“…
What’s
it been like for you, this entire process?
LOWERY: There’s been an intense learning curve, but
my entire career has been a learning curve of trying to figure things out and
learn new things and get better at what it is that I want to do. I’ve also always been hoping that the movies
I make get out to wider audiences, and one of the ways to do that to make a
“bigger” film. This has been sort of
like a culmination of what I’ve always wanted to do with my filmmaking, and
also just the next step in the process.
As crazy as it is, it also feels very natural because it’s what I’ve
been pushing towards. I’m sure there’s more
craziness around the bend that I have no idea what will happen. You just very quickly assess the lay of the
land for each film, and with this one in particular, you have certain
considerations like the scale of it and the budget of it and the people you’re
working with, but very quickly it all boils back down to the work itself. Which would be the same on a $12,000 movie as
it would be on a $50 million movie, I presume.
I don’t know, I haven’t gotten there yet.
When
you first came up with the idea, when you’re first doing it, how much changed
along the way to the genesis to what ends up on screen?
LOWERY: The one thing that’s always stayed the same
is that shot of Casey [Affleck] walking out of the woods after breaking out of
prison. That was the very first version
of the script ever, which was a completely different movie, still had that shot
in there. It started off because I had
made this very tiny feature called St. Nick that had no dialogue and was very
quiet and very subdued, and in the interest of doing something different I
would do an action film next. I started
to write an action movie, and that did not get finished, but the seeds of it,
which involved a guy breaking out of jail, fed their way into this script.
I think the first draft of it ended with
everyone dying. Other than that, it’s
pretty close to the initial version. All
of the ideas and creative instincts are still very much in tact. It was funny, when we were shooting, I went
back and looked at that first draft where everyone died at the end and I was
like, “That’s not too bad.” A lot has
changed and I spent a year working on it, but it’s still the same movie on a
very intrinsic level.
…
When
you showed it at Sundance to what’s being released, did you make any changes?
LOWERY: I cut about eight minutes out of it, plus two
minutes out of the credits which were egregiously long. It’s ten minutes shorter altogether. I hope people who have seen both versions
can’t really tell what’s different about it.
I felt there was a point when I was making these changes and I showed
one of my producers and he didn’t know what was different. I felt that once I got past that litmus test,
we’re on the right path. Everything was
working within the movie, I just thought it could be a little tighter. There’s some material we put back in. In some parts it’s longer, there’s a little
bit more dialogue here and there.
There’s one scene I cut out, that to this day I’m like, “Why did I cut
that out? That should still be in
there!” It didn’t slow things down too
much, but I’ll always regret one thing or another, so I’m happy it’s just that
thing.
…
You’re
an editor also. I’m sure you’ve killed a
lot of babies along the way. When were
you cutting for Sundance, was it a rush to get it in, and then you showed it to
the audience and it was like, “Oh, I see where it’s not working now” or “I see
where I could do better?”
LOWERY: As an editor, in my head I was prepared for
all the pitfalls I might have working on this film. I was perhaps at first too egregious about
killing the darlings and murdering those babies, because I was just like, “Oh,
this doesn’t work. Cut it out, cut it
out, cut it out, cut it out.” I was
cutting things left and right, and the editors I was working with were like,
“Hold on, we just haven’t gotten it right yet!
You don’t need to cut it out!” I
was like, “You’re right.” We were down
to the wire. We were shooting in October
still, and we showed a cut to Sundance in the very beginning of November and
got in. We found out we got in at
Thanksgiving, and then realized we still had a lot to do. We were definitely down to the wire, trying
to get it done. We cut our sound mix in
half to have more time in the editing room, and because we did that we knew we
would go back to our sound mix afterwards and reopen the movie and that we
would have a chance to address we felt like we might want to address as far as
the edit goes. Watching it at the Echols
for the first time was really the first time we saw it with an audience. We did two friends and family screenings just
to see it projected while we were editing.
