WEBVTT - Ep70 - Aaron Katz / "Gemini" 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:16.840 M m m m. You're listening to Playback a Variety 0:00:16.880 --> 0:00:20.279 I heart radio podcast. I'm your host, Variety Awards editor 0:00:20.360 --> 0:00:23.440 Chris Tapley. Today I'm talking to director Aaron Katz about 0:00:23.440 --> 0:00:26.200 his new film Gemini, is the latest in a string 0:00:26.239 --> 0:00:29.400 of independent works including Cold Weather and land Ho and 0:00:29.440 --> 0:00:32.440 he's uniquely qualified to talk about the state of independent cinema. 0:00:32.520 --> 0:00:34.080 So we get into that and a whole lot more 0:00:34.680 --> 0:00:37.040 coming to you this week from my garage. That's right, 0:00:37.120 --> 0:00:41.280 my garage. We keep it chill here sometimes, so sit tight. 0:00:41.520 --> 0:01:02.040 This is playback your Speed fan. I love Speed. Um, 0:01:02.080 --> 0:01:04.480 it's funny. I'm so used to seeing Speed. We have 0:01:04.520 --> 0:01:07.720 an ex rental copy and a clamshell. Uh. And so 0:01:07.800 --> 0:01:10.840 you my copy of Speed like sticks out farther because 0:01:10.840 --> 0:01:14.640 it's as it should because it's a larger case. And uh, 0:01:14.920 --> 0:01:17.560 I always look. I love getting rental copies because you 0:01:17.600 --> 0:01:21.960 get more trailers on the rentals. Oh yeah, I guess, um, 0:01:22.800 --> 0:01:24.240 like the cell through stuff would just go to the 0:01:24.240 --> 0:01:27.440 movie usually. Yeah. Like h So I feel like on 0:01:27.520 --> 0:01:31.039 rental copies, some especially like Mirormax and Dimension films from 0:01:31.040 --> 0:01:34.280 the nineties have so many trailers. Remember I watched I 0:01:34.319 --> 0:01:37.040 watched Swingers the other day, and it's got like all 0:01:37.080 --> 0:01:41.360 the dimension slate, all the trailers. It's fun because half 0:01:41.400 --> 0:01:43.440 the movies are things start like fun things you've heard of, 0:01:43.480 --> 0:01:47.120 and half it's like, what the hell is this? Some 0:01:47.200 --> 0:01:50.560 of it makes me want to go find it? Definitely, 0:01:53.240 --> 0:01:56.960 I think we're set. Let's dive in. Okay, everybody, I'm 0:01:57.000 --> 0:02:01.760 here with Aaron Katz, the writer and direct an editor 0:02:01.960 --> 0:02:06.400 actually and editor of Gemini. Thanks for coming on the show. 0:02:06.480 --> 0:02:10.440 Thanks for having me. I've invited Aaron into my den 0:02:10.480 --> 0:02:13.440 of excess. I guess there's a lot to look at 0:02:13.520 --> 0:02:18.120 the air episode. Uh, As I said, Aaron directed a 0:02:18.120 --> 0:02:19.960 film called Gemini, which is in theaters right now. You 0:02:19.960 --> 0:02:21.600 can check it out. I wanted to make sure we 0:02:21.639 --> 0:02:23.560 got him in here while it's still in theaters because 0:02:23.600 --> 0:02:25.079 I love it. And if there is an air of 0:02:25.120 --> 0:02:28.239 familiarity about this episode, that will be because Aaron and 0:02:28.320 --> 0:02:31.200 I go back. We were in college together. So yeah, man, 0:02:31.200 --> 0:02:33.280 thanks for coming on the show. How you doing doing 0:02:33.280 --> 0:02:35.560 pretty good? I mean, come on, give me more than that. Well, 0:02:35.560 --> 0:02:39.160 I'm doing great. Looking at your VHS collection, it's just 0:02:39.480 --> 0:02:43.000 appreciating your copy of Sliver, which has a special significance 0:02:43.000 --> 0:02:46.320 to Gemini because just a few days before we started 0:02:46.320 --> 0:02:51.480 shooting Lola Cark, who who's the star of Gemini, and 0:02:51.639 --> 0:02:53.920 uh Andrew Reid, our director of photography, who also went 0:02:53.960 --> 0:02:56.760 to school with us in North Carolina, we all watched 0:02:56.800 --> 0:02:59.040 Sliver together. None of us had seen it before, but 0:02:59.120 --> 0:03:01.000 we thought it would be a good one to watch 0:03:01.120 --> 0:03:04.000 to just kind of immerse ourselves in the mindset of 0:03:04.520 --> 0:03:10.760 eighties and nineties. Esther House thriller