A conversation with D. Marshall Hertford, winner of the Cricket Award for Best Screenwriting in a Short Film

http://www.merryweatherjones.com/content/a_conversation_with_d._marshall_hertford,_winner_of_the_cricket_award_for_best_screenwriting_in_a_short_film Sat, 03 Nov 2007 22:04:47 GMT A conversation with D. Marshall Hertford, winner of the Cricket Award for Best Screenwriting in a Short Film D. Marshall Hertford: Are you in the shower? [startled] Lord M'Deentor: Yes, can you hear the water? DMH: No, but I can hear the echo. LM: But not the water? DMH:: Yeah, sort of. LM: [laughs] DMH: Just got done watching A Very Long Engagement. LM: : Did you like it? DMH: I liked Jodie Foster. LM: [laughs] Dirty. DMH: They did it from beeeeeeehind. LM: [laughing] DMH: That movie was all about vaginas. LM: You think? DMH: Yeah. LM: You must have loved it. DMH: Nah, I didn't. It was overdone, a little bit. The narration especially. And the introduction of characters, come the fuck on: "She never thought about her lover when she satisfied herself." It was all about vaginas, man. LM: Jean-Pierre Jeunet also directed Amelie. That wasn't terrible. DMH: Yeah, I love Audrey Tatou... usually. But here, she just felt kind of... I dunno. The characters were too achetypal. You had her as the feminine hero overcoming her weakness to find her man (who remains mostly mysterious to us) and meanwhile, everyone else in the whole damned story basically serves as an usher, all of them pushing her toward her goal. LM: She's not strong enough as a personality to embody that kind of character. DMH: Yeah, I agree. She's too quirky. LM: I didn't like the romantic interest. He was so vague. DMH: Yeah. That was why I said it was all about vaginas. It wasn't about the men at all, it was all about the women they'd left behind. LM: And I felt like the director didn't really know what he wanted to say, where he wanted to take it. DMH: Yeah. It was really aimless. But I guess seeing Audrey Tatou's ass and Foster's tits was good enough. LM: And this totally screws Dwight's theory, 'cause he freaking loved that film. [Dwight is a mutual friend of Lord M'Deentor and Mr. Hertford] DMH: Yeah, primarily because the plot devices are kind of film noir. Like with the albatross and the plane named after it, and the question he asks her twice: something like, "Does it hurt you to walk?" Dwight loves that symbolism shit. I bet he'll love Brick, and I bet he loved the Maltese Falcon. LM: He's a closet romantic. DMH: Yep. And this was a sappy movie. And not really all that gorey--more dirt than gore. Also, you're holding a bag of "Yo Mix" in this picture. LM: You're looking at it now? DMH: It's a good picture. Did you just take this? LM: Yup. It's "Tokyo Mix," actually. DMH: Oh. LM: I thought the amount of gore was appropriate. Not too much, not too little. It was something I felt the movie did right. DMH: Mmm. I'll give it that much. I've also got Capote to watch. And for some reason, I picked up Everything is Illuminated but ended up with Get Rich or Die Tryin'. I don't know what happened. Maybe I got the wrong box. LM: Capote was great. DMH: Yeah. I assume it will be. LM: I won't discuss it until you've seen it. DMH: It's okay. I already know how it's going to go, basically. Oh! I bought Solaris, too. LM: I haven't seen it. Soderbergh-Clooney, right? Any good? DMH: It was pretty... well, interesting. LM: Must be, if you bought it. DMH: It's a tough one to pin down. I really need to watch it again... [trails off] LM: Do you get the Travel Channel? I can't remember if we've talked about it, but Bourdain's coming on in like, forty-five minutes? And he's going be in Florida. DMH: I'm doing a LOT of writing. And I need to make a call. But I'll try and check it out. LM: It'll be good. He'll smoke and complain and drink and piss people off in your home state. DMH: I just can't let the muse go, you know? LM: Yup. DMH: I'm writing notes like crazy, now. I don't want to lose these thoughts. LM: What would you say is your process when you have an idea and want to get it down on paper? DMH: My mind works in such strange ways. Here's a great example: This morning I remembered that I wanted to continue writing about two of my character's childhoods, and how they discovered girls in grade school. So I wrote "acetic" on my forearm. LM: I think you ought to write about writing "acetic" on your forearm. DMH: [laughs] No one wants to read about me. They don't want to see an eccentric bleed on paper. Not randomly, anyway. LM: Yes, they do. I promise you, people are hungry for every day stuff, personal stuff, humble lifestyle stuff. DMH: I hate most diaries and journals. They remind me of how we're all just apes, and how I'm such a fucking strange ape. No one wants to read about strange apes. They want to