The Echols was the first time to really watch it. You instantly see things, you read the room,
you see how things are going, you see things you maybe want to tweak or change. Then I spent about two months just not
looking at it at all, and that was really helpful as well, because in that time
I could digest those feelings and get over and take some time away from the
movie, which I’ve not done at all since before we started shooting. Then go back and reassess things and see how
they look, and at that point you start to rework with it and dig back into the
movie, and find the things that needed to be addressed. That was really a wonderful luxury to have,
to do that and have the support of IFC who had bought it were already happy
with it to let me go mess with it some more.
Then we got into Cannes, and once again it was a mad dash to get it done
in time. We weren’t on any particular
ticking clock until all of a sudden we found out that we were going to show
there. It was like, crap, we got to
finish this movie in a hurry again!
…
Film
or digital, and why.
LOWERY: I think it depends entirely on the
project. Digital is my safety net. I
know how to use it, how to operate those camera, it makes sense to me. Film is much more mysterious. There’s a rigor to it that I need other
people to help me with. I had to sit down
with the bond company and explain why we had to shoot this movie on film. It’s such an abstract at this point, because
digital is so good and of such high quality that you have to speak in
abstractions such as, “It really just feels right.” You’re saying, “Every single frame, the grain
structure is slightly different and that means something on a very intrinsic and
hard to define level.” Whereas with
digital, every thing’s going to be exactly the series of ones and zeroes, and
the light responds the same way in each frame.
You have to decide whether or not each project needs that ephemeral
quality that film at this point can provide.
I love digital. There’s a movie
that I’m writing right now that I have already that this is a movie I’m going
to shoot in digital, but I hope the choice remains. There are some stories — not even stories,
some feelings — that you can’t
accomplish in cinema without using cellulite. I’m sure it’ll all
change. I’m sure digital will advance,
continue to advance. For the time being,
as much as I love it, I’m not just going to embrace for every movie. I hope to
embrace both.
…
LOWERY: An agent at William Morris read it, and he
asked, “Can I sign you?” I was like,
“Let’s talk about that later.” He was
like, “Can I send this out to some of our actors? Aside from me wanting to go for a deal, can
we try to get this to some of the actors?”
He asked who I would be interested in, and I gave him a few ideas, and
Casey was one of those, but for the character of Ruth, I thought that I would
find an unknown actress. Then Rooney’s
agent asked if we could send it to her, and that was sort of a lightning strikes
moment, because The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo had just opened a few weeks
prior. She was someone who I thought was
a tremendous actress from the three films of hers I had seen, but I couldn’t
tell you what she looked like in person or what she really looked like, because
every role was so different. I was
really excited about the idea. We sent
the script out, I wrote a little note to each actor, and we sent it out with my
short film Pioneer. I think it was the
combination of that short film and the script that got them excited about
it. Also, just their personalities. They all like that type of material and
wanted to tell that type of story, and then conveniently had a window of
opportunity in which they could all do it.
It was all a serendipitous combination of right material, right time,
and them taking a chance on me.
I’m
sure I have to wrap up in about a second, so let me just ask you with the stuff
you’re writing now, are you envisioning more indie? More Hollywood actors? What are you thinking about for the future?
LOWERY: It’s a little bit of both. You always want your movies to reach the
widest audience possible. Some of the
things I’m writing right now — a great way to get things out to audience is to
use actors they recognize. Right now I’m
writing things with people in mind, I’m writing something I want to do with
Casey again. The are other ideas I have
where maybe the right approach is to go make another $30,000 movie with nobody
it. It’s more personal, it’s more
risky. I don’t want to spend someone
else’s money on something that might never make it back. The riskier it is, the better I think it is
to spend less money on it. It just
depends on the movie. I really hope I’m
lucky enough to continue making a living off of this, but I also don’t want to
limit myself to one thing. The $12,000
movie I made before this one, the feature, I love that movie. I think it’s a great film. I had such a good time making it, and I think
I would love to do another movie like that as well.”
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