world. You've read his book? No, 0:03:10.960 --> 0:03:13.120 I've never read it. I that's high on the list. 0:03:13.639 --> 0:03:15.240 Hang on a minute, I'm gonna leave this on the 0:03:15.280 --> 0:03:19.880 show alright, just so everyone understands. What do we got? 0:03:21.760 --> 0:03:24.480 I know, Dead Silence works on on radio very well. 0:03:25.240 --> 0:03:31.000 Oh yeah, I mean Esther House hates Hollywood. Um, question 0:03:31.040 --> 0:03:33.280 is do you No? I don't hate Hollywood. I mean 0:03:33.320 --> 0:03:35.720 there's a lot to hate in Hollywood, a lot of 0:03:35.760 --> 0:03:38.640 things that are depressing, but there's a lot of wonderful things. 0:03:38.640 --> 0:03:40.440 I mean, one of the reasons to make this movie 0:03:40.480 --> 0:03:46.280 is to confront my conflicted feelings about it and too 0:03:47.600 --> 0:03:50.480 sort of live in the tradition of of movies and 0:03:50.520 --> 0:03:53.040 books that both celebrate and have a lot of trepidation 0:03:53.040 --> 0:03:55.160 about Hollywood, but I think it's much more in the 0:03:55.200 --> 0:03:57.680 tradition of something like do every What makes Sammy Run 0:03:57.760 --> 0:04:01.520 by Budgetood, which is very very cynical about Hollywood, but 0:04:01.600 --> 0:04:05.880 also very uh loving towards it as well. And I 0:04:05.880 --> 0:04:07.960 would say that Gemini is less in the tradition of 0:04:08.080 --> 0:04:12.280 movies like um The Player or State in Maine, which 0:04:12.360 --> 0:04:16.680 just seemed to despise Hollywood and the entire purposes to 0:04:16.839 --> 0:04:20.480 satirize it. I look at those filmmakers Moment and Altman 0:04:20.680 --> 0:04:25.640 not exactly Hollywood types, not that you are, but yeah, 0:04:25.720 --> 0:04:29.600 you're right. Yeah, it's interesting though I've grown to appreciate 0:04:30.120 --> 0:04:35.440 more of the artistry of Hollywood filmmaking and and uh, 0:04:35.640 --> 0:04:38.800 not to get in too deep on on our past, 0:04:38.839 --> 0:04:41.240 but we were in a screenwriting class together and our 0:04:41.279 --> 0:04:47.680 tastes differed pretty wildly at that time, and uh, as 0:04:47.760 --> 0:04:51.400 time has gone on, I've grown to appreciate more of 0:04:51.400 --> 0:04:53.440 the things. I think you probably would have liked and 0:04:53.440 --> 0:04:56.280 appreciate it at that time. And you know, looking back 0:04:56.360 --> 0:04:58.800 at the things that inspired Gemini. You know, I already 0:04:58.800 --> 0:05:01.680 mentioned Esther House, but all so, you know, more broadly, 0:05:02.160 --> 0:05:05.039 eighties and nineties thrillers like Curtis Hanson stuff. I'm talking 0:05:05.080 --> 0:05:07.160 pre l a confidential stuff like The Hand that Rocks 0:05:07.160 --> 0:05:10.680 the Cradle and Bad Influence, and those films at the 0:05:10.800 --> 0:05:15.080 time were regarded as I don't not exactly be pictures, 0:05:15.120 --> 0:05:18.240 but movies that weren't to be taken seriously as art. 0:05:18.560 --> 0:05:20.400 And looking back at them, I think many of those 0:05:20.400 --> 0:05:23.320 movies are elegant and like just as good as anything 0:05:23.360 --> 0:05:27.400 and should be should get perhaps more respect than they 0:05:27.440 --> 0:05:32.520 do as as um really great artists working. I think 0:05:32.520 --> 0:05:36.000 the industry term for those might be an entertainment, you know, 0:05:36.200 --> 0:05:39.560 just dismissively, that's just an entertainment. Yeah, But I think 0:05:39.560 --> 0:05:41.160 that I think that's just the wrong way to think 0:05:41.200 --> 0:05:43.359 about it. And maybe it's hard to see in the moment, 0:05:43.480 --> 0:05:46.760 you know, when you know critics are grinding through their 0:05:46.800 --> 0:05:49.400 weekly slate of stuff, it's hard to see that like 0:05:49.839 --> 0:05:52.239 Bad Influence, which is of course shot by Robert Ellswoit, 0:05:52.320 --> 0:05:54.320 as where many of the Hanson films of that era, 0:05:54.880 --> 0:05:59.560 is like a beautiful, restrained esthetic exercise and