to be here or it ain't going to happen.
25:49So I had to explain to Mike that I had to leave the auditions, you know, and I needed him to
25:52hold it down while I left, and he's like, yo, where are you going?
25:55I'm like, I'm going to go, I might make a Rocky movie.
25:57And he's like, yo, if you put me in the movie, you can go.
26:00So I didn't think it was going to happen.
26:02We shook hands right there.
26:03All right, you can play in this movie if it goes, you know, but that's how it, that's
26:06how it happened for me.
26:06That's amazing.
26:07That's good.
26:08Door is only open for a split second, and he knew to go through it.
26:13Yeah, exactly.
26:14And Yorgos, you and Emma, how do you explain that?
26:17We just met, and it was obvious from the beginning that, you know, we got along, and
26:22we worked together on The Favourite, and that was a great experience.
26:26From then on, we just kept building on that, and there was a lot of trust between us, and
26:31we became, you know, very close friends, and she's become a producer in the films because
26:36it was just a natural thing.
26:38Like, I wanted to run everything by her, and I trust her sensibilities and taste and thoughts
26:44about, you know, the entirety of the film and the production.
26:47So it just became a natural thing, and, you know, we're creating, like, a bigger group
26:53around us that involves crew as well that comes back, and other actors that also, you
26:58know, we keep working with, and it just becomes like a theater troupe, like, traveling around
27:03making films in various places.
27:06And to you, Jim and Joachim, is it something that you just know at the minute you start
27:11working with Sigourney or Renata?
27:13I mean, Renata literally was one line in Oslo, and then you write the next movie for her.
27:20Yeah, she was in Oslo August 31st, and because I'm obsessed with light, and we were waiting
27:27for the transitional light every morning for eight days, and then shot something else for
27:31the rest of the day, she was actually on set for nine days or something altogether with
27:34that one line.
27:36And I felt so safe around her.
27:37You know, I could give her a task.
27:38She was kind of a character that I was hanging out with the main character throughout the
27:42night, and I gave her a task in bicycling around or hanging out at the party, and I would
27:46look at the rushes coming back, and everything she does is interesting.
27:50She makes a great choice.
27:50I didn't really direct her much, but she was just a human being living in the background
27:55there.
27:55And then I thought, she'll be a great star, and then she got all these roles in theater,
28:00but no one cast her for lead parts in movies, so I wrote her worst person in the world,
28:04and that's it.
28:05And I'm just grateful she wanted to do the work.
28:08I mean, it's not just, we'll say, in the connecting from many years up to Avatar movies
28:15at Sigourney, but there's obviously years with Arnold.
28:18Bill Paxson, I worked with a number of times, Arnold, Lance Henriksen, and the principals
28:22in Avatar have now worked with three times.
28:25I was terrified of Sigourney before I met her.
28:28She was Ripley, you know, and I had written this part.
28:31I just prayed that she liked the script, which she did.
28:34But, you know, I think it's an issue of trust and respect, bi-directional, and you want to
28:41be trusted by the actor, you want to be respected by the actor, but it's earned, you know, and
28:46I trust and respect the actors that I love to work with now.
28:52I mean, when Avatar went out and became this huge thing, it was like, well, do I really
28:57want to go back into that and have that hang over my head, you know, indefinitely?
29:02And I thought, well, yeah, but they're great people.
29:05They're really lovely people, and they're so vivid, you know, just in what they're able
29:11to create and what Zoe can do, what Sam can do, and Sigourney, I brought her back from
29:16the dead.
29:16I wrote a whole other character for her, you know, and it has a troupe kind of feeling to
29:24it, very much, like, almost like an old radio theater troupe.
29:28And the thing that's lovely about performance capture is people can play other characters.
29:33Like, if Zoe got bored on the first film, she'd just play somebody else for a scene.
29:38Wow.
29:39Oh, that's brilliant.
29:40That's great.
29:41Yeah, and Kate did that, too.
29:43If she didn't have any lines or a moment in a scene, she'd just play somebody else.
29:48So I think Kate's got about three characters, and I think Zoe's got three or four.
29:53That's amazing.
29:55But we also have this actual troupe, where we call them the troupe, and I call them the
30:01Swiss Army Knife, jack-of-all-trades kind of actors, because they might play an old man
30:05one day, or a boy the next day, you know, a male warrior the next day, and they can do
30:12anything, you know, and they're just constantly changing hats, changing characters, and it's
30:16very egalitarian, because, you know, when you're on a movie with a big movie star, everybody
30:20knows when it's time for Tom Cruise's close-up, and the world kind of stops while everything
30:25gets ready.
