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FILM
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PHOTO BY LISA
Gus, anonymous
The Portland director
reaches back to his indie
roots with Gerry
by
Gus Van Sant at home in Northwest Portland. His new
film, Qerry, opens March 21 up the street at Cinema 21
L isa B radshaw
us Van Sant moved back to Portland in
2002 after a two-year stint living in New
York. It seems that for laid-back, queer,
independent film directors (we lured Far
from Heaven’s Todd Haynes, too), Portland is
just a little more comfortable.
“I think it’s the same thing that keeps other
people here," Van Sant says. “There’s a lot of
new people who’ve come here since I’ve been
gone. It’s incredible.” But not off-putting.
“Actually, you know, I have just as gtxxJ a time
being here, if not better.”
He certainly seems comfortable enough
padding around his loft in the Pearl District
barefoot, posters of teen-agers cast in his just-
wrapped latest project— shot in Northeast
Portland— on the walls. Unmatched furniture is
LB: You went from big budget on your
casually scattered around the large, one-room
last two films back to a smaller budget on
space. There's clearly a penchant for guitars (1
Qerry. W hich is more difficult?
count six); otherwise, anyone could live here.
GVS: It’s harder when you have a huge crew
The director’s new release, Gerry, starring
because the crew has to do their job.. .and
Casey Affleck and Matt Damon, opens March 21
they’re a problem, you know, because you can’t
at Cinema 21. A far cry from Northeast Portland,
tell them not to do their job. I mean, you can, I
Van Sant, Affleck and Damon wandered around
guess, but then they would just be sitting around,
with a small crew in Death Valley, Utah and
i So if you don’t hire them in the first place, then
South America to film this somewhat eerie tale of
you’ve kind of, like, got something going.... All I
two guys who get lost on a day hike.
| notice is that it just takes a lot more time.
The story is based on the trio’s own script (or,
rather, lack of script) and will delight Van Sant
LB: So you shot this film with no script,
fans who think his HollywtxxJ films (Good Will
right?
Hunting, Finding Forrester) have sold him out.
GVS: T hat’s also easier. It’s more, maybe,
intense.. .you’re doing a lot more thinking on
Lisa Bradshaw: You’ve received criticism
the set.... The thing about having a script
from fans of your earlier work regarding your
Hollywood films. How do you choose your
projects?
G us Van Sant: T he ultim ate thing that
guides me [are] things th at I really like....
G er r y
T he first three films— Mala Noche, Drugstore
Cinema 21, March 21 to 27
Cowboy and My O w n Private Idaho.. .were
hunched together with the same point of
us Van Sant’s latest movie, Gerry, starring
view; they were Portland street stories. Good
Casey Affleck and Matt Damon (and only
Will Hunting, you know, the characters were
Casey Affleck and M att Damon) ought to
still street characters from South Boston. The
put to rest those ideas that the Portland film
only difference was up until then, they were
maker has left his indie roots behind.
Shot in the American West and Argentina
all anti-heroes; they were all nefarious charac
ters that were not heroic types.... I’d never
with no script and a crew of 30, this minimal
ist, yet strikingly beautiful, film follows two
had a straightforward kind of positive, uplift
ing story.... I d idn’t know w hether I needed
guys who head out on a day hike (with no
to be speaking from the point of view of an
water or sun protection or anything else
beyond the clothes on their hacks) in an
anti-hero to really make a film.
unnam ed desert area.
A lot of the time, I’m chixising something
because I’ve never done it.... But it went agaiast
Choosing an alternative path to other
tourists, they soon become completely lost and
the grain of people who do know your history.... I
was breaking whatever form people were expect
unable to backtrack. They wander around ever-
changing landscapes in ever-changing times of
ing in an effort to see if I could make a popular
piece that was not about me. ..the idea of having
an identity as a particular kind of filmmaker— I’m
not sure I really agree with it. I want it to be sort
of anonymous. At least I think I do. [Smilesl
G
LB: You used to have a thing for Matt Dil
lon; now you seem to have a thing for Matt
Damon. W hat is it about those two guys?
