Bang Gang (A Modern Love Story): Interview with Eva Husson

Bang Gang
Bang Gang

Format: Cinema

Seen at LFF 2015

Release date: 17 June 2016

Distributor: Metrodome

Director: Eva Husson

Writer: Eva Husson

Cast: Finnegan Oldfield, Marilyn Lima, Daisy Broom

Original title: Bang Gang (Une histoire d’amour moderne)

France 2015

98 mins

French director Eva Husson talks about adolescence and excess, shooting sex scenes and creating cliché-free female characters.

One of the great surprises of last year’s London Film Festival, Eva Husson’s bracing debut Bang Gang paints a frank, uninhibited and nuanced portrait of modern youth. Based on a real-life case, the film follows a group of teenage friends who engage in sex parties in a small French seaside town. Experimenting in this way will lead each of them to find their own limits and work out their own singular relationship to sex and love.

Virginie Sélavy talked to Eva Husson at the BFI London Film Festival in October 2015 about adolescence and excess, shooting sex scenes and creating cliché-free female characters.

Virginie Sélavy: Bang Gang goes against all the clichés about today’s youth and the panic about the internet. Although you integrate things such as posting photos online in the story you show that the characters’ exploration of sexuality is just part of growing up.

Eva Husson: I’m interested in the exploration of limits. I think that’s the job of teenagers, and the characters just do their job. Some are more confused than others, and some go further. A number of people asked if I thought the film represented youth. No, I don’t think that young people are constantly having intense group sex. But I think that it is very likely that similar excessive behaviour goes on, and it reveals archetypes and issues that are common to everyone. I think it’s much more interesting to choose an excessive type of story to approach that than a more traditional little love story that no one would have cared about.

It is based on a real event, is that right?

Yes, it was inspired by something that happened in 1996 when three hundred kids got syphilis in a small town. That’s what caught the attention of the hospital. They started to think it was a little strange, all these kids coming to them with that same problem. They questioned the kids and they realised there was something a little off. So it’s not something that is recent, and at the time you didn’t have all these issues of videos and photos. I included that in the film because I felt I couldn’t ignore it.

The way you portray the parents is very nuanced. They are quite sympathetic, they’re not repressive, they just don’t really understand what is going on.

I felt it was important that the parents shouldn’t be repressive caricatures because that’s often the way they are represented. I was touched by the fact that the parents try their best but fail, they’re a little clueless. They are quite open-minded and could understand their children if they talked but of course adolescents don’t talk. So I was looking back with sympathy at my parents and my friends’ parents, who were middle class and well-intentioned but got so much wrong. I was angry with them for a while and then I realised that they just did what they could.

You play an adult in the film, the maths teacher.

Yes, because even though in my head I was a teenager until I was 35 it was impossible to continue being a teenager. I love acting because I started as an actress, and I liked the idea of having a small role. Due to the intensity of the shooting I didn’t feel able to play a bigger role. And my husband plays the chemistry teacher, my mother plays the Spanish teacher, my brother is the disabled father and my cousin plays Alex’s mother. It’s a family affair.

What was the shooting like?

It was hard, because of the financial situation. We had limited means compared to our ambitions and so it was difficult to do all the things we wanted to do with the quality we wanted. Also we shot in some isolated places. All the scenes in the house were shot in the country and it was hard to be all crammed together in one place, day and night. The kids were fed up with each other, they were at each other’s throats. It was a bit like a holiday camp, it was drama after drama. To be honest I found it all quite funny. But there was also a lot of enthusiasm. The creative team was really close, there were many happy moments. I’d just had my baby and so I felt a little like a warrior: I’ve just given birth, I can do anything now, all problems have solutions. But I was scared, it’s not like I went in thinking, ‘great, I’ve just had a baby and now I’m making a film, that’s so cool’. I went in thinking, ‘oh shit…’ It actually gave me a strength I didn’t suspect I had.

Was it the first time you made something so explicitly sexual?

For a long time I was worried about the project for that reason. I found the story fascinating, I found the exploration of the extreme fascinating, but as for the sexual aspect of it… I’d shot one or two sex scenes before and I knew they weren’t the most pleasant scenes to film. Everyone is uncomfortable, watching people pretend to moan is not great to be honest… And so I wasn’t too happy about that, but at one point I said to my actors, ‘look, it’s very simple, your bodies are tools, you think of it as dancing, we’ll think about bodies in space, we’ll choreograph them, we’ll do it as a physical relationship to space. Don’t let yourselves get overwhelmed by your own emotions, it’s not about you, it’s about the characters’. And that’s the guiding principle that we all followed. When the actors talk about it they don’t seem traumatised. The other thing is that I kept the sex scenes to a minimum. I wanted it to be about the trajectories of the characters and for those scenes to exist only in relation to their emotions.

