Tag Archive for 'Karyn Kusama'

I know I’ve been posting a lot about Jennifer’s Body but I’ve been holding onto these links from interviews with Karyn Kusama and they are too good to not share.

Seems that she even knew (didn’t everyone besides Fox?) that selling the film to boys would flop as she says to Jenni Miller over at MTV.com.  I also love how she stands up for creating a film that reflects women and not men’s images of how women should be and act.

I don’t know if selling the film as a straight horror film and selling it primarily to boys is really going to do any of us any favors, frankly,” Kusama said. “But we’ll see. I’m really crossing my fingers that I am completely wrong and I really hope I am, you know. I really do.

I think boys will really enjoy it, but it makes me extremely, extremely frustrated to imagine that I have been working on this movie for nearly two years now and have committed this much time and energy because, precisely because I felt like if I were nineteen again, I would know someone was speaking to me and gave a s–t about my existence in the pop cultural landscape.

On how things still are the same after 20 years:

It’s a little tough sometimes to feel like things haven’t changed all that much in over 20 years, speaking for my nineteen-year-old self, and 20 years later, things seem as barren… for smart, complicated entertainment [made] for females that boys will also enjoy, you know? It gets under my skin, as you can see!

For those who have followed Kusama’s career she has had her challenges in Hollywood as a female director who directs out of the box.  She started with the amazing Girlfight and also directed Aeon Flux. Here she talks about the challenges facing women directors:

I definitely think it’s a conversation that needs to keep happening,” she said. “As much as I am tired of it, I’m tired more by the fact that it’s a conversation that needs to keep happening. We are not out of the woods, by any means, and I just think we have to sort of accept that information and then try to do something about it, you know? Try to examine it and try to really consider how we’ve gotten here and why we can’t seem to move past it, you know? That’s sort of where I’m at, just sort of trying to understand better the slow march toward change.

It’s hard to get a woman director in Hollywood to say this out loud.  Yes, we are tired of needing to have this same conversation for the past two decades, but if we stop asking the questions and figuring out the answers we will never make change for women directors.

ST VanAirsdale also gets some good nuggets in his excellent interview at Movieline:

About what she was drawn to the Jennifer’s Body script and her passion for horror film:

For me, one of the most interesting ideas in the movie is that the monster is female, but the villain is male. It’s her victimization that creates a monster. And that says a lot to me about femininity.

I’ve been asked countless times, “Why are you drawn to horror films? Why do you think women are drawn to horror films?” And it’s because in a way, it’s one of the few genres that tells it like it is. A lot of times, women do feel like they’re running for their lives somehow.

Lastly, her honesty in the next quote in talking about making mistakes and the difficulties on directing a studio film:

With Aeon Flux, I was so green to the politics of studio egos and agendas that I had no idea I was in trouble — even when I was. This was a different situation. I had people who were equipped and willing to protect me in a completely different way.

I got really lucky with this movie. There were some big disagreements between me and the studio, but ultimately we found our common ground. I don’t know how you make movies — and try to protect the meaning of your work that you know need to still be there — without those disagreements. When you make a studio movie, do you decide to be compliant or resign yourself to it? I don’t, and it might kill me. The system breaks you. It does. In some ways it can really make you a leaner, meaner machine. Maybe I’ll be that. Or maybe as time goes on, the harsher it’s going to be for me. But I think it’s worth fighting for your work. At the end of the life you live, that’s all there is. That’s why I do this.

She has totally impressed me.

‘Jennifer’s Body’ Is Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman (MTV.com)

Director Karyn Kusama on Jennifer’s Body, Megan Fox and the ‘Crisis of Being Looked At‘ (Movieline)

‘Jennifer’s Body’ Director Karyn Kusama On Women In Hollywood, Diablo Cody And Outsiders (MTV.com)

Tags: Jennifer's Body, Karyn Kusama, Megan Fox

Jennifer’s Body written by Diablo Cody and directed by Karyn Kusama is exactly what I expected.  It’s a campy, women centric look at the atrocities of being a teenage girl.  For some of us who have been there, the first line of the film “Hell is a teenage girl” seems just right.  Megan Fox and Amanda Seyfried play two best friends who have grown apart.  Jennifer (Fox) is the nasty sex pot and Seyfriend plays Anita (Needy) the nerdy girl with the cute boyfriend who has become Jennifer’s lapdog.

