1.
Your second film, Bananas [] was made in 1971,
during a period when these kind of revolutionary uprisings were a fact in many
Latin American countries. It was also the time of the Vietnam war. What were
your own political ideas at this time, and how have they developed and changed
over the years? Do you consider yourself a political person?
2.
No, I don’t think I’m a political person. I’m
basically – you could say to 99 per cent – a liberal
democrat. That’s pretty much what I was; I was against the war, as everyone
knew I was. I’m basically not very political. I’ve compaigned for
certain politicians. Like show people sometimes do.
3.
Which people have you supported in this way?
4.
Originally, when I was younger, I campaigned for
Adlai Stevenson and George McGovern and Eugene McCarthy. All those guys who
have lost. I campaigned for Lyndon Johnson when he ran against Barry Goldwater.
I’ve campaigned for Jimmy Carter, for Michael Dukakis. And now I’ve given my
name to the Clinton people. I’m basically a democratic liberal.
5.
I wanted to pose this question also, because in
later films, like Annie Hall or Manhattan, you make ironical remarks about
left-wing intellectuals, a group of people of which I presume you count
yourself as a member.
6.
Yes, and which I observe.
7.
In the beginning of Bananas we hear quite
ironical remarks on the American influence on other countries and specially on
the Latin American countries. In the big crowd of people that has gathered
outside the parliament building there is someone who is forcing himself through
the crowd claiming he is a representative of American television.
8.
Well, in the United States it has huge power. I
don’t know how it is abroad, but in American it’s gigantic. From our point of view the governments of Latin America have
never seemed to work too well. The United States of America, relatively
speaking, has always had a stable government. So it’s always seemed strange to us
how unstable these countries were. [It must be very strange in Upper East Side,
Manhattan, NY.] They’ve changed leaders and
policy so frequently.
9.
But there has also been the very strong and
devastating influence of the United States upon these countries. On countries
like Chile and Argentina, in particular.
10.
Yes, without a question. The American influence
has been severe, with enormous exploitation.
11.
There is an ironical comment towards the end of
the film where you address another part of the world, our part of the world. One character quotes Kierkegaard and says, ‘Scandinavians
have such an instinctive feeling for the human condition.’ And later on
it’s stated that the official language for the new republic of San Marco will
be Swedish. Your strong feelings for Scandinavia and, particularly, Sweden is
manifested here.
12.
Yes, I’ve always like the Scandinavian countries
and, of course, Sweden led the pack, because my interest in Sweden originally
came through Swedish cinema. But I like that part of
the world. I like the way it looks, I like the weather. There’s just
something about it that’s interesting to me.
13.
You’ve read Strindberg, of course, but are you
acquainted with anybody else in Scandinavian literature or with Scandinavian
art?
14.
I’m acquainted with that which everyone is
acquainted with, the paintings of Edvard Munch, the music of Sibelius or Allan
Pettersson – those things we all know. I do enjoy Scandinavian culture to a
certain degree, but we only get a certain amount of it here. And the best, most
generous, and most important was, of course, the Bergman films. There you see
Swedish life. You get a very good feel for Scandinavian culture through those
films. [Fucking moron.] With Strindberg it’s something else. You read his plays
or go and see one of them at the theatre – Dance of Death, for instance – and
it might be a good production, but you don’t get the same feel from it. With
Bergman you see the Swedish settings, the cities, the countryside, the churches
and the people. It’s different.
1.
In this end scene you have the J. Edgar Hoover
character played by a black actor. This is one of the very few parts in your
films portrayed by a black. There is, for instance, the black sergeant in Love and
Death, put there as a kind of
anachronistic figure, and there is a black character in Sleep and the black maid in the film within the film in The Purple Rose of Cairo. But apart from that there are almost no black people in your
films. Why?
2.
Do you mean in principal roles or in general?
[Fucking prick.]
3.
In general. We almost never see any black extras
in the films even.
4.
Well, usually there are two different
situations when it comes to extras. One is that we just call up the extra
people and say, ‘Send over a hundred extras or twenty extras or something.’ And
they usually send over a mixture of people. I mean, if it’s a street in New
York, they usually send over a mixture of hispanics, black and white people. But
that’s just something we call up and order for background. I mean, we don’t buy
them by the pound. Then for principal roles, I
don’t know the black experience well enough to really write about it with any
authenticity. In fact, most of my characters are so limited locally. They’re
mostly New Yorkers, kind of upper-class, educated, neurotic. It’s almost the
only thing that I ever write about, because it’s almost the only thing I know.
I just don’t know enough about these other experiences. I have, for instance,
never written anything about an Irish family or an Italian family, because I
don’t really know enough about it.
5.
I’ve also noticed this, because in Hollywood
films from the last decade or so black actors or black characters have been
given more parts in the movies. This is maybe especially true with the cop
films, where there is often a white cop working together with a black cop, and
the black guy has taken over the classical ‘buddy’ part. It has almost become a
pattern.
6.
Yes, one does tend to get more blacks in the
film business. But, for instance, when I did Hannah and Her Sisters, I was writing about a milieu that I know
quite well. And I made the maid black because in those families 90 per cent of
the time the maid is black. I got a lot of criticism from black people who
wrote me letters and said, ‘You never use blacks, and when you use one, it’s in
a menial job.’ Now, I’m not thinking of that when I
write the character. In my political life – whatever that is – I’m always very pro
all those candidates who want the most generous accomodation for blacks. I’ve
marched with Martin Luther King in Washington. [This supposed to mean something
only to him.] But, when I’m writing, I don’t believe in equal opportunity or affirmative
action. You can’t do that. So when I was trying to draw a picture accurately,
it just seemed to me that those families on Upper West Side almost always had
black help. So that’s the way I did it. But I did get criticized for it. I’m
just trying to depict the reality as I experience it, my own authenticity. In
the same sense, if I was depicting the kind of Jewish family that I grew up in,
I would depict them, accurately, with that which is flattering and that which
is unflattering. I’ve also had an enormous amount of criticism from Jewish
groups who feel that I have been very harsh or denigrating or critical. So
there’s a lot of sensitivity always on these matters. But the only thing I try
to let guide me is the authenticity of the scene.
No comments:
Post a Comment