30:26But in performance capture, we're just capturing the authenticity of the moment.
30:31between human beings, and we figure out all the coverage later.
30:34That's all later.
30:36I can't imagine that.
30:37There's no close-up, baby.
30:40So everybody's kind of equal.
30:41With your performance capture, you can subsequently change the entire angle of the shot, or the
30:48type of shot, and everything.
30:49We're not doing shots.
30:50We're doing performance.
30:52And so it exists.
30:53It's more like theater rehearsal, almost.
30:55There's no audience there.
30:57It feels like rehearsal.
30:58You can stop, you can start, you can change, you can move around, but you're focusing in
31:03on that.
31:05It's the thing we do.
31:06We try to find the authenticity of the scene.
31:08I actually use rehearsals to train actors to accept my gaze, because, you know, if you
31:14sit with your friends and you stare at them and feel them all the time, they think you're
31:17crazy.
31:18So I kind of find this kind of acceptance.
31:21And sometimes I step back, oh, I don't want to be in the way.
31:23But they see that I have a, it sounds cheesy, but a loving gaze.
31:27I cast them because I dig them.
31:28I really want them to do well and support them.
31:30And then I can be close.
31:32And I'm allowed to be there.
31:33So that's what rehearsal is.
31:34It's a fine line, isn't it?
31:35It's super.
31:36And sometimes it's almost like you see that they're dealing with shame, and you kind of pull
31:39back a little bit or something, if that's a part of the scene.
31:43But they all need something different, though.
31:45That's the crazy part.
31:46Of course they do.
31:47And I think, you know, we all instinctively key in to what the actor needs in the moment.
31:53That's a presence, or if that's, you know, get the hell out of the way.
31:56Absolutely.
31:57Well, I find, Chloe, you use methods that are not ones that I've heard often elsewhere.
32:03Why is I the weird one?
32:05No, I don't think it's, but I'd love to hear how you arrived at some of these decisions,
32:09particularly at Hamnet.
32:11Like, there's a scene where Jessie Buckley's lying by a tree with a baby that I believe
32:16she would have just given birth to, and you're essentially, like, cuddled up next to her,
32:21I guess, directing her from that position.
32:23So just building a different sort of close relationship with your actors than many others
32:29would, just how did you arrive at some of those techniques?
32:31I like the performance troupe, the circus analogy, so stand by for that one, because
32:38it is going to be weird.
32:40But I think that's where we come from.
32:42You know, nowadays, like, there's all these rules, and we have to follow, which is understandable.
32:49But at the same time, it's a very fine line, what we're going through in our own lives,
32:55and then what's happening as we do as performers, storytellers.
32:59So it's messy, and it's embodied.
33:03And so I went in digging in those four years of midlife crisis of somatic expressions and
33:10embodied creativity, and so to get out of my head and go into the subconscious.
33:15And so there were a couple of modalities, ancient modalities, old modalities that I pull out
33:23of mystery schools and Jungian psychology and to experiment in Hamnet.
33:30Hamnet was a big experiment to work from that place.
33:32So there's dream work, working with dreams, and it's very fun, the Jungian lineage.
33:37And we'll have that on set, and sometimes we would put 300 extras under, into a collective
33:45dream, right before we call action.
33:48And then there is tantric workshops, which is come to the Hindu tradition, and it's working
33:55with energies, and it's working with polarities.
33:58So we will get Paul and Jesse in a polarity workshop to see how much they can get into their
34:04gendered polarity to the extreme, and then let them clash into each other.
34:10So there's just different kinds of somatic exercises.
34:14So I don't rehearse the scenes, but I try to get them into this kind of, into their bodies
34:21and have them comfortable with each other, and to know here are the containers where we
34:27can go.
34:27And once the containers are really strong, then the water can go very deep.
34:31But that container is only strong and safe if it's embodied.
34:36Are you saying the container of the character itself, or the container that they're acting
34:40within?
34:40I think both.
34:41So once they are in their bodies, and they have experienced each other in the most polarized
34:47way, then it's a seed planted, including, let's say, you get a Shakespeare family, including
34:53the children, doing a dream work together.
34:55So they're kind of dropped into their subconscious, and then you guide them into a collective dream.
