Back at the Sydney Film Festival in June, I managed to sit in a Q & A Discussion with 99 Homes director Ramin Bahrani after the screening of his incredible film. Here’s an excerpt from this insightful and oft times, entertaining talk.
You’ve worked with non-professional actors before. What is you take on using non-professional actors –v- professional actors?
There are certain things that a non-professional cast can do that professional cast actors cannot do and the vice versa is also true. For Michael Shannon… what he can do… the dialogue Shannon has to deliver, I cannot get that out of non-professionals. And the emotional mind that Andrew has… that moral ambiguity he has to deal with would be harder for me to pull from a non-professional. I like both sides and I’ll probably go back and forth.
What is your take on Antony Partos and Matteo Zingales and how did you find these Australian Composers?
I made like the smallest changes to the movie and somehow I convinced the US distributor to cover the expenses…which is very rare for a filmmaker to get that chance. I wrote the film to this Wagner cue but later I just said what happens if I let Antony take a stab at it with Matteo and they came up with something that was sooo good that I switched.
I had this temp score that I liked very much and Michael Hill the music supervisor was trying to find something that matched the temp score or was laced in that world and he provided me 20-30 composers and their music and all of it matched the world for the music I was using temporarily in the film but none of it was original or… it all sounded very generic to me until I heard their music and I was like WOW, these guys are so talented. There’s something special and imaginative and creative in their work. And I got lucky, they had an opportunity and they said yes and so it was just…yeah.
Could you comment on the way the spaces of Orlando and Florida at large spoke to this tale of the favours of liberal capitalism. How they kind of spoke to you when constructing this story.
There were four epicentres to the housing crisis in terms of states: California, Nevada, Arizona and Florida. And I picked Florida because the other states felt done already. Like California had Hollywood, pornography, and the other ones has prostitution and gambling, and murder… anyway… Florida seemed like retirees and golf (cue laughs) and more than anything, Walt Disney World, so I went there and was just struck immediately by what I was seeing.
I also spent time with Fraud Attorneys, I was in the foreclosure courts that you see in the film (they’re also known as the rocket dockets) where they decide your case in 60 seconds flat. I actually went there with Lynn Szymoniak who was a Fraud Attorney to banks mistakenly tried to foreclose on and she’s the one who unravelled rebel signing of forged documents that you see in the film. She actually led a lawsuit for the Government against the banks at the tune of US$90 million and won. I would go with her to the foreclosure courts; yes,
Lynn Szymoniak is an amazing person and she actually uses her portion of the money to set up a not-for-profit to help people who lost their homes. But when I went to the foreclosure courts with her, I would carry a yellow legal pad to take notes. And first I was watching people lose and lose and lose and they kept losing and then they started winning and they kept winning and I just said to Lynn, ‘what’s going on’? And she said ‘the judge thinks because you’re with me, you’re a journalist for the New York Times and he doesn’t want to be portrayed badly’. And it became a real situation because I had to go to the next appointment. And I couldn’t leave because if I left, people would lose. So I had to stay there all day.
You know, we went to the motels on the side of Highway 142, just east of Disney World where you would see, just like in the film, middle class families, just the same as you or your neighbour, or your sister and there they were living in motels, lots coming there. And then shooting the film we tried to portray the more intimate spaces with the hand held camera a little bit looser style with a little bit more intimate feeling to them. And then the mansions like Michael Shannon’s home or the other empty mansions that he has, we tried to shoot those more with steadycam in a wider frame, very, kind of more distant feel to them. And while they’re impressive looking, there was something cold and…it didn’t feel like a home. Even Michael said ‘I’m gonna flip it. God Bless… yeah, I’m gonna flip it next year’.
You’ve been working on an incredible project now, that Michael Shannon’s also involved in with a great legend of film and cinema. You were telling me about that. Tell us about that and tell us about what you’ll do next.
I shouldn’t talk too much about that cause it’s not my position but I was… lucky enough to be working on Werner Herzog’s last set and Michael was in the film. I shouldn’t talk about it – it’s not my movie but It was such an amazing kind of learning experience to work with one of my favourite heroes and to see what he does and how he works.
