Debra Granik directed and co-wrote the Academy Award-nominated feature film “Winter’s Bone.” The drama was named Best Feature at the Gotham Independent Film Awards, won the Grand Jury Prize and the Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award at Sundance Film Festival, and was awarded the Humanitas Prize. Her other credits include feature “Down to the Bone” and the documentary “Stray Dog.”
“Leave No Trace” will premiere at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival on May 13.
W&H: Describe the film for us in your own words.
DG: This is a story about a father and daughter living on the margins of society. They try to think their own thoughts and live undetected. It’s about a father trying to live with the invisible wounds of war and a young daughter who must learn to exist alongside these wounds and figure out where and how they can live going forward.
It is also about their fierce bond and surviving the process of cleaving yourself from someone you love and rely upon.
W&H: What drew you to this story?
DG: This is a tale of unusual survival that we found compelling in its details, and it involved a kind of regional filmmaking that is very exciting for us as filmmakers. To document a specific region, in this case the Pacific Northwest of North America, is what makes us want to make films.
We’re also drawn to characters who are non-conforming people on a search.
W&H: What do you want people to think about when they are leaving the theater?
DG: I want people to think about all the people we don’t usually see represented onscreen in American cinema. I want people to think about what it means to live with the scars of the deep trauma caused by war and the people who spend the rest of their lives living on the margins of society as a result. I want people to think about what it means to live by your own choices in this country, even if you don’t agree with those choices, or society doesn’t sanction them.
I want people to enjoy female protagonists who don’t have to be sexualized to be interesting to the story or to the commerce of filmmaking.
W&H: What was the biggest challenge in making the film?
DG: This was the first time we have collaborated so deeply with multiple entities, and it definitely has its challenges. In the past we have been able to move in a very nimble, small way which was not as possible with this film, but [producers] Anne Harrison and Linda Reisman did everything they could to support our style of filmmaking, which is sometimes at odds with how most American films are made.
It can be hard to make a quiet film in a cultural moment where loud and overwhelming elements of soundtrack and dire stakes are ubiquitous.
W&H: How did you get your film funded? Share some insights into how you got the film made.
DG: We were fortunate enough to have the unwavering support of Bron Studios and First Look/Topic who funded the film. Our producing partners, Reisman and Harrison, brought Bron and First Look to the table. Reisman and Harrison optioned the book many years ago from Peter Rock and remained champions of his novel, tirelessly sticking with it until they found the right partners.
W&H: What does it mean for you to have the film play at Cannes?
DG: This is a huge milestone for me. I like to think of my films as representing a side of America that doesn’t often get screen time and those are films that happen to also have a hard time finding a life outside of the U.S. — so to know that our film will reach a larger, non-American audience is a rare and novel experience.
Hopefully Cannes is also an opportunity to meet, learn from, and enjoy the work of filmmakers from around the world.
W&H: What’s the best and worst advice you’ve received?
DG: Work with people with whom you genuinely share taste, sensibility, interests, and even politics!
W&H: What advice do you have for other female directors?
DG: Forge a team with the people mentioned above!
W&H: Name your favorite woman-directed film and why.
DG: I admire a great many films from women. In the last couple of years, I’ve been an ardent champion of Céline Sciamma’s “Girlhood.”
W&H: Hollywood and the global film industry are in the midst of undergoing a major transformation. Many women — and some men — in the industry are speaking publicly about their experiences being assaulted and harassed. What are your thoughts on the #TimesUp movement and the push for equality in the film business?
DG: I am watching with great interest what organizers around the world are doing. For example, with the French nonprofit Le Deuxieme Regard. Since their launch five years ago, they have become a true lobbying force for promoting women in the French film industry, challenging French cultural institutions, and creating an Observatory to monitor equality in the French film industry. They have created several proposals [outlining] political incentives that are currently being considered by the French government, [including] a tax credit incentive for projects directed by women, a national observatory of equality, etc.
They are planning a number of actions at Cannes, including the French Cultural Minister announcing some new government commitments and the very first talk uniting rising gender equality movements with representatives of Time’s Up U.S., Time’s Up UK, CIMA (Spain), Greek Women’s Wave, and Italian Dissenso Commune.
Over here at home, we don’t have that kind of government support as the French women are galvanizing, but we do have Caroline Libresco and the Women’s Initiative at Sundance and Stacy Smith at USC, and all the crucial ways that the Institute’s various programs sponsored and nurtured a whole generation of women filmmakers. I have been buoyed by the continued support of the Sundance Institute and its festival for many years as an independent filmmaker, and I always have to throw attention to what they’ve done for many of us to call Time’s Up! way before there was a movement.