has a 0:05:59.640 --> 0:06:03.080 credit rely fun performances from James Spader and Rob Low, 0:06:03.240 --> 0:06:05.760 and like hard to Do It Better. You can't make 0:06:05.760 --> 0:06:08.000 that kind of film any better in my opinion, And uh, 0:06:08.200 --> 0:06:09.520 I don't know if I bet, I've got a lot 0:06:09.560 --> 0:06:12.640 of two and a half star reviews at that time. Yeah, uh, 0:06:12.680 --> 0:06:15.200 this movie, Jem and I I loved it. It's probably 0:06:15.200 --> 0:06:19.440 my favorite one you've made so far. What struck me 0:06:19.480 --> 0:06:21.039 about it? What I wanted to talk to you about? 0:06:21.040 --> 0:06:22.280 You kind of just started to get into it a 0:06:22.279 --> 0:06:26.800 little bit. There's more style, more swagger in this movie 0:06:27.040 --> 0:06:30.520 than your previous movies. Certainly it's a movie with the 0:06:30.640 --> 0:06:33.760 d n A of you, uh just in terms of, 0:06:33.839 --> 0:06:36.640 you know, the interactions between your two actresses and stuff 0:06:36.680 --> 0:06:39.159 like that. There's a very real world feel to it. 0:06:39.160 --> 0:06:40.920 But there's also just you know, just from that opening 0:06:40.920 --> 0:06:42.720 shot of upside down palm trees, which I thought was 0:06:42.760 --> 0:06:46.599 kind of amazing, just an easy, simple idea that put 0:06:46.680 --> 0:06:48.800 you on edge immediately and kind of put you in 0:06:48.800 --> 0:06:52.400 a frame of mind. Along with this kind of swinging 0:06:52.760 --> 0:06:55.400 not swinging, but like the score from Kegan de Witt 0:06:55.560 --> 0:07:00.960 is like this jazzy, uh cool, you know vibe, and 0:07:01.000 --> 0:07:03.080 obviously that adds to the atmosphere. So what what I want, 0:07:03.160 --> 0:07:04.760 what I wanted to talk to you about was what 0:07:04.960 --> 0:07:09.160 brought that on I guess, I mean, what brought the 0:07:09.200 --> 0:07:12.600 intent to put more style into this movie than maybe 0:07:12.600 --> 0:07:16.800 you have in other films. I've gotten very interested in 0:07:18.000 --> 0:07:22.280 making films that have this sort of h bigger scope 0:07:22.360 --> 0:07:27.040 of of of visual elegance, I hope is what we achieve, 0:07:27.280 --> 0:07:31.120 and it really has to do with the fact that I, 0:07:31.240 --> 0:07:33.640 as I was alluding to earlier, I've come to appreciate this, 0:07:33.800 --> 0:07:37.600 this style of studio filmmaking, and I really enjoy the structures, 0:07:37.600 --> 0:07:40.400 the rhythms, the look of some of those movies, and 0:07:40.480 --> 0:07:42.800 so on this one, what I wanted to do was 0:07:44.000 --> 0:07:46.520 use a lot of that and really celebrate the tradition 0:07:46.520 --> 0:07:50.600 of that, and then populated with characters who h have 0:07:50.760 --> 0:07:52.840 a foot in the world of the you know, the 0:07:52.920 --> 0:07:55.360 narrative that's from that structure, and a foot in the 0:07:55.360 --> 0:07:58.040 world of some of my past movies, which allow more 0:07:58.160 --> 0:08:00.600 space to you know, examine who these people are and 0:08:00.640 --> 0:08:03.760 treat them as people who are um, you know, real 0:08:03.880 --> 0:08:06.440 living people alive in the here and now and and 0:08:06.520 --> 0:08:10.880 um not just engines for the narrative. You said you 0:08:10.880 --> 0:08:12.760 guys took a look at Sliver. I mean, do you 0:08:12.840 --> 0:08:16.720 tend to take a look at another movie do you 0:08:17.120 --> 0:08:19.680 in terms of establishing like a visual aesthetic, do you 0:08:19.720 --> 0:08:23.720 look at artwork or anything like that to help dictate, 0:08:23.760 --> 0:08:27.080 like specifically on this one, what was driving the aesthetic 0:08:27.120 --> 0:08:29.800 you had in mind inspirationally, I don't know if there 0:08:29.840 --> 0:08:32.880 was any one movie, but we were pretty immersed in 0:08:33.000 --> 0:08:38.360 watching h maybe starting with the early eighties. I really 0:08:38.360 --> 0:08:40.959 think of like Body Heat and American Juggalo was kicking 0:08:40.960 --> 0:08:44.240 off a new era, new style of thriller. You look 0:08:44.240 --> 0:08:45.800 at the stuff from the late seventies and it has 0:08:45.840 --> 0:08:48.800 a really different vibe, and I feel like these sort 0:08:48.840 --> 0:08:52.160 of um uh yeah, I think people would say in 0:08:52.160 --> 0:08:57.280 some ways more commercial uh types of thrillers uh started 0:08:57.320 --> 0:09:00.920 around that time. But I really we were just watching 0:09:00.920 --> 0:09:04.360 a ton of those movies, um, blow Out as another one, 0:09:04.640 --> 0:09:06.760 and you know, even stuff you know through the mid 0:09:06.800 --> 0:09:10.040 to late nineties like Wild Things and Poison Ivy. I 0:09:10.080 --> 0:09:14.160 guess that's ninety two. Uh cruel intentions like obviously those 0:09:14.160 --> 0:09:16.240 are a bit more on the salacious end of the spectrum, 0:09:16.320 --> 0:09:19.040 but we really, I would say, we're just immersing ourselves 0:09:19.080 --> 0:09:21.360 in this world, and a lot of those movies have 0:09:21.360 --> 0:09:28.360 have a very um, glossy aesthetic. Uh, And so we 0:09:28.440 --> 0:09:31.520 wanted to have fun with that um and yeah, it 0:09:31.520 --> 0:09:33.600 felt pretty inspired by that. And then also I would 0:09:33.600 --> 0:09:36.920 say a little bit by like early Hong Kong action cinema, 0:09:36.960 --> 0:09:42.200 and especially A Better Tomorrow, which you know, John Wu 0:09:42.559 --> 0:09:45.560 came to be known for such excess and Better Tomorrow 0:09:45.600 --> 0:09:49.079 definitely is indulgent, but it's very restrained, and I think 0:09:49.080 --> 0:09:51.600 it's just a great film about a city at night. 0:09:51.679 --> 0:09:53.760 And so in some ways we wanted to make our 0:09:53.800 --> 0:09:55.760 own great film about a city at night and felt 0:09:55.920 --> 0:09:59.400 inspired to do that maybe more than like, you know, 0:09:59.520 --> 0:10:02.520 taking looking at an aesthetic and trying to recreate it. 0:10:02.600 --> 0:10:05.959 Sure that idea though, of watching a bunch of movies 0:10:06.000 --> 0:10:09.040 immersing yourself and that do you do you feel like 0:10:09.120 --> 0:10:11.079 reticent at all in the midst of that, that you 0:10:11.200 --> 0:10:14.760 might subconsciously even start to lift this or that in 0:10:15.000 --> 0:10:17.319 ways that maybe you didn't want to. You know, I 0:10:17.400 --> 0:10:20.640 asked this question a lot, what what drove, what inspired 0:10:20.679 --> 0:10:22.120 the look or whatever? Did you look at films? And 0:10:22.120 --> 0:10:23.960 a lot of time filmmakers are quick to say I 0:10:23.960 --> 0:10:26.000 didn't want to watch another movie because I didn't want to, 0:10:26.240 --> 0:10:28.319 you know, which sometimes I think is kind of bullshit. 0:10:28.559 --> 0:10:30.520 I get what they're saying, like, I wasn't out to 0:10:30.559 --> 0:10:34.240 copy somebody, but I think that being inspired by movies 0:10:34.360 --> 0:10:37.120 is part of the game, right. So But that having said, 0:10:37.120 --> 0:10:39.680 that's my question, do you feel any kind of trepidation 0:10:39.720 --> 0:10:44.679 about that? I don't really. I enjoy watching movies so uh, 0:10:44.880 --> 0:10:47.559 and I enjoy sort of immersing myself in a world. 0:10:47.679 --> 0:10:50.880 And I feel like if you're broad enough about it, 0:10:51.360 --> 0:10:54.160 like you watch a lot of movies from a certain genre, 0:10:54.720 --> 0:10:58.040 then it tends to all just be more general inspiration 0:10:58.400 --> 0:11:01.440 rather than let's lift this shot. And I think that, 0:11:01.840 --> 0:11:04.000 you know, it's funny. I think the only time we've 0:11:04.000 --> 0:11:08.680 ever lifted a shot directly was on Cold Weather. And 0:11:08.679 --> 0:11:10.680 it's not even a shot from a movie's cold cold 0:11:10.679 --> 0:11:13.880 weathers movie, you know, two movies ago and um, what's 0:11:13.920 --> 0:11:17.720 that Jason Statha movie where he is like a driver 0:11:17.960 --> 0:11:20.360 for like a bank heist? Uh now, I don't