read about everyday apes. I'm going for "focused" and concise. It's well-planned blood spilling. LM: The way you're talking to me, right now, that's how I think you should talk to your audience. DMH: From time to time, I do. I've just had so few experiences. LM: The stories of your life could keep me entertained every day of the week. DMH: But it has to translate. People aren't attuned to simply relating with someone real; they want to relate with characters. Maybe you or I enjoy relating with other people--but the characters. If they can be somewhat ordinary, I think it's a start. LM: People don't read to read about characters, which are often just a doorway to the author's personality. With or without a lot of experience, you've got a lot of personality. It's all in how you choose to present it. DMH: You get burned if you invest too much of your personality in your art. You pour your heart and soul into a project, it gets greelit, and then you're fired and ten new writers are brought in to dumb it down. Gritty naked honesty is a bad idea. You can't expose yourself like that. LM: Like that scene we're treated to in 2046, where Tony Leung almost exposes what my brother would call "too much"? DMH: [laughs] For Tony Leung, too much is never enough. LM: You've introduced me and everyone I know to so much great music--what gets you in the mood? DMH: To write? [both laugh] Mmm. Actually, this is so cool, man. Angelo Badalamenti is doing the soundtrack for Life of Pi. LM: Another Jean-Pierre Jeunet project. Badalamenti works on David Lynch's films, right? DMH: Yeah. Have you read or heard of the book? LM: I've heard of it. DMH: Great book, you have to read it. LM: I'm not reading anything at the moment. Too distracted. DMH: That's awful. LM: I know, I can't help it. DMH: I'm going to send you some books I just finished, maybe they'll interest you. LM: I appreciate that, thank you. DMH: I can't stand the idea of you not reading. LM: You've never gone through a period where you couldn't sit still and committ? DMH: I'm only as disconnected as my comforts and desires allow me to be. LM: Selective laziness. [both laugh] Did you watch Last Days? DMH: Yeah. Slow pace... very calculated and slow. Almost brooding. They portray Kurt well, very introverted, lonely. The scenes shift back and forth pretty randomly. They show one part of an event, then flip forward twice, then come back and add some more to the first event. Sort of similar to Elephant. LM: I've only seen parts of Elephant, but I know what you mean. DMH: It's trademark Gus Van Sant. There's a great scene where the PI and Jonathan are driving, and the trees above are reflecting off the windshield. Van Sant does this purposely, to make you shift your attention from the passengers in the car to the tress. It's sort of a weird effect. Also, there's a great scene where Kurt's playing a song and rushing around frantically playing instruments. The entire thing is shot from outside an open window, with the camera moving out very slowly. It takes about nine minutes. LM: He's forcing the audience to take their time and look at the scene. DMH: Yeah. Dialogue is totally unimportant in his movies. LM: The directing style is similar to Asano's acting method. DMH: Exactly like Asano. LM: It's the look--no words are needed. DMH: And Kiyoshi Kurosawa. He's the one who did Cure and Bright Future, and Pulse. LM: Bright Future was wierd. I liked it. Have you seen it, yet? DMH: Nope. Good ending, I hear. LM: I won't spoil it. DMH: Who's your favorite Japanese actor? Asano? LM: I like Asano a lot. DMH: I think Yakusho is my current favorite, probably because he's in everything Kurosawa does. But then, Yakusho is in everything else, too. [laughs] Not a particularly striking man, but an intense actor. LM: I seem to recall him from the information given for certain films featured on YesAsia. DMH: He played Nobu in Memoirs of a Geisha. He's also in Cure. What a fucking crazy movie. LM: I haven't seen Cure. DMH: You really should. LM: Oh! Did you get the growDino wet? [referring to a toy she sent him] DMH: Yeah, I mentioned that yesterday. LM: I know, but I was distracted. Did you blow it up? DMH: No. [laughs] I want to leave it in the packaging. LM: Aren't you curious about what it's like when it's big? DMH: [Bwahahaha] I think it's more humorous to leave it unopened. Like an unaltered piece of art, or something. LM: But it's sad. You're never going to play with it. DMH: Maybe I'll open it when the time is right. LM: [laughs] DMH: This thing is like a fine wine, man... Audrey Tatou, Tony Leung, Gus Van Sant http://www.merryweatherjones.com/content/a_conversation_with_d._marshall_hertford,_winner_of_the_cricket_award_for_best_screenwriting_in_a_short_film http://www.merryweatherjones.com/viewcomments.php?articleid=153