Tuesday, February 17, 1998
Confidential director on the record
FILM: Hanson discusses Los Angeles, movies and his big Oscar
competition
By Tommy Nguyen
Daily Bruin Contributor
Somewhere in the middle of my conversation with director Curtis
Hanson, I looked out the window of his Westwood office and noticed
a movie theater down below. I couldn’t bring my eyes away from the
view, even when I asked him the question: "Sorry to interrupt you,
but what’s it like to look out your office window and see your
movie playing across the street? I know you’re a filmmaker 10 times
over, but you must feel some kind of emotional stirring whenever
you see that marquee."
Looking outside, Hanson leans back in his chair with his hands
joined behind his head, "It’s funny, isn’t it?" And for a moment he
smiles quietly, taking it all in.
The view for Hanson has been especially sweet: a week ago his
"L.A. Confidential" garnered nine Academy Award nominations,
including three for Hanson (as producer, director, and
co-screenwriter).
The Bruin was able to catch Hanson last Wednesday, the day after
the Academy announced its nominees. It was also the day after
Hanson introduced a screening of Billy Wilder’s "The Apartment" for
the UCLA Film and Television Archives. He was kind enough to ignore
the cannonade of phone calls in his office and talk
un-confidentially about Los Angeles, movies and his career.
Before you came back to UCLA to introduce "The Apartment," we
first met at an archive screening of "The Day of the Locust," a
wonderful film and appropriately one of your favorites as well.
"Locust" and your film both describe a gorgeous Los Angeles of the
past. You grew up in L.A., so when you were making the film, was it
very much a romantic affair for you?
Well, the two pictures are very different. It was more of a
coincidence that we met there. "L.A. Confidential" (portrays) a
very different ’50s, a time of a booming economy compared to the
depression of the ’30s. Also, this is the city of my childhood
memories, so the film was an opportunity to deal with that, and
deal with a theme that I’ve always been interested in to one degree
or another in other pictures of mine. That there’s a difference
between image and reality.
I read James Ellroy’s book and part of what attracted me to it
as a movie was that, as I met each character in the book, I had
certain assumptions. Then I found out that my assumptions were
wrong. And I thought, here’s an opportunity to deal with this theme
in a city of manufactured illusions.
You mention Los Angeles as a city of illusions, and many critics
have noticed the amount of layering you do in the film. Are all
those layers there to disguise an ugliness about Los Angeles? We
watch "The Day of the Locust" end with an apocalypse, in a violent
moment of truth. In your movie, order is restored, but there’s a
sinister element present, with yet another layer placed between
public perception and the truth about the LAPD. Is that as good as
it gets for Los Angeles?
The ending is about these characters and where they are, and how
they fit into this thing that we know as Los Angeles. And it was an
image being sent out in the ’50s, very deliberately, to lure people
and businesses here after World War II. The irony of that moment is
that image: the utopian sun, the limitless orange groves, the wide
beaches. All of that stuff was being bulldozed into oblivion to
make room for the very people in search of the things that were
being destroyed.
So that’s all part of the layering you were talking about. At
the end of the movie, people think it’s a happy ending because
things are resolved. But in fact, it’s a very ambiguous ending, as
you say correctly. Ed Exley tells the truth, but the truth is
reworked, a spin is put on it. He’s there left alone, not looking
too happy.
One of the happiest moments I had in our preview process was
when a lady wrote, on the response card she filled out, that at the
end when Exley stands there alone, is he supposed to be the young
Daryl Gates. I love that she thought of that, that Gates could have
started this way, where you see he could go either way. But he’s so
good at going one way that he can’t help himself.
What makes Los Angeles such a storyteller’s paradise? Sam
Shepherd attributes it to a kind of "junk magic" of the city. What
do you see personally?
I see a lot of things because I know Los Angeles pretty well.