35:00It might not be useful in the moment, but I trust that when seed is planted in the subconscious
35:06and a chance to tap into the collective unconscious, then something bigger is going to be making
35:12this film through us, alongside with decisions we make consciously.
35:17But something bigger is going to come through in moments, usually when we need them most.
35:21Do you throw something in during the scene, or do you try to stay external to that container?
35:27Once the scene begins, we want to be as present as possible.
35:31I mean, you as director, are you saying, take that line again, or do this, or do that during
35:36the scene?
35:37Or are you letting that sort of alternate reality that you've created with them run its course?
35:42Usually it runs course, unless there's a line, there's a moment I knew I have to feed that
35:47line, it came out of me.
35:49I try to do these exercises myself to make sure my decisions are coming from the body, not
35:55from the mind.
35:55And if it's truly from the body, then I will shout it out.
35:59Don't we all want to go to each other's sets?
36:02No, I do!
36:04And just be very small.
36:05I'm loving everything, I'm hearing, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, man.
36:09Yeah, I want to.
36:10So, how transferable are these approaches that we've been talking about between sizes
36:18and scales?
36:19Do you feel, as a filmmaker, a huge difference when you're going, in terms of what you are
36:25having to do on a day-to-day basis, when you go from that small, small scale to, you
36:31know, Marvel?
36:32The biggest one is second unis.
36:33Like, that was a big one, and I'm like, they had to explain to me what it was, you
36:37know, like, hey, there's going to be another unit.
36:39And I'm like, wait, what?
36:42It's going to be a director, and it's like, I'm like, wait, wait, excuse me?
36:44And they're like, oh, yeah, they never really don't record sound.
36:46And I'm like, they don't have sound?
36:47Like, there's so much, you know, like, the size of these productions.
36:51So, I told them, I was like, I'm not doing a second unit.
36:54So, I'm like, I don't understand it, I'm not doing it.
36:57And I'm like, you know what?
36:58They say, well, what's your favorite action movies?
37:03So, I said, you know what?
37:04Terminator 2, right?
37:05I said, like, if Terminator 2 had a second unit, then I'll do it.
37:07And they come back and say, they come back.
37:10And they came back and they printed out the credits, bro.
37:15Pointed to it all, like, fuck.
37:17You know, so, but it was great, man.
37:19Like, I met my AD on Sinners with my second unit AD, and I learned a lot from those folks
37:26that work on those units, man.
37:28But that was the big one.
37:29You know, like, just the concept of, like, a whole nother, you know, a whole nother crew.
37:34In Panther 2, we had your underwater unit, like, walked off a way of water, like, one of us.
37:40So, it was all these methodologies that they were, like, hey, we do a breathe up right before.
37:44We got a screen here, and then, you know, and I had to learn how to get down at the bottom of the tank.
37:50So, you had Kurt Kroc doing the breathe up with the actors?
37:53I was like, oh, bro, they gave me the horror routine.
37:56They were good guys, yeah.
37:57And I'm like, man, what else did James do?
37:59He's like, man, the whole set's vegan.
38:00I was like, damn, I can't do that.
38:04And, Chloe, would you add your experience of going from the art house to Marvel?
38:10Just any, what was your, were you surprised by anything?
38:13I actually didn't feel the difference very much.
38:16I think because when you make film with $5 million in the desert with 27 people,
38:23without an AD, you know, you do everything yourself, it's extremely stressful.
38:29And then, so, at Marvel, when we did Eternals, it was like, wow, people are doing stuff for me,
38:35and things are taken care of, and then you ask for something that is there,
38:39people show up to work.
38:41It's great.
38:42But also, what happened, what my experience was that that 27 people stayed the same.
38:48I was going to say, there's an intimacy around the camera that doesn't change.
38:52Beyond that, there may be levels of extras and production and must-go lights and all that stuff.
38:59But there's an, I think it's the five people around the camera, the DP, AD, the principal actors in the scene.
39:07That intimacy never changes, no matter what's beyond that.
39:11And that's where our focus is anyway.
39:13I don't think scope makes size.
39:16You know, I think it's really the story.
39:17I mean, like, sentimental value is huge.
39:21It's just gigantic, you know.
39:23And so, it's really the story.
39:26And Fruitvale, oh my God, you know, I just...
39:30Impact.
39:31It's impact, it's story.
39:33That's where the size is.
39:34With these last three films, Heartlocker, Zero Dark Thirty, well, not the last three, but your trilogy.
