By Robert Sims, Special to TheMovieKit.com
This was my first time attending SXSW, and I saw and heard many things at the various panels and Q&A that I will stay with me for a long time. Here are a few of the moments that stood out for good and bad reasons.
Wondering whether anyone is funnier than Bill Murray. The former Saturday Night Live cutup naturally had the audience at the Paramount in stitches during Get Low’s post-screening Q&A. When someone asked how director Aaron Schneider and his cast were able to make a 1930s dramedy that was both touching and hilarious, Murray immediately replied, “There’s a couple of you I’d like to touch, but most of you I’m going to be hilarious with.”
Making a mental note that I should never ask Dakota Fanning to sing in public. Starring as jailbait-aged singer Cherie Currie in The Runaways, Dakota Fanning’s required to perform