Those scenes feel very frank, very sensual, and never empty.

We spent a lot of time thinking about why we were filming each scene, what needed to be shown, in fact what was the minimum we could show, without overdoing it because others have done that, and I wasn’t really interested in that as a filmmaker. We thought a lot about what it meant for the character, which made a lot of decisions easier. When it came to nudity, I wanted it to be something simple. That’s why I had a couple of scenes where you see them naked early on so that afterwards you know that they can be naked, it doesn’t need to be all frontal. I didn’t want to focus on the genitals because people don’t really want to see that.

You’ve created great female characters that are very complex and different. They do what they want to do without compromising and they don’t get punished for it.

That was very important to me. As a woman I was thinking about how women and female sexuality are represented. I thought that a full-blown teenage female sexuality can be explored in a way that doesn’t necessarily end badly. Of course, if you shag lots of people, there is the risk of sexually transmissible diseases. For me that’s not punishment, that’s a fact. But at that age there is also that extreme malleability that means that you learn the lesson of what didn’t work, of what was a little too much, and you carry on, and you construct your identity. The construction of female sexual identity fascinated me, that’s something I really wanted to explore. I think there will be viewers who will find it hard going because it goes against the patriarchal view of things – even in films I love like Breaking the Waves, the female character really suffers, it’s punishment after punishment after punishment.

It’s interesting that syphilis is what happened in the real story because today the big STD threat is AIDS. That’s something that would change your life because there is no treatment, whereas now you can treat syphilis, which removes the potentially tragic element of STD.

Well, I did wonder if I should keep that in, so it was a real narrative choice, because a lot of people were saying to me, syphilis is over. It’s not common, that’s for sure, but it does happen. And it’s precisely no longer a lethal disease these days so the kids can move on, and that’s what’s interesting. I had a fairly wild youth, not in terms of orgies, but drugs, and people around me took lots too, and we all turned out OK. So it’s possible to explore your limits without it destroying your adult life. For me it’s a lie to say that if you mess up as a teenager you’ll ruin your life. It’s the only moment in life when you can go very far and make a full U-turn without any real consequences. I liked the idea of exploring that.

The film also dynamites all the clichés about girls, sex and love, the idea that girls are romantic and boys are not.

Yes, for instance, for Gabriel, a boy, and I know many boys like him, intimacy is something that is very strong and intense and he can’t do collective sex. However, he’s enough of a freak, in a good sense, to think that it doesn’t matter what this special girl who means so much to him does with her sexuality, because he’s someone who sees what really matters. George, on the other hand, is a romantic girl, but for her that’s not connected to sex. So she can sleep with boys without it being in contradiction with her sentimental side. And Alex may initially seem like a little bastard, but through him I was looking back with tenderness at teenage boys, realising that they were just a bit dazed, they didn’t understand everything. At the time I thought they were obnoxious, but in fact they were a little lost because learning about love and relationships is actually not easy – now, 20 years ago or 2000 years ago.

Interview by Virginie Sélavy

Watch the trailer:

Tale of Tales: Interview with Matteo Garrone

Tale of Tales 1
Tale of Tales

Format: Cinema + VOD

Seen at Cannes 2015

Release date: 17 June 2016

Distributor: Curzon Artificial Eye

Director: Matteo Garrone

Writers: Edoardo Albinati, Ugo Chiti, Matteo Garrone, Massimo Gaudioso

Based on the fairy tale collection Pentamerone by: Giambattista Basile

Cast: Salma Hayek, Vincent Cassel, Toby Jones, John C. Reilly

Italy, France, UK 2015

134 mins

The Italian director talks about fantasy movies, casting Toby Jones as an eccentric king and why every director only needs to make one good film.

Matteo Garrone might have made his name with the gritty, realist mafia drama Gomorra (2008), but his latest offering is a different beast entirely. A fantastically bizarre, wildly imaginative and highly stylized affair, Tale of Tales features a trio of stories, set in three neighbouring kingdoms and focusing on the increasingly mad and often hilarious miseries of their royal leaders, all of which are loosely based on the folk myths collected and published by the 16th-century Neapolitan poet and scholar Giambattista Basile.

Pamela Jahn met with the Italian director at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2015 to talk about fantasy movies, casting Toby Jones as an accentric king and why every director only needs to make one good film.

Pamela Jahn: It seems like Gomorra, which turned out to be your most successful film to date, and your new film Tale of Tales could not be further apart?