39:40Heartlocker, Zero Dark Thirty, and A House of Dynamite.
39:42Making films that deal with the American military and government and all of that, segments of it have given you pushback.
39:48Is that a badge of honor?
39:51Would you have been happy if that hadn't happened?
39:53Well, I never anticipated it, necessarily.
39:56Yeah, I just think what's interesting is there's a conversation.
39:59Whether it's antagonistic or productive, there's a conversation.
40:03And that's, that was the intention of the film.
40:06And so, I feel, like, thrilled that, you know, we've arrived at that place.
40:11Jim, you've been the leading figure in the area of motion capture and 3D technology for...
40:16We say performance capture.
40:18Pardon me, performance capture.
40:19Is it being used as much as you would have expected when you embarked on this kind of revolution?
40:26It's very niche.
40:27It's very niche.
40:27It was, we never intended to revolutionize how movies are made.
40:30And if you can shoot something with a camera, I mean, there's nothing I love more than hand-holding with a camera in my hands.
40:36And a couple of actors and just, you know, it's that intimacy around the camera that I love.
40:42You know, performance capture is a means to an end to do a specific thing, which is quite niche.
40:46Performance capture is just a way to do makeup.
40:48It has to be recognizably the actor, but pushed a little bit into a slightly near-human character.
40:55So it has limited applications.
40:56If we hadn't made so much damn money with Avatar, I wouldn't be doing it.
40:59Yeah, interesting.
41:00I'm not trying to sell it to anybody else.
41:03Trust me, it's a nightmare.
41:05But it's fun.
41:06It's fun.
41:07I mean, it's a nightmare downstream, but the actual act of creation is a lot of fun.
41:11Because you're not worried about camera and dolly track and time of day and all the other things that you worry about.
41:16You've got to stamp that image, that sensor or that film plane, with the thing.
41:22You know?
41:22And you don't have to do that in performance capture.
41:25All you've got to do is just get the essence of the scene and you're good.
41:29And then you sort all the other stuff out later.
41:31And the actors love it for that reason.
41:33Because they don't have to hit marks.
41:35They don't have to worry about the lighting or how to turn or any of that sort of thing.
41:39Man, I'm just trying to think about how you're doing it.
41:41Like, are you taking notes on where you want to be when you watch it?
41:45You know how you'd line up maybe with a viewfinder or a video camera or however you kind of block your scene?
41:52Just do the same thing once with the virtual camera.
41:55You see where the characters are going to be.
41:57There's a waterfall there.
41:58There's a floating mountain up there.
41:59There's a creature over there.
42:00And then forget about it.
42:01And then I just jump in and I get right in.
42:03Like you say, get right in there, space.
42:06And after a while, it's like wildlife photography.
42:09They're used to the camera hide to the blind.
42:12They're used to me being there.
42:14You know, I try to be as, you know, tiny as possible.
42:18But I love it.
42:19Ryan, one thing that got a lot of attention was that with Centers, you made a deal that 25 years from now, the rights, the ownership will revert to you.
42:28What made you decide with this film to seek that?
42:32And is it something that you think will become more common going forward?
42:36Brilliant.
42:37Yeah, I can't speak to what's going to happen going forward.
42:40But what I will say about that is it was something that I looked to other filmmakers, you know, for.
42:46Like I'm constantly looking at what everybody else is doing to kind of find my way.
42:50I have a hard time leaping to a place that I haven't, you know, haven't at least seen somebody get to before, you know.
42:57And yeah, I knew it was something that was possible.
42:58You know, filmmakers that I know had done it and I was fortunate enough to have made some movies that had some financial success.
43:10This one, what I figured those things that bought me was the ability to write on spec, you know.
43:15And I was coming out of the, we were coming out of the collective strikes, the writer's year strike, the sad strike.
43:20And everything felt like existential.
43:23The conversations about cinema and are people still going to the movies, do young people go to the movies.
43:28You know, all these, all these things kind of, all of it, you know, it was all, it was, it was, you know, it still is a scary time.
43:33But it was a, it was a scary time when, when, when it felt like, man, this next movie I do might be my last, you know what I mean?
43:40And it being so much about capitalism as much as it is about anything and my people's relationship with it here in this country.
43:46Right.
43:46And my, my uncle was a sharecropper, like, like, like the, like the folks in the, in the, in the film who had been, you know, fucked over his whole life, you know, and I'm, and I'm telling his story.