remember 0:11:20.400 --> 0:11:22.679 what this movie is called. It's like a very classy 0:11:22.679 --> 0:11:26.840 Stathum picture. Um, the bank job, the bank job, the 0:11:26.880 --> 0:11:29.559 bank job, the bank job. I think that's what it thinks, 0:11:29.600 --> 0:11:31.760 the bank job. Well, anyway, at the post, I get 0:11:31.760 --> 0:11:35.440 it confused with the wasn't there like the Italian Job. 0:11:35.480 --> 0:11:37.959 You can get confused with that. Yes, the Bank the 0:11:37.960 --> 0:11:39.880 Bank Job, the Bank Job ten years ago, so ten 0:11:39.960 --> 0:11:42.000 years ago. Yeah. The Bank Job has a really great 0:11:42.000 --> 0:11:44.280 poster which is just Jason Statham sitting in a car 0:11:44.400 --> 0:11:48.200 like looking over his shoulder, and it's so evocative of 0:11:48.240 --> 0:11:50.480 like waiting for the heist to happen, you know, with 0:11:50.520 --> 0:11:52.640 the title and that picture, it's like you don't see 0:11:52.760 --> 0:11:55.520 much beyond you know, just this guy's face. But it's 0:11:55.520 --> 0:11:58.400 a really amazing poster. So that's the only time we've 0:11:58.400 --> 0:12:01.320 ever that I've never seen that poster. It's you've ever 0:12:01.320 --> 0:12:04.319 seen like the DVD poster you talk about this, right, Yeah, yeah, exactly. 0:12:04.320 --> 0:12:07.280 That's got a throw that's really cool. Uh. And so 0:12:07.440 --> 0:12:09.360 that's the only thing we've ever lifted directly. There's a 0:12:09.360 --> 0:12:11.760 shot in Cold Weather where um, one of the actor's 0:12:11.760 --> 0:12:13.720 trist is like waiting for someone to come out, and 0:12:13.760 --> 0:12:15.520 we were like, let's let's do the Bank Job poster 0:12:16.760 --> 0:12:18.160 because I think that movie was, you know, just a 0:12:18.240 --> 0:12:20.040 year or two old at that time, and people were like, 0:12:21.120 --> 0:12:24.280 let's let's do that. But other than that, uh, And 0:12:24.320 --> 0:12:25.800 I feel like that's a weird enough one that I 0:12:25.800 --> 0:12:29.959 don't mind admitting it. I know exactly. Yeah, no one's 0:12:30.000 --> 0:12:32.679 going to accuse me of stealing anything, but uh yeah, 0:12:32.800 --> 0:12:36.240 I I really feel like the other part of it 0:12:36.280 --> 0:12:39.880 is that, um, Andrew Reader, director of photography, and I 0:12:39.920 --> 0:12:43.240 tend to have these I wouldn't say conflicting ideas, but 0:12:43.360 --> 0:12:46.760 strong ideas about what we're gonna do. Uh that often 0:12:46.800 --> 0:12:49.240 we get into a place and start talking about it, 0:12:49.280 --> 0:12:52.599 and it's sort of naturally becomes this other idea, this 0:12:52.720 --> 0:12:55.280 third idea that neither of us had on our own. 0:12:55.280 --> 0:12:59.160 And so that tends to if anyone is overly um, 0:12:59.160 --> 0:13:02.240 thinking of something that already exists, we tend to evolve 0:13:02.320 --> 0:13:06.360 that into something else. Uh. Speaking of Andrew, you guys 0:13:06.400 --> 0:13:09.680 have been working together the whole time, right, Yeah, well 0:13:09.800 --> 0:13:11.640 four out of four out of the five. So he 0:13:11.720 --> 0:13:14.079 was actually still he graduated two years after than me, 0:13:14.080 --> 0:13:17.199 even though he's maybe a year older. But so he 0:13:17.280 --> 0:13:19.080 was the gaffer on Dance part of USA in my 0:13:19.120 --> 0:13:21.960 first film, not the DP, but ever since then he is. 0:13:22.440 --> 0:13:24.679 I mean I spoke to him for Quiet City. Actually 0:13:24.679 --> 0:13:26.040 I loved that movie. There was a great shot in 0:13:26.040 --> 0:13:28.920 that movie that I talked to him about that year. Uh, 0:13:29.400 --> 0:13:31.160 that's two thousand and seven. By the way, how does 0:13:31.160 --> 0:13:33.480 that feel You've been making movies for more than a decade? Aarond, 0:13:33.559 --> 0:13:37.640 it's pretty strange to, yeah, have made five movies and 0:13:37.720 --> 0:13:41.920 to have been doing it for this long. Um, I 0:13:41.960 --> 0:13:45.120 don't know, I