Matteo Garrone: Yeah, it seems strange…But, for me, there are also dark fairy tales in Gomorra, in the same way as the tales talk about archetypes, about human beings, so they are also somewhat modern too. And my approach is always one that starts from a realistic approach, from observation of contemporary reality, but at the same time there is also a fantastic dimension. In this case, I started off with fantastic tales and tried to bring them a little closer to reality. But all my movies are very visual, so the approach was not so different from my point of view. I actually felt that the line was quite natural, especially since I always talk about obsessions in my films, and Tale of Tales is about desire and how this desire becomes obsession. Of course, the language of Gomorra was much more based on a documentary style, but behind this choice of the language is an important visual work.

There are not many fantasy movies coming out of Italy these days.

No, but we also have directors who in the past worked well in that genre. For me, one of my references was Mario Bava, for instance. He worked with horror but also with fantasy. And I also like the early work of Pasolini, his short movies and fairy tales in particular, so we do have a heritage of that in Italy too.

When did you discover Giambattista Basile’s tales for yourself?

As a kid, I read tales like the ones by the Brothers Grimm like everyone else. I discovered Giambattista Basile only four or five years ago, through a friend of mine, who is a painter. I immediately fell in love with them, with the different characters of the stories, but also with the visual aspect.

This is your first English-language film. Do you think anything got lost in the translation of the stories into English?

No, because, first of all the original stories were written on the streets in the Neapolitan dialect of the 16th and 17th centuries. So even when you read the book in Italian you are already reading a translation. I also think there is something Shakespearean in the way Basile writes, and hopefully we helped a little to make him known in the world, finally. Because it’s really unfair that nobody knows this author who wrote the first book of fairy tales in Europe and who was the first to write about Cinderella and about many other famous tales…everybody only knows the Grimms. And at that time, the tales were not for kids, they were seen as entertainment for a mixed audience. That’s partly why these tales are also very dark sometimes and also almost oral because they are of medieval origin. It was important to me to keep the soul of Basile’s writing, the violence but at the same time also the comical aspects, because Basile is a master of mixing comedy and fear.

Toby Jones is brilliant as the eccentric king whose love for a giant flea overpowers the love he feels for his own daughter.

Yes, he’s wonderful. Jones is an actor, who like Vincent Cassel, can play comical and dramatic, all at the same time, and always in a way that never becomes cliché, he’s always believable. And that was very important for me with Basile’s tales, to find the right balance between comic, dramatic and the grotesque.

Like in the scene in which Salma Hayek, who plays a queen desperate to receive a child, has to eat a sea monster’s beating heart.

Salma was very generous with me. She’s Mexican, you see, and when we met, she basically told me I’m like a Mexican director because I’m so crazy. But in all honesty, when you believe in something the rest doesn’t matter, so she went through that scene without flinching because she believed in what we were doing.

What is she actually eating in that scene?

It’s a sort of disgusting cake, I think.

Together with Paolo Sorrentino, you are one of the most acclaimed Italian directors today. Is it true that you live in the same building?

Yes, it’s true. We meet in the elevator sometimes, but since he won the Academy Award for The Great Beauty I decided we shouldn’t meet too much. (laughs)

Why did you decide to work with Peter Suschitzky, the cinematographer, who is also a long-term collaborator with David Cronenberg and who shot all of his films?

I saw the work he did with Cronenberg. It’s realistic in its roots but at the same time you can feel something that is artificial in a way. And that’s exactly what we wanted to do with this film, we wanted to create an image that is believable but at the same time you feel like it was created in a studio. Almost like the beginning of the cinema, like the Méliès, something that is almost a performance, something that can surprise the audience, visually and emotionally. But at the same time you feel it’s artificial.

You used to be a painter in your earlier career. Why did you stop?

When I stared making movies I stopped painting, because for me making movies is always a figurative art, and it’s my way of painting now. Unfortunately, I can’t do both, because when I do cinema I think about it 24hours a day, I’m constantly thinking about the language of cinema. It’s something that I cannot combine and think about both at the same time. So if I ever start painting again I have to stop making films. But I’ll probably need at least two years to switch my mind because it takes time. I am very curious though to see what would come out of it, so maybe if I make a movie that is a complete disaster, I’ll go hide in my studio and start painting again.

You mentioned elsewhere that making this film was a very difficult experience for you.

I learned a lot about the technical aspects with this movie, but sometimes it was very frustrating for me because I like to have the control, especially the visual control. And sometimes when you work with special effects you shoot only with a green screen, so you have to imagine what it will actually look like. It’s like you’re giving away your brushes to somebody else and see what they do with them. And it took a long time to see something, like for example, even only to see the giant flea, I had to wait five months.

Has that somewhat discouraged you from making more ambitious fantasy or genre-twisting films like this in the future?

I think making films is always difficult. The world of cinema is somehow connected to something almost esoteric, because when you make a movie in a way you’re blind. Every day you make a piece but you forget what you’ve done the day before, it’s not like when you’re painting that you always see the colour that you put in front of you on the canvas. Instead, putting all the different pieces together is like a mosaic and finally, hopefully, you understand the tone of the movie. But sometimes it is easy to lose the control, visually. And my point of view is this: if a director makes just one really good film in his career, that’s enough. Then you can make mistakes. But imagine if every director would make just one good movie, how rich cinema would be!