43:54So, so it was one of those things where we, we, we went out with the, with the script and had a list of, of, of asks.
44:00And fortunately enough, like, like credit to the, to the, to the, to the, to the health of the business, a lot of studios were into it, you know, like, and that, that, that, that was, you know, heartwarming.
44:07And then terrifying once Warner Brothers said, all right, let's go.
44:10I didn't want to make them look stupid, you know.
44:12And if anybody like looks to, to me and what I did for, for motivation for something, I think that's, that's awesome.
44:18Cause I definitely looked around to, to, to Tyler Perry and M. Night Shyamalan and, and Quincy and, you know, and everybody else.
44:24So I'm constantly looking at what folks who did it before me are, are doing and how they navigate in certain things, you know, so I felt very fortunate.
44:31Sure.
44:31I want that deal.
44:3425 years from now.
44:35I'll be 96 if I make a movie next year and I get that deal.
44:43So, uh, I don't know what the fuck I'm going to do with it at the age of 96.
44:46But if you had that deal back then, at least you know you haven't.
44:49I might not even know what it is.
44:52But can you imagine if you had that deal when you made Avatar?
44:54I wish I had.
44:55So Chloe, you mentioned taking four years off.
44:59Uh, that was very understandable because almost overlappingly, but released in back-to-back years were Nomadland and then Eternals.
45:07Yorgos, you have now made three in three years.
45:11There was 2023s, poor things, 2024s, kinds of kindness, and now Begonia.
45:16Uh, so I'd like to point that towards you two and just ask, what is the ideal amount of time between films for a filmmaker?
45:23I'm ready to take a break, as I've mentioned, and it has become a thing.
45:27He's taking a break from filmmaking.
45:29Which is like, I just want to go on holidays for, you know, a few months.
45:34It's going to last a week.
45:35Yeah, because, like, the last, I don't know, four or five years I haven't, like, I haven't stopped.
45:40And some of the films, like, almost overlapped.
45:43Like, when we're, I shot kinds of kindness when we're doing the VFX for poor things because I felt it was just too long and I didn't want to sit around.
45:52And we had this script, so I went, like, why don't we go and shoot it until, you know, the VFX is finished and then we can go and edit that one.
46:00And then Begonia, you know, I received that script and I got excited.
46:06And so when we went to Cannes to present kinds of kindness, we had already started prepping Begonia.
46:13So it's too intense.
46:16I wouldn't recommend it to anyone.
46:17At that point it felt very exhilarating.
46:19But, you know, after a long time, you know, doing it, you go like, I think, yeah, there should be some time in between films.
46:29So, yeah, I'm ready for that time now.
46:32Chloe was four years too long or just right?
46:36I think there's no, I don't have an answer to that because I think the internal landscape informed the external landscape.
46:43Meaning that I actually don't believe that stories, I choose the stories.
46:49I really do believe they choose me.
46:51You know, when whatever we're doing in our own lives and working on ourselves and when you become the right conduit, I believe story exists past, present, future way beyond us.
47:04I love the Australian Aborigines believe in the dream time, you know, that our reality is streamed into existence by the creator.
47:13So I like to think that I'm a conduit half of the time, like I can have intentions and interests and questions I want to ask the world.
47:22But then at the right moment in my life, I will be chosen to tell certain kind of stories.
47:28And that could be back to back.
47:29That could be every 12, how many years.
47:32But when that happens, synchronicity will start happening around me.
47:37It's clearly you're chosen.
47:39It has to be now.
47:40And then you can decide if you want to answer the call or not because it's not going to be easy.
47:45And so that's only until it gets to that point, I will leap.
47:49I find that there's a sense of it being received while you're making the film, that the film's telling you what it's supposed to be.
47:58I've sort of gotten to that place, especially on this last film, where I felt like it wasn't me imposing my will on the story.
48:09I can see that.
48:10Well, having seen the film.
48:12And Catherine, do you seem to relate to that?
48:14Yeah.
48:15No, no.
48:15I think what Chloe was saying about the film, the stories find you, you know, and then you're kind of incapable of not doing it.
48:22You know, there's something.
48:24Then it becomes a pull that's, you know, indomitable.
48:28I always go into the writing room with my dear friend Eskil Fugt.
48:32We made film scripts together.
48:33I directed six films.
48:35And I always have this idea of doing something a little bit more fancy or cool.
48:39And then something occurs.