I’m as nostalgic and regretful as anybody about the good things
that are gone from Los Angeles. But at the same time, I love this
city, and that people come here from all over the world and bring
with them their hopes and energy and culture.
I can go to neighborhoods where I remember as a child and not
even know if I was in the same country, or even the same continent.
I like that. I like the energy of this living , breathing,
constantly changing city. I would rather live in a city like that,
than a city that’s a museum to its own past.
There’s a scene in your movie when the corrupt Capt. Dudley
Smith raises his badge and says, "Hold up your badge so they know
you’re a cop." Do you feel you’ve been given the same kind of
instructions, as if people have been saying, "Hold up ‘L.A.
Confidential’ so they know you’re a director?" Obviously, Dudley
says it with perverse irony. But do you see any irony in your new
stature as a filmmaker?
"L.A. Confidential" is sort of a milestone in a long road that
I’ve been going on. The new stature is gratifying, exciting, but at
the same time it’s the result of what came before. It was from the
success of my two previous films ("The River Wild" and "The Hand
That Rocks the Cradle") that I was placed in a moment of possible
leverage, to push for something that was more ambitious and more
personal. These themes in "L.A. Confidential," which are dealt in a
more wholesome way, are in all of my other pictures as well.
So you don’t get irritated when film critics say "L.A.
Confidential" was "surprisingly" directed by Curtis Hanson?
I’m not irritated – look, I love the critics right now.
It’s the critics that have kept it afloat, with the movie being
released back in September.
Yes. But I love critics anyway. Some filmmakers say how they
never read reviews. That’s not me. I like to read what people have
to say.
I feel, though, that the level of criticism is not what it once
was in this country. When I was a teenager and trying to learn
about movies, thinking about them all the time and wanting to talk
about them, it was the critics with whom I felt I had a dialogue
with. Writers like Pauline Kael, Andrew Sarris and James Agee. It
didn’t matter if I agreed or disagreed: it was a conversation.
Today, this is a time when synopsis often passes for review,
opinion passes for insight. It’s mirroring the culture.
A sound-bite era.
Yes! The desire for the sound bite. It used to be that people
loved to talk about movies.
Let’s talk about what happened yesterday morning. What were you
doing in New York when the Oscar nominations were announced? Were
you just trying to benefit from the Eastern Standard Time?
When I agreed to introduce the screening of "The Apartment," I
had no idea it would fall on the day the nominations would come
out.
Otherwise, you wouldn’t have come back to Los Angeles.
(laughing) No, I would say let’s do it a few weeks later. I was
in New York because the night before it was the dinner for the
National Board of Review. I was there to pick up the best director
and picture awards. So I did benefit from the East Coast time
because I was able to watch the nominations on TV.
But as it turns out, I was very happy to come back for "The
Apartment" screening. It was very healthy psychologically. Because
it hit me – that all this acclaim for "L.A. Confidential" is great,
but really the only true test of a movie is time. "The Apartment"
is one of those movies – and that’s why I picked it – that has so
well stood the test of time.
Okay, I’m going to ask you a question, and I hate to ask this,
but Bruin readers love backstage drama, so here it goes …
"Titanic" is one of those movies people either love or hate …
(rolling eyes playfully) "Titanic, "Titanic," "Titanic"…
(laughing) What say you?
Everybody wants to talk about "Titanic."
C’mon. I’m only asking this because it’s your major rival (in
the Oscar race). Give me something.
Look, I liked it. What can you say about it: like the ship, it’s
the biggest one ever made. As a moviegoing experience, it’s very
enjoyable. I liked going into that world of that ship in a way you
can only do in the movies. As far as our picture in this rivalry,
if you will, I feel as if it’s surfing along in the wake of the
"Titanic." But that’s okay.
But is it sad that "L.A. Confidential" would have beaten all of
the competition in the last three (Oscar) years combined, and now
this movie "Titanic" is here, and your movie may not be remembered
because of it?