Interview by Pamela Jahn

Watch the trailer:

Maria Usbeck’s Film Jukebox

Maria Usbeck
Maria Usbeck

After five years as the singer of US new wave band Selebrities, it was homesickness that led Ecuadorian musician Maria Usbeck to record her first Spanish-language album, a percussive pop travel diary that revisits the influence of her homeland and mixes it with other exotic cultures she encountered on her travels. ‘Amparo’ is out on Labrador in Europe, Cascine in North America and Rallye in Japan.

1. Wild Tales (Damián Szifron, 2015)
This Argentinian film truly caught me by surprise. Six short stories, each more intense and dramatic than the other. Each one shows us the moment when a person can truly lose their grip. The topics for each story are incredibly well thought out as they reflect a very contemporary Argentinian and South American society, from a wedding that turns into a complete wreck to an actual plane wreck. I would suggest to watch this if you are in need of a laugh but can also handle some moments of pure edge-of-you-seat anxiety.

2. Cría Cuervos (Carlos Saura, 1976)
During the end of the Franquist era, a young girl lives with her two sisters, grandmother and aunt. Her mother has passed after a very long illness, her father later dies of a heart attack. Carlos Saura takes us through this dysfunctional drama allowing us to feel and think as if we were this little girl. Middle child syndrome meets the most beautiful cinematography and art direction. The soundtrack is by one of my favourite Spaniard singers, Jeanette. The main theme ‘Porque Te Vas’, was a song I used to dance and sing along to as a little girl myself.

3. Fando y Lis (Alejandro Jodorowsky, 1968)
This is Alejandro Jodorowsky’s first film, which, when it premiered in Mexico in the 60s, caused a rather angry reaction from its audience. The nature of the film is rather blasphemous. It’s based on the play by the Spanish writer and filmmaker Fernando Arrabal. Its surrealism brings to life human emotion with a rich depth of traumatic pasts and agnostic nature. It’s a film that truly makes you think.

4. Io non ho paura (Gabriele Salvatores, 2003)
A story about a cruel realisation for a young boy, who discovers the darkest side of adults. Filmed in Spain in Italian, this film takes you to a small village during the hottest summer days. As a kid I spent a lot of time running through fields and the woods with my sisters and cousins. Always on the hunt for some sort of adventure or entertainment. Director Gabriele Salvatores delivers an excellent portrait of innocence in the face of desperation. Extremely moving.

5. Araya (Margot Benacerraf, 1959)
Black and white Venezuelan-French documentary that came out the same year as The 400 Blows. It’s beautifully shot. The documentary shows the lives of the Venezuelan people who lived in this beach town called Araya at the time. Working in the salt marsh, making clay pots and having a type of lifestyle that was slowly already starting to disappear and continues to do so.

6. Twilight (Julio Bracho, 1945)
I watched this Mexican film noir about a year ago while on a first date. The man who took me on this date deserves an award for choosing this film. Now if only he was as great as the film was… A dramatic story unravels in the life of a high class society doctor and professor. This man goes through a bit of an existential crisis. His long-lost love has resurfaced and he finds himself torn. This love story captures you with impressionist imagery.

7. Eco de la montaña (Nicolás Echeverria, 2014)
Director Nicolás Echeverria, who is best known for Cabeza de vaca, shows us the life of the indigenous artist Santos de la Torre, of the Huichol people in Mexico. He depicts his work, his family life, his ideals and rituals, as well as his relationship to the outside world. It’s mostly inspirational and eye-opening.

8. The Maid (Sebastián Silva, 2009)
I never myself had a nanny or a full-time maid. When I was growing up in South America, most of my friends did, and their maids were almost like family to them. Director Sebastián Silva was able to unleash the essence of what is almost a psychological thriller. The portrayal of the maid is something truly unforgettable.

9. Dark Habits (Pedro Almodóvar, 1983)
There is nothing like combining Catholic guilt with surrealism. Works like a charm in this Almodóvar film. In a home for rebellious women turned nuns, the most scandalous, witty and funny situations take place. It’s a thrill to watch everything unfold as you dig further and further into the troubles of each character.

10. Y tu mamá también (Alfonso Cuarón, 2001)
I was in high school when this movie came out and I remember thinking that this and the music video for ‘Lady hear me tonight’ by Modjo were the most outrageous concepts I could’ve laid my eyes upon. Instantly in love. It’s about two friends who go on a road trip and meet an older woman who is keen to seduce them. The film is not only about sexuality but about the secrets that they hold from each other.