G V S: I like them as lead characters....
Am I supposed to say, like, I’m in love with
them? [Smiles] I’m in love with all my lead
characters.... A nd on their part, too; they
generally want to be in love with the director.
It’s sort of like they’re being admired by the
c am era...it’s som ething they’re after as screen
personalities. So hopefully the director is the
person w ho’s admiring th e m .... It’s like a love
affair, sort of.
is.. .you’re basically reprcxlucing the script—
that’s your daily job.... There’s not really any
time to create anything new .. .it’s usually the
way films are made. But all those ideas of “this is
usually the way to do it” are kind of watch words.
O n Gerry, the three of us were writing—
Matt, Casey and myself—writing or coming up
with ideas.. .it’s sort of like you’re creating it as
you’re going.... We didn’t really know what
exactly we were going to be doing.
LB: T he film is so convincing at making
these guys seem lost, I wondered how you
kept from actually getting lost.
GVS: Generally, we’re always near a road. I
did get lost in location scouting, though. Not
lost, exactly, but stranded. I had a .. .fan belt
day and night, barely speaking to each other
and becoming, with the audience, more and
more panicky about how this story will end.
And that’s it.
Van Sant cites Hungarian director Bda
Tarr’s cinematic style of long takes as a major
influence in creating Gerry, which employs
four- or five- minute continuous shots with no
dialogue. This is certainly not commercially
advantageous, but it’s worth it for an audience
willing to endure the grueling, demanding jour
ney with M att and Casey.
By the time the boys shuffle into the white,
industrial landscape of U tah’s salt flats (“almost
like a heaven," says Van Sant), they’re barely
alive, but you’ll be energized by what movie
making can offer. Gerry is one of the best films
you’ll see this year.
Casey Affleck (left) and Matt Damon choose the road less traveled in Qerry
—LB
break. We were scouting in the Death Valley
area, and I really didn’t think 1 was going to make
it to the main road without passing out, and I
thought if I passed out I would just sort of, like,
bake [pauses] and die. I got very scared. I made it,
but I didn’t think I was going to make it.
LB: In the film, both characters are
named Gerry. Why?
G V S: They aren’t really both named Gerry,
they’re just calling each other Gerry. The best
word for it is “fuck-up.” ...S o they’re calling
each other fuck-up.... It’s a word that they—
Matt and Casey— use in real life.... “Gerry”
became a term for something that w as...not
put together well or messed u p ...an unsound
idea or an unsound concept or person.
LB: This film seems like an allegory about
two average guys choosing the road less traveled
and then making their way through difficult
landscapes, trying to survive in a harsh world.
G V S: It’s easy to read into it or have it be a
symbol for life, a lifetim e... the selection of the
actual story, you know, you start seeing the
vastness of the actual idea of these two guys
getting along and not making it o r.. .making it.
That whole idea invites all of these symbolic
and metaphoric things. It promotes that; and
we’re trying to...encourage people to read into
it and not discourage them to read into it by
telling them what to think.
LB: Last fall we interviewed Todd Haynes
who said he didn’t think of mainstream, for
mulaic film as “gay movies.’’ D o you think
Qerry is a gay movie?
G V S: He would say yes because it doesn’t
fit into the industry standard of making a
movie. He doesn’t want to see a movie that
does fit into that standard without criticizing
the standard because he’s very much
into...subverting some of the same things that
I’m into subverting, which is...how you’re
communicating to people with film .... There is
a kind of industry standard way of dealing with
the vocabulary of a film. He doesn’t want to
use that vocabulary because it’s not only a
straight vocabulary, it’s an industrial revolution
vcKabulary. It’s a really old, antiquated behe
moth and, like, useless.
LB: This year you’re both nominated for an
Independent Spirit Award for Best Director.
GVS: We’re competing, yeah. I think he’s
gonna win, though. [Laughs] I just can’t imagine
that I would w in.... And, you know, I want to see
him win, too. I’m a really big fan of his films. J H