Michael though, Michael drank a cup of coffee for like an hour and a half like I would watch a film. If it was a film and I a juror, I would give him Best Actor. I knew him for a while and I really wanted him to be in this film and he said yes. And then I went to meet him and it was in the summer and …Michael has two beautiful daughters and I wanted a beach vibe so I imagined him with fake tan, he had this kind of blonde touch to his hair and I saw him and I thought Wow! What you should be like that in the movie. Cause Michael in the movies is always this gruff, kind of mean guy and I know him to be this really nice guy, great golfer, and a great sense of humour. And suddenly he’s so handsome…and like a god that came out of the sun and landed here and that’s what I wanted for like to be put in these beautiful suits. And I used to make him tan on the roof of his hotel. And I would always ask him were you tanning and he would say yeah but I wouldn’t believe him. And then he would take a picture of his leg, you know, cool thighs so I would know he’s tanning. Cause he’s a smart person he’s refused to go to the tanning salon. But he’s such a gentleman.
And Andrew, Andrew was on board first. Initially the character was 10 years older and than I wrote it for Andrew when he expressed an interest to do it. And it made the whole thing much more interesting. And I had written it for his own age which is 30 and Andrew’s like, ‘let’s make it sharper and make him 27 cause he’s not a fully formed man yet’. And it was actually his idea to lower the age of the mom so that it was like he had his son very young; his parents had him very young.
And their acting styles are very different so you know my job is to not change the set for one or the other but to find a way somehow for both styles to be able to reach their potential on set without limiting one or the other. And because they’ve got such different acting styles, there was always some electricity , some sparks which was great for the film and great to see. That was great cause we don’t do shot lists or storyboards – I don’t understand what that is or why people do that – I like to see the thing happen live, in the location and to work with the actors on the blocking of a plot and movement of the cast. Once we see it happening live because right now with lights this way, we’re standing here and I’d always imagined the scene to be different and now it’s this other way. So then we can have it happen live, then and only then can we bring the camera and think, what would be the best way to shoot the scene, for the emotional form as opposed to making it from the cast, a kind of slate for the camera.
For example, in Dennis Nash’s action sequence, it’s a horrific scene. Great cinematographer Bobby Wachowski, he likes to keep eye out from the outside and in a lot of practical light so there’s no film from inside the house. The house is completely empty and designed entirely by our great production managers so that we had access to everything we could touch and do whatever we wanted and because Andrew and Dennis were so dedicated, they would be putting specific props they wanted in very specific places to make it personal to them. And then I hired a real Sherriff to play the part of the Sherriff who’s done a lot of evictions and then the clean up, with the exception of one of them is a real clean up and is what they actually do for a living. And then the script, the actors in the script had a great sense of what they have to do but they’re also completely free in that space to do whatever they want and react to whatever’s happening and if, Andrew or any others started delaying but the Sherriff’s not going to allow that course he knows what’s going on. And the way he kicks the door open it’s so obvious he’s a Sherriff. And the shoot, there were just two cameras and let the thing happen.
What did you shoot the film on and if the kinds of people depicted in the film have seen the film?
The film was shot on an Alexa which is a high definition camera.
The people that are in the film, I don’t know other than the main cast haven’t seen it yet. It basically opens in the US on September 25th but all the trailers are out on the internet and Facebook page.
What was interesting is that we shot the film in New Orleans because of tax credit reasons. In the US, you get a lot of tax rebates in New Orleans… A lot of films get made in New Orleans now or in Louisiana and what was kind of exciting about it in terms of casting, we were using low or non-professionals like when Andrew was knocking on all those doors over and over informing them of these cash for keys deals, at least half of that population are real homeowners who lived in those homes and then there were actors that we cast. All those people, be they professional actors or non-professional actors in those scenes, they could access a working treatment between them, and a lot of them had lost their homes or had severe damage or been displaced or broken. So it wasn’t actually an addiction but they had a sense and could access that.
For me I think that going into those sequences, I think Andrew’s best performance is with that elderly man he evicts. That’s based on a real eviction that I witnessed; the real one is even more horrific because the elderly man had dementia. I shot that entire scene here but I felt that you would never believe me and criticise me so I deleted it. Cause the real line is more; it’s always more than we can tolerate. But I didn’t tell Andrew that he was an actor; the elderly man is actually an actor but I did tell Andrew…I told him that it’s an old man who has dementia – I have no idea what’s going to happen in the scene that he has to just have to deal with it. And I think it’s actually his best performance; he looks so horrified there and the old man went along with it. And played on it.