Much has been made about how Diablo Cody wanted to put a feminist bent on the horror genre which she loves.  I’m not a big horror fan and this was way more campy than scary.  It’s about revenge on all the people who do you wrong.  Jennifer becomes evil “not high school evil” as Needy says but evil evil when an idiot band of indie rockers decide that the best way for them to become famous is to sacrifice a virgin to the devil.  (Go with it.)  Since they are in a small town, they think all the girls are virgins and so we know there will be trouble when Jennifer gets into their van looking for fun pretending she is a virgin.  Clearly, she doesn’t know what they have in mind and quickly believes she is about to be gang raped.  The ritual goes awry when the idiots sacrifice a non-virgin and so Jennifer becomes possessed by a demon.  (Go with it.)  And the demon wants revenge.  She wants revenge on all the guys who treat high school girls like crap.

Cody said in an interview with Reuters: “(Director) Karyn Kusama and I are both outspoken feminists. We wanted to subvert the classic horror model of women being terrorized.”

So now the terrorized is the terrorizer.  I want to make it clear that this film is by no means a work of art.  Megan Fox is beyond plastic looking and her acting is atrocious and on the whole the film is not particularly scary.  But as a fan of Cody’s work I love how she takes expectations and messes with them.  I also love the pop culture laden language and while Cody has talked about the feminism as being subversive, I found it to be very present and overt.

Here’s my favorite line: “PMS isn’t real.  It was created by the boy run media to make us seem crazy.”

Any movie that has the guts to say a line like that gets points in my book.

Film opens wide tomorrow.

Tags: Amanda Seyfried, Diablo Cody, Karyn Kusama, Megan Fox

Diablo Cody is one of the figures who gets both the love and hate especially from other women.  On the one side she used her sexuality (her stripper book and pole-dancing life) to get her break in Hollywood and I bet that meetings in Hollywood with Diablo are nothing like meetings in the past with female screenwriters.

On the other hand she used what she knew and broke into the boy’s club and now in two years is kicking ass up and down the street with a new movie (Jennifer’s Body- out September 18) and a successful TV show The United States of Tara.  She has figured out what works (like so many guys have) and has run with it.  Her success opens the door for other women.  Her success also opens the door to lots of scrutiny and because there are so few other women at her level, she has a lot of responsibility to continue to be successful cause you know the saying (in Hollywood) when one women fails — we all fail.

I know that women and lots of feminists have issues with Cody and her work.  But I am impressed with her.  She stands up for herself and her beliefs and for women and feminism.  Who the hell else in Hollywood admits so publicly and proudly that she is a feminist and that everything she does is layered with feminism?  Let me think.  No one.

Here’s some stuff she said in a great interview on The Frisky:

My feminist hat is permanently welded to my head—I definitely can’t take it off! It’s so important for me to write things from the female perspective and in service of women and in the right roles for women. That’s usually what I’m thinking going into it. Obviously, the story goes first. But then my next priority is how am I going to sneak my subversive feminist message into this?

The Frisky: Do you always think the female perspective is the feminist perspective, though?

DC: No, not always. But I think representation is obviously the first step to equality, so if women aren’t being represented in a diverse way in movies, they’re going to remain marginalized.

You have to listen to her on Elvis Mitchell’s show, The Treatment.  She’s humble, smart, in awe of the opportunities she has gotten, and is a true lover of pop culture.

Now I haven’t seen Jennifer’s Body yet (I will at the end of this week.)  I have never been interested in the horror genre before but I want to see this film because Cody wrote it and because it is directed by Karyn Kusama.  (Cody also has an executive producer credit on the film.)  Who knows if the film will be feminist.  Just because the person who wrote it is a feminist doesn’t mean that the film will be feminist even if it stars women.  This is a mainstream Hollywood movie.  It was bought by Fox Atomic (which doesn’t exist anymore) and now is being released by big Fox.  It’s opening wide which means 2500 plus screens.  It could potentially gross 30 million or more on opening weekend.  It’s going to attract young men and young women.  The men cause Megan Fox is hot and the women cause young women seem to love horror films.

Here’s what the NY Times had to say about women and horror:

And yet recent box office receipts show that women have an even bigger appetite for these films than men. Theories straining to address this particular head scratcher have their work cut out for them: Are female fans of “Saw” ironists? Masochists? Or just dying to get closer to their dates?