48:41And then it's like, oh, okay, it's going to be this.
48:43And I'm always grateful for that, because I feel like my biggest anxiety is always going back to the blank page.
48:49And I don't develop.
48:50We write what we write that year, and then I make it.
48:53So that takes time also.
48:55And every time something happens, like I smash my knee up on the worst person in the world.
49:00It took them four years between.
49:01I had to learn to walk again.
49:02For this one, I had two kids.
49:04You know, like, so life.
49:05But I also make films about life, so I accept it.
49:08But I admire people who can, like, I always look to other people, like, oh, how do you develop all those things at once and stuff?
49:14But I seem incapable.
49:16Maybe I'll learn one more.
49:17You got to do it your way.
49:18Yeah.
49:19I think by now, that's what I do.
49:20You got to do it your way.
49:21Somewhere around that time, I was getting ready to work on this movie.
49:24I went to go see Andre 3000 do a flute, a flute concert.
49:29Yeah.
49:30And I'll never forget, like, it was in this place called The Cave in, like, Napa Valley where they did a jazz festival.
49:35He says, hey, me and my band, we're just a bunch of people that have our antennas way up.
49:40And we're going to play whatever comes to us in a moment.
49:43I was expecting to hear the album.
49:44You know what I mean?
49:44I was a little disappointed.
49:45But he says, we just have our antennas up high.
49:49And we're going to play whatever you guys give us, whatever his is.
49:52I thought about it, like, every day working on a movie was like, yo, I got to make sure that my antenna is up to catch, you know, to catch whatever, you know, whatever, whatever is around and whatever I'm responding to.
50:04But the antenna also has to be deep, like down within myself so I can know where I'm at, you know what I mean?
50:11And what I'm responding to.
50:13So, you know, that combination, you know, I thought about it all the time, you know.
50:19Oh, that's interesting.
50:20So the two most veteran members at this table are Jim and Catherine.
50:25You guys have been doing this the longest.
50:28You were married from 89 to 91.
50:30You made films together after that.
50:32We were married longer ago than half our lives.
50:35No, well, and then continue to make great films together, including, we mentioned Strange Days.
50:39We love working together.
50:40And I know that you guys have been very supportive.
50:43It's funny how your films always seem to come out in the same year.
50:47But I guess my question is, what is the biggest thing that you've each learned from the other?
50:53Oh.
50:55We're loving this.
50:56Can I jump?
50:57Of course.
50:58Authenticity.
51:00Catherine cannot do anything that's not authentic.
51:03It would drive you nuts to do something that wasn't authentic.
51:07Seriously.
51:08I mean, it's like not about, for you, I think it's evolved, to not be about pushing away that which is commercial.
51:16It's figuring out what's real in the world and then running that through your lens.
51:23And I look for that in my own work.
51:25I've seen you do it.
51:27I mean, we work together on film.
51:29But it's got to be real.
51:30Oh, that's very kind of you.
51:32No, but it can't be fake.
51:34It can't follow some formula, some alchemy that's imposed from without.
51:39It's utter authenticity.
51:42And that's the power of your films.
51:43Oh, thank you.
51:44I'm not saying I do it that way.
51:48Catherine?
51:49I think the desire to just reach as far as you possibly can.
51:56I mean, that really comes from Jim.
51:58You know, just a reach that seems both improbable and impossible.
52:02And yet, doable.
52:08You do it.
52:10Okay, so our last minute here.
52:12What is the most misunderstood film in your filmography that you would like people to go back and watch again?
52:18I think I heard you talk about yours, Joachim.
52:21What would it be?
52:22It would probably be a film I'm terribly proud of.
52:26It's called Louder Than Bumps.
52:27Yes.
52:27That I think I have, you know, I was working with Devin Druid, Jesse Eisenberg, Isabella Pair, and Gabriel Byrne.
52:32And I was doing a dream project about family, deeply personal.
52:36And it came after also August 31st.
52:37And I think people wanted me to do a repeat of that.
52:40And that kind of, and do you remember that year at Cannes we were there together?
52:44And we'd both done films in English language, and they were giving us hell about it.
52:48Do you remember this?
52:49Which, which one?
52:51You don't remember.
52:53Pat, we met at some party, and we were talking about, like, there was, like, it was, you know, you and me were both, we were all doing English language.
53:00It became a thing.
53:01And I think, I think we were a little bit hurt by it.
53:03Maybe not as much as me.