Oh, I don’t think that’s the case. Whether a film wins or not,
that doesn’t mean whether it will be remembered. There are many,
many wonderful movies that never even got nominated, let alone won.
When I was joking about "Titanic," "Titanic," I think "Titanic"
offers the obvious story, because it’s so big, cost so much.
You yourself would never ask for $200 million.
I think there should be a separate category: Best Film Over $150
million (laughing). I think what "Titanic" has done, which is quite
healthy, is that a lot of people are seeing the movie that normally
don’t go to the movies. And they’re liking it. And so naturally I
would hope that, while they’re there, that they like the popcorn,
they like the trailers to the other movies, and maybe they’ll come
back again.
Well, do you see a lot of movies? What was your favorite of last
year?
I do, and I must say it’s hard for me to pick a favorite. I have
difficulty with the whole idea of competition between films because
movies are so different from one another, with what they set out to
achieve, what they do.
I think the single worst thing that has happened to the movie
industry – and "Titanic" was once a victim of this at one stage and
now it’s benefiting from it – is the fascination in the media and
the public with what movies cost and what they make at the box
office.
When I look back at all the movies I loved through the years, or
ones that moved the whole movie-making process forward, so many of
them were not huge hits. And very few of them won their weekend, in
the way everyone is obsessed with today. It’s like a sporting
event. And because it’s so trumpeted in the press, the people are
all concerned about it. It’s as though one were rating restaurants,
and McDonalds would win the weekend, every week. But is that what
you want to eat every week?
As a moviegoer, I don’t care how much a movie costs, and I don’t
care if it’s making a profit. All I care is does this film move me?
Does it involve me? That’s what it’s all about.
And perhaps there are too many movie awards out there as
well?
Well, the competition of movies on an artistic level, I just
think it’s difficult because all movies are different. I mean, it’s
a cliche to say it’s an honor to be nominated, but it’s true. To be
selected and put in a group of pictures and have people say, as the
Academy does, that there is excellence in this group. But without
actually having to say which one: how can you compare "The Full
Monty" with "Titanic?"
But overall, awards and nominations are good because they call
attention to movies that people might not otherwise go see. "Boogie
Nights" is a good example.
And because of the attention "L.A Confidential" is receiving,
the scripts are coming in too, aren’t they?
Tons of scripts.
But your mostly into your own scripts, no?
I’ve written my own, but I like very much the idea of working
from other people’s material. It gives me such a broader spectrum
of experience to base stories on.
Was it also satisfying writing journalistically about film? You
used to work for Cinema magazine.
It was great. I was able to learn, to watch; it got me on sets.
The most valuable learning experience I had was when I took some
photographs of Faye Dunaway that were instrumental in getting her
cast in "Bonnie and Clyde." And rather than sell the pictures,
which ("Bonnie and Clyde" producers) offered to buy, I said I’d
rather go to Texas when you guys make the movie and watch for a
couple of weeks.
I did. That gave me the opportunity to see what happens. I went
to dailies at night; it was very valuable. And my first
professional writing was on a horror movie that was in such bad
shape that (the filmmakers) wanted me to go on location and write
scenes that were shot the very next day. So again I was allowed to
be on the set.
Well then, what are you working on now and when should I be on
the set?
(Hanson laughs hysterically)
Curtis? … Curtis?
(still laughing) Don’t know. Wish I could say come by the set
next week. But I’m not working on anything at the moment.
Nevertheless, his wish that he could say "come by next week" was
still exciting. But living in Los Angeles, I had to negotiate
whether his nice gesture was selling me an image or giving me the
truth. Still, that good smile on his face was real, as real as
people’s love for movies, and that’s what I’m betting on.
And I bet I’ll see that smile again on Oscar night.
courtesy of Monarchy/Regency Ent.
Director Curtis Hanson
courtesy of Monarchy/Regency Ent.
Hanson (right) directs a scene on the set of "L.A.
Confidential."