Jennifer’s Body is a film created to appeal to both men and women (I think it will skew young).  If they can manage to pull it off it will be a big deal.

“Jennifer’s Body” was designed with both feminists and 15-year-old boys in mind, a seemingly eccentric blueprint that, as Ms. Kusama points out, is in line with the best movies of the slasher tradition. “It may be one of the best ways for a young male audience to experience a female story without feeling like they have been limited by a female perspective,” she said.

I think that women, feminists, need to stop beating up on Diablo.  We love to eat our young.  Sure her feminism is different but does that mean it’s not feminism?  Just the fact that we are having a conversation about feminism in a horror movie to me is a step forward.

Here’s the trailer:

The Fempire (Women & Hollywood)

Taking Back the Knife: Girls Gone Gory (NY Times)

Exclusive Q&A: Diablo Cody Talks Megan Fox, Therapy, And Doing “The View” With Courtney Love (The Frisky)

Tags: Jennifer's Body, Karyn Kusama, The United States of Tara

The Festival just keeps getting more and more loaded.  (Descriptions are by the festival)

I’m sure I’m missing a bunch but here are some highlights of films by women and some not by women but about women.  Hopefully we will be able to see most of them in the near future.  Some already have releases scheduled.

Midnight Madness

Jennifer’s Body written by Diablo Cody, directed by Karyn Kusama

According to Jennifer’s Body, high school isn’t the best time of one’s life. It’s actually hell on earth, awash with teenage angst, hormones and fountains of blood. Penned by Juno scribe Diablo Cody and directed by Karyn Kusama (responsible for the acclaimed Girlfight), Jennifer’s Body is the shocking flipside to Cody’s slacker teen romance.

Contemporary World Cinema

Lourdes directed by Jessica Hausner

In order to escape her isolation, wheelchair-bound Christine makes a life-changing journey to Lourdes, the iconic site of pilgrimage in the Pyrenees Mountains.

My Year With Sex directed by Sarah Watt

A tender story from Australia highlights the realistic ups and downs of an Australian family in the year following a parent’s emergency medical procedure.

Discovery

The Angel directed by Margareth Olin

A young mother (played brilliantly by Maria Bonnevie) struggles with a history of drug abuse in this exquisitely rendered and deeply compassionate piece, the first fiction film from one of Norway’s most respected documentary filmmakers.

Applause directed by Martin Pieter Zandvliet

Paprika Steen delivers a tour-de-force performance in this devastating drama about an alcoholic actress trying to put her life back together.

Beautiful Kate directed by Rachel Ward

In order to make peace with his combative, dying father, a writer must return to his childhood home and confront long suppressed memories of the mysterious deaths of his brother and twin sister.

The Day Will Come directed by Susanne Schneider

Thirty years after giving her daughter up for adoption to join the terrorist underground in Germany, Judith is tracked down by her nowadult daughter Alice to a vineyard in the Alsace where she is living with a new family and a new identity.

A Brand New Life directed by Ounie Lecomte

Impressive debut by French-Korean filmmaker Ounie Lecomte who, inspired by her childhood, recounts the emotional journey of a little girl abandoned by her father in an orphanage.

Eamon directed by Margaret Corkery

A family holiday brings to a head the destructive love triangle between Eamon, a little boy with behavioural problems, his selfish mother Grace and his sexually frustrated father Daniel.

The Happiest Girl in the World directed by Radu Jude

Family conflict produces comedy in this story of a young girl who wins a car in a lottery and her scheming parents who insist on selling it.

My Dog Tulip directed by Paul Fierlinger | Sandra Fierlinger

Christopher Plummer and Isabella Rossellini voice this vividly animated, touching tale of friendship between an elderly bachelor and his German shepherd.

La Pivellina directed by Tizza Covi | Rainer Frimme

A small abandoned girl is sheltered by a circus woman in this tale of courage, loss and togetherness.

Shirley Adams directed by Oliver Hermanus

Intimate, precise portrait of a “coloured” mother in Cape Town, South Africa whose son is disabled in a neighborhood shooting.

The Unloved directed by Samantha Morton

Morton shifts from actor to director in this stark, intimate portrait of a young British girl thrown from an abusive family into the hands of government care.