What was one of your toughest scene to make in the film and how you worked through that?
I don’t know really. Toughest scene? Hmm, I don’t know if it was one of the toughest scenes…
Usually making films is very, constantly wondering if any of this is making any sense. I remember shooting this scene when Michael Shannon wants Andrew to take that false document in his hand and explains what’s going on, the camera stayed away from them and I remember thinking it…I couldn’t understand Andrew’s look of surprise – he would go like this (pulls face) – see him in a wider shot and I kept shooting until I finally realised that of course the camera should go closer to Andrew and he was like…grasp, I could render his emotion without having to do anything ridiculous.
Oh, I can tell you one very hard scene. I had a horrible A.D. His name is Chris Bryson. His name’s Chris Bryson. Chris Bryson. Every conversation would end yes, and…yes, and. So, would you like to come to Sydney? Yes, and I would like my girlfriend to come. Would you like to have a tea? Yes, and I would like a stash of these articles. Yes, and. Yes, I like the scene, and I’m liking the whole directions etcetera. This A.D. was always double no, no. Can’t make the date? No, we can’t do this. No we cannot. It was just killing me and…he was horrified that I didn’t have shot lists and all this stuff. Anyway, we’re shooting the final scene of the film ok…Frank Green’s – the final scene. We’re in that location for 3 days. The first day we’re supposed to shoot the first two scenes in Frank Green’s home which is when Andrew first meets him and at the table and the second one where Andrew shows up in that nice shirt. That’s day 1. We only got one of those scenes done so now we’re behind schedule. And there’s no wiggle room here…nada; it’s not a Hollywood film where you keep shooting. Day 2 and Green’s supposed to shoot the final scene cause it’s a big scene: there’s a lot of extras, there’s moving cars, there’s guns, there’s breaking of windows – there’s all this stuff that you need help to do. After the first day we’re still behind schedule because the A.D was so unorganised and we were always starting 2 hours late and all these stuff ups. The cinematographer and I sat down and said we have made for you a shot list now. This is the order we want it to be now due to the movement of the sun. At such and such time, windows need to be ready to break and anyway cut. The next day, he’s messed that all up again and he quit. He quit while we’re trying to shoot the final scene. No problem, don’t worry they’re producers. I’m cool, goodbye Chris, Paul’s like do you want me to apologise to Amber? Go bring him back for one? We’re better off without him. Then he takes our entire department which is 5 other human beings. And we’re trying to shoot the last scene of the film. And I needed those people because they are very good Pas and very good at keeping things the days on action films and of course Michael Shannon sees all this and somehow got them all to come back. So then we shot the final scene without the A.D and the second A.D and we made up the other scene and wrapped early.
The ambiguity at the end works and is a triumph for Nash’s character. He’s done what he’s done but you kind of get the feeling that Shannon’s Character is absolving that.
Of course Michael is never going to change. None of these crooks involved in this scandal went to jail. No one involved were liable or went to jail. They got fined but never went to jail. JP Morgan was fined $500 and they’re still making money off that. And no one goes to jail. The freeman character is based on a real guy David Stern. Mother Joan Brooks broke the story of all these forged documents, never went to jail. I don’t think Michael would of course. You know what’s interesting, about it…what I like is the ending to Frank Green who refuses to destroy himself even if he knows that it’s true. Never change the system. The system is the villain, not him. I have sympathy for him, I can empathise with him – I get it. I understand why he is doing what he’s doing. Frank just refuses to budge and if he is going to destroy himself, I remember we had to shoot the ending of the film and in the script there is no dialogue between Michael and Andrew and I always thought there should be something between them even more than just a look and no one. Let’s just work it out on the day. And so we’re shooting and so Michael tried something but I thought it didn’t work then he tried this nigh cue and I was someone over there and he was over here and we finish the take It’s a long scene, we don’t break it up and shoot the whole thing and then he grins and then says what do you think?
Don’t tell them what you were thinking. And I think that is very important In this day of google and phones and internet and everyone wants to know everything at all times and I think it is good not to know.
99 Homes is released in UK and US cinemas from Friday 25th September, 2015.