don't know. I don't have a good 0:13:45.160 --> 0:13:46.559 answer for you. I'm gonna come back to that with 0:13:46.600 --> 0:13:49.080 a different question. But let's start with Andrew. How's that 0:13:49.120 --> 0:13:51.360 evolution been working with him? I mean I thought his 0:13:51.400 --> 0:13:53.280 work was a considerable step up on this movie. I 0:13:53.320 --> 0:13:56.720 mentioned the opening sequence and stuff. But you know, just 0:13:56.720 --> 0:13:58.719 talk about the evolution of working with this guy, and 0:13:58.720 --> 0:14:01.240 and and is it important for you to maintain consistency 0:14:01.240 --> 0:14:04.160 with the DP It is? I mean, in general, I 0:14:04.280 --> 0:14:08.040 like maintaining consistency and having creative relationships that extend over 0:14:08.120 --> 0:14:12.320 multiple movies. Um. And I think that it allows us 0:14:12.320 --> 0:14:14.800 to have this sort of common language with each other 0:14:15.040 --> 0:14:18.520 and shorthand and we know how each other work. Uh. 0:14:18.559 --> 0:14:21.760 And so you know we've evolved together over four movies, 0:14:22.160 --> 0:14:25.000 the first one of which you mentioned, Quiet City. Um, 0:14:25.080 --> 0:14:27.600 you know, we made that movie for two thousand dollars 0:14:27.680 --> 0:14:30.000 with no resources at all. We shot that on the 0:14:30.360 --> 0:14:36.000 h v X two hundred. Uh and I think there's 0:14:36.000 --> 0:14:37.640 things about that movie that look good. I think the 0:14:38.000 --> 0:14:41.239 it's the appropriate aesthetic for that movie. But it's very 0:14:41.480 --> 0:14:44.640 rough and tumble and and and low fi. And uh, 0:14:45.040 --> 0:14:47.680 you know, we we made the best of the resources 0:14:47.720 --> 0:14:50.680 we had. And and but as we've gone on we've 0:14:50.720 --> 0:14:55.440 had we've figured out how to uh, well a have 0:14:55.640 --> 0:14:58.000 more resources because the budgets have gotten bigger, but be 0:14:58.160 --> 0:15:01.160 really utilized those resources and really figure out how to 0:15:01.320 --> 0:15:05.240 make the most of them. Um. So yeah, we just 0:15:05.360 --> 0:15:07.680 on each film have tried to challenge ourselves and if 0:15:07.680 --> 0:15:09.640 we ever feel like something is too easy, we know 0:15:09.720 --> 0:15:13.640 there's something wrong. And especially in this case, when we 0:15:13.640 --> 0:15:16.720 were you know, wanting to live in the tradition I've 0:15:16.720 --> 0:15:19.080 been talking about of those thrillers from the eighties and nineties, 0:15:19.240 --> 0:15:22.280 really wanted to live up to how great we think 0:15:22.280 --> 0:15:25.880 some of those films are shot and to find ways 0:15:25.960 --> 0:15:29.040 to be really expressive about Los Angeles, a city that's 0:15:29.040 --> 0:15:31.800 been shot you know, more times maybe than any other city. 0:15:32.600 --> 0:15:35.240 Book to do it our way, to show how we 0:15:35.280 --> 0:15:38.280 saw the city, and to find visual ways that were 0:15:38.320 --> 0:15:40.960 striking and unique. Drill down on that, how do you 0:15:41.000 --> 0:15:44.400 see the city? Well? I guess it started maybe with 0:15:44.440 --> 0:15:47.760 that idea of a color palette, which is, when driving 0:15:47.800 --> 0:15:50.680 around Los Angeles at night, there's this contrast between the 0:15:50.680 --> 0:15:53.960 sera orangey glow of the street lights and and often 0:15:54.000 --> 0:15:56.400 there's clear, clear skies and a kind of a white 0:15:56.440 --> 0:15:59.600 blue glow from the moon. So that was our sort 0:15:59.600 --> 0:16:01.640 of star paraty aesthetic. And you see that a little bit, 0:16:01.720 --> 0:16:04.960 especially what we shot right around here. Uh So the 0:16:05.040 --> 0:16:07.360 characters go to an Italian restaurant right at the beginning 0:16:07.360 --> 0:16:10.080 of the movie, and there's a driving sequence after that, 0:16:10.720 --> 0:16:14.200 which we actually shot on the very last day. We 0:16:14.200 --> 0:16:16.720 were returning the equipment from