53:05Anyway, I'll get off my soapbox by saying I'm very proud of that film.
53:08For me, it was Strange Days.
53:09Oh, go ahead.
53:10Go ahead.
53:10Maybe.
53:11I would say Detroit.
53:13I don't know.
53:13It was such an important piece to me, anyway.
53:17And, you know, this horrible, horrible, horrible tragedy.
53:20And I don't know.
53:22I just think that was kind of misunderstood.
53:25People should take another look at Detroit, for sure.
53:28I was saying Strange Days because, you know, nobody went.
53:33I know.
53:34They just didn't show up.
53:35It's a great movie.
53:36I love it.
53:37I'm very proud of it.
53:38I produced it and co-wrote it.
53:39It's strange.
53:39Catherine directed it.
53:41And it's.
53:41That's the one who I bring up.
53:42I want to see it.
53:44What?
53:45Strange Days is what everybody brings up.
53:46When I'm with Angela, whenever your name will come up.
53:49Oh, Angela's so phenomenal.
53:51Yeah, everybody brings up.
53:52Yeah, Strange Days.
53:54Strange Days is wonderful.
53:55Mine is the most easy answer, Eternals.
53:57You know, I'm always learning, trying to be a better filmmaker.
54:00Right.
54:01Never say that any kind of film that's perfect or, you know, it doesn't need to be improved.
54:06And then, you know, will we ever ready?
54:09Sometimes maybe not.
54:10Always could be better.
54:11So, I've learned a lot.
54:13But I do feel that it was very much, for me, about a pantheon of gods, immortals, discussing the nature of humanity.
54:23And it was something like a Greek play.
54:25And I really wanted to talk about that.
54:28And there's a lot of passion, deep love for the film.
54:31But I thought that I don't say more, because whatever I say always gets misunderstood.
54:36Okay, last thing.
54:37And I will note, Charlie XCX declared that this past year there was Joachim Trier summer, right?
54:45This was hyping up this great filmmaker.
54:48Who is an up-and-coming filmmaker who you really admire and not at this table, somebody who you really similarly believe in and want to give a shout-out to?
54:58Joachim, as the namesake of this, you go first, please.
55:02She did mention a couple of other directors, too.
55:05Yes, yes, yes.
55:05PTA, amongst others, who I think is a genius.
55:07Yes, yes.
55:08But, okay.
55:09There's a Norwegian director called Dag Johan Haugirud, who won the Golden Bear this year.
55:15So, he's not a newcomer.
55:16He's made films longer than I have.
55:18And the world is discovering him at the moment.
55:20And he's made great films.
55:22I don't move in the festival circuits, right?
55:24No, I don't.
55:26I don't see people when they're just breaking.
55:29You know?
55:30I mean, I used to.
55:32I mean, I remember when David Lynch showed up.
55:34Oh, man.
55:35With Blue Velvet.
55:36Oh, my God.
55:38I mean, not lately.
55:38Okay.
55:39You're going to have somebody else.
55:40We'll go to Ryan.
55:42I got Boos Riley.
55:44Yes.
55:44You can't call him a newcomer.
55:46Yeah, we can just say somebody that deserves more attention than their guest.
55:49Yeah.
55:49You know, we're from the same area.
55:51Like, I ran into him getting coffee or how you, but he kind of, he kind of, like, got a sensei vibe.
55:58He's just an incredible storyteller and got a very deep point of view.
56:02So, I think, you know, I shot Boos out.
56:04Yeah, I mean, I'm having trouble thinking newcomer, but, like, I always think, like, someone who's now a very good friend, Kelly Reinhardt, her films don't get the attention, I think, that they deserve.
56:17Or, you know, I don't know the reason they feel, I guess, they might be too subtle, which is why they're so beautiful and fragile.
56:26And, you know, and there's other, like, Alita Orvacher I love.
56:30Oh, I shouldn't say Alita.
56:31Or Lucretia Martel.
56:34Yeah, I'm thinking of these women that, you know, make incredible films and they don't get the attention that we get, I guess.
56:41I always just say, Happy as Lazaro is one of the best films I've ever seen.
56:47Well, on behalf of The Hollywood Reporter and everybody watching, thank you guys all so much for making the time to do this and for these terrific films that we've been talking about.
56:55Really appreciate it.
56:57We did it!
56:59We did it!
57:17We did it!
57:29We did it!
57:32We did it!
57:33We did it!
Comments