Special Presentations

Bright Star- Jane Campion

A drama based on the secret love affair between 23-year-old English poet John Keats (Ben Whishaw) and the girl next door, Fanny Brawne (Abbie Cornish), an outspoken student of fashion. Intensely and helplessly absorbed in each other, they rode a wave of romantic obsession that deepened as their troubles mounted. Only Keats’s illness and untimely death proved insurmountable.

An Education- Lone Scherfig

A coming-of-age story about a teenaged girl in 1960s suburban London and how her life changes with the arrival of a playboy nearly twice her age. Torn between her parents’ dream of going to Oxford University and a more tempting kind of life, she must decide if the new path is one that will trap her or set her free.

Glorious 39- Stephen Poliakoff

This tense conspiracy thriller set on the eve of World War II and based on disturbing real events, focuses on a young woman who stumbles across evidence of a sinister Nazi appeasement plot. As her close friends begin to die in suspicious circumstances, she finds her own life in danger from an increasingly menacing and powerful enemy.

London River- Rachid Bouchareb

This intimate drama tells the story of two people, a Muslim man and a Christian woman, who are immediately affected by the July 2005 London bombings. Both of them are drawn to the British capital when their children go missing on the day of the attacks. Putting aside their cultural differences, they will give each other the strength to continue the search for their children and maintain their faith.

Mother- Bong Joon-ho

A unique noir thriller that digs into the secrecy surrounding a terrible murder and the mystery of a mother’s primal love for her son. The films of director Bong Joon-ho regularly, and brilliantly, break with convention, thanks to an imagination that is not confined to the accepted parameters of humour, suspense or horror – Mother is no exception.

Partir- Catherine Corsini

Suzanne (Kristin Scott Thomas) is a well-to-do married woman and mother in the south of France. Her idle bourgeois lifestyle gets her down and she decides to go back to work as a physiotherapist. Her husband agrees to fix-up a consulting room for her in their backyard. When Suzanne and the man (Sergi López) hired to do the building meet, the mutual attraction is sudden and violent. Suzanne decides to give up everything and live this all-engulfing passion to the fullest.

The Vintner’s Luck- Niki Caro

Set in early 19th century France The Vintner’s Luck tells the compelling tale of Sobran Jodeau, an ambitious young peasant winemaker and the three loves of his life—his beautiful and passionate wife Celeste, the proudly intellectual baroness Aurora de Valday and Xas, an angel who strikes up an unlikely friendship with Sobran. A fantastical creature with wings that smell of snow, Xas turns out to be an unconventional mentor. Under his guidance Sobran is forced to fathom the nature of love and belief and in the process, grapples with the sensual, the sacred and the profane—all in pursuit of the perfect vintage.

Whip-It- Drew Barrymore

Drew Barrymore’s directorial debut stars Ellen Page (Juno) as Bliss, a rebellious Texas teen who throws in her small-town beauty pageant crown for the rowdy world of roller-derby. Marcia Gay Harden (Mystic River, Pollock) plays Bliss’s disapproving mother, while Drew Barrymore, Kristen Wiig (Saturday Night Live) and Juliette Lewis (Old School) play roller-derby stars. Whip It also stars Eve, Jimmy Fallon, Daniel Stern, Alia Shawkat, Ari Graynor, Andrew Wilson, Zoe Bell and singer-songwriter Landon Pigg.

Women Without Men- Shirin Neshat

Shirin Neshat’s first feature-length film is based on a magic-realist novel written by Iranian author Sharnush Parsipur. The narrative interweaves the lives of four Iranian women during the summer of 1953, a pivotal moment in Iranian history when an American led coup d’état brought down the democratically elected prime minister Mohammed Mossadegh and reinstalled the Shah to power. The film chronicles each woman’s quest for change and their mysterious encounter in a magical orchard.

Vanguard

Fish Tank- Andrea Arnold

Andrea Arnold’s assured follow-up to Red Road is a taboo-breaking love story about a violent teenaged girl transformed by desire for her mother’s new boyfriend.

My Queen Karo- Dorothée van den Berghe

A young girl witnesses the moral dilemmas of free love when her parents join a squatter community in 1970s Amsterdam.

Tags: Diablo Cody, Drew Barrymore, Ellen Page, Karyn Kusama