we had shot some palm 0:16:16.760 --> 0:16:19.120 trees around my house and we're returning the equipment driving 0:16:19.120 --> 0:16:24.840 down Colorado and and um shooting shooting had the camera 0:16:24.880 --> 0:16:27.360 pointed out the window and shooting the parks and businesses 0:16:27.840 --> 0:16:31.480 at night, and yeah, you get this collection of neon 0:16:31.600 --> 0:16:34.040 lights and street lights and then the you know, when 0:16:34.080 --> 0:16:36.320 you hit a street that you're looking down, you know 0:16:36.320 --> 0:16:38.600 this this glow of the moon. And so that was 0:16:38.640 --> 0:16:41.320 kind of our starting place. And also it had to 0:16:41.360 --> 0:16:44.800 do with choosing the right locations and really choosing locations 0:16:44.840 --> 0:16:48.920 that spans an experience that we wanted to portray in 0:16:49.000 --> 0:16:51.560 Los Angeles, like, Los Angeles is a city that has 0:16:51.600 --> 0:16:54.680 a million different experiences, a million different neighborhoods that you know, 0:16:54.680 --> 0:16:56.520 I've lived here for five years, You've lived here, I 0:16:56.520 --> 0:17:00.240 think for like twelve thirteen years. And I think I 0:17:00.240 --> 0:17:02.000 could live here for fifty more years and I would 0:17:02.040 --> 0:17:04.600 still find a pocket of Los Angeles that I knew 0:17:04.600 --> 0:17:08.320 nothing about, didn't even know existed. And so we wanted 0:17:08.359 --> 0:17:12.920 to express some of the horizontal nature of Los Angeles 0:17:13.000 --> 0:17:15.199 and how driving is so important to the city and 0:17:15.240 --> 0:17:18.280 how a person can span all the way from you know, 0:17:18.359 --> 0:17:20.639 Eagle Rock to the Hollywood Hills and Korea Town in 0:17:20.680 --> 0:17:22.639 between in the course of a night, which feels like 0:17:22.640 --> 0:17:26.120 a very Los Angeles experience as opposed to, for example, 0:17:26.160 --> 0:17:28.760 in New York, it's a much more vertical experience. Everyone 0:17:28.880 --> 0:17:31.960 stacked on top of each other. Here, it's all stretched out. 0:17:32.240 --> 0:17:34.640 How did those visual ideas about the city, did they 0:17:34.680 --> 0:17:39.600 inform or were informed by it all? Theme in the film, Yeah, definitely. 0:17:39.760 --> 0:17:42.800 I mean, you know, we also chose to shoot in 0:17:42.880 --> 0:17:46.760 a two three nine aspect ratio to to kind of 0:17:47.160 --> 0:17:51.520 highlight the horizontal expansiveness of the city, and it's a 0:17:51.520 --> 0:17:54.320 city where, Um, I'm trying to think. I don't want 0:17:54.320 --> 0:17:56.400 to reveal too much for those people who haven't seen 0:17:56.400 --> 0:17:59.080 the movie yet. UM, but I will talk about the 0:17:59.160 --> 0:18:03.800 last shot, which pans away from our main action and 0:18:03.880 --> 0:18:07.879 into a wide city scape of the city. And I 0:18:07.920 --> 0:18:10.040 think that's our way of expressing something that we feel 0:18:10.040 --> 0:18:12.119 about Los Angeles, which is that it's a city with 0:18:12.160 --> 0:18:16.000 a million stories and like everyone's intersecting, uh, and that 0:18:16.040 --> 0:18:17.439 this is just one of them. In a way. It's 0:18:17.520 --> 0:18:20.600 like the the you know, the Naked Naked City about 0:18:20.600 --> 0:18:22.720 TV show and movie, which has the voice over that's like, 0:18:23.000 --> 0:18:25.320 that's a million stories in the nightked city, that's just 0:18:25.400 --> 0:18:29.199 one of them. And I really I felt like that 0:18:29.280 --> 0:18:32.320 about this view of Los Angeles, that we're happening to 0:18:32.359 --> 0:18:34.920 interact with these characters for this limited period of time. 0:18:34.920 --> 0:18:36.719 We're going to get this view into their lives, but 0:18:36.760 --> 0:18:39.720 that there's just one very small piece of the fabric 0:18:39.760 --> 0:18:41.560 of the city. By the way, let's drop in like 0:18:41.600 --> 0:18:44.879 a synopsis here for anyone who has probably confusing people. 0:18:44.920 --> 0:18:47.360 What's your elevator pitch on Jim and I Now elevator 0:18:47.400 --> 0:18:50.480 pitch is that it is a movie about a personal 0:18:50.520 --> 0:18:55.719 assistant to a celebrity. And there let me back up 0:18:55.760 --> 0:18:58.960 to say that this relationship is something that I encountered 0:18:59.040 --> 0:19:01.320 in Los Angeles and became very interested in. It's the 0:19:01.359 --> 0:19:05.920 reason why I wrote the movie because this relationship, the 0:19:05.960 --> 0:19:09.440 lines between personal and professional are very blurry and it's 0:19:09.480 --> 0:19:12.160 not clear like where the job begins and ends being 0:19:12.160 --> 0:19:14.560 a personal assistant, and I thought that was such an 0:19:14.560 --> 0:19:17.560 interesting starting place for a thriller, someone who's in some 0:19:17.640 --> 0:19:19.959 ways taken on the identity as an extension of the 0:19:20.000 --> 0:19:22.600 identity of the person that they're working for. So that's 0:19:22.640 --> 0:19:24.920 where we start out the film. And as the film 0:19:24.960 --> 0:19:30.560 goes on, Heather, who played by Zoey Kravitz, who's the celebrity, uh, 0:19:30.760 --> 0:19:35.000 is uh concerned that there's a lot of people who 0:19:35.000 --> 0:19:37.400 are angry at her, and she borrows a gun from 0:19:37.520 --> 0:19:42.640 Jill played by Lola Kirk, her assistant, And I'm maybe 0:19:42.720 --> 0:19:44.199 gonna leave it at that, but let's just say the 0:19:44.200 --> 0:19:46.920 guns introduced an act one tend to go off later 0:19:47.520 --> 0:19:50.119 there you go. Uh. Speaking of which, by the way, 0:19:50.160 --> 0:19:53.200 one of my friends was Mickey Rourke's personal assistant during 0:19:53.240 --> 0:19:58.600 Iron Man Too. That guy has stories I'm yeah, uh, 0:19:58.640 --> 0:20:00.520 it's something I think people feel like. I saw this 0:20:00.600 --> 0:20:03.840 mentioned I certainly thought about it. Was anything about Bergman 0:20:03.920 --> 0:20:06.919 or persona in your mind here it's funny. No, I 0:20:06.960 --> 0:20:08.960 we didn't think about that, but it has come up 0:20:09.119 --> 0:20:12.960 since then. Um No, I mean, if anything, I was 0:20:13.000 --> 0:20:15.480 thinking more of like you know, single white female or 0:20:15.520 --> 0:20:18.640 something of that, which which had some you know, blurry 0:20:18.680 --> 0:20:21.680 identity situations. You don't really go there, they're like you 0:20:21.720 --> 0:20:23.560 kind of you're expecting it to sort of go in 0:20:23.640 --> 0:20:26.600 like not like a sixty direction and like that, but 0:20:26.680 --> 0:20:32.240 just an even more dangerous direction. Did you willfully stay 0:20:32.240 --> 0:20:37.320 away from that? Or was that I wanted to, Yeah, 0:20:37.520 --> 0:20:40.919 certainly set the movie in those in the tradition of 0:20:40.960 --> 0:20:45.080 those movies, but also have it feel like life. Like 0:20:45.240 --> 0:20:48.840 I really wanted it to feel like what if something 0:20:48.880 --> 0:20:51.679 like this really happened to us? Like what would you know? 0:20:51.720 --> 0:20:54.919 What would an ordinary person deal with this? And so 0:20:54.960 --> 0:20:57.520 in some ways I wanted it to feel heightened and 0:20:57.560 --> 0:21:00.119 in others I wanted it to feel believe of the 0:21:00.200 --> 0:21:02.280 bowl and the sense the sense of like, Okay, this 0:21:02.320 --> 0:21:05.280 is a person who's like alive. This isn't like this 0:21:05.359 --> 0:21:08.119 is you've seen an aesthetic of movies, but you're seeing 0:21:08.119 --> 0:21:11.080 behavior that feels like real life. Yeah, that gets back 0:21:11.080 --> 0:21:12.439 to what I was saying. I think it's has the 0:21:12.520 --> 0:21:15.520 DNA of view and that's why it's such an interesting mixture. 0:21:16.520 --> 0:21:18.480 You were talking about a specific shot. There's another shot 0:21:18.520 --> 0:21:20.359 that I thought was kind of amazing. Whenever you can 0:21:20.359 --> 0:21:22.560 see a shot like this in a movie that you've 0:21:22.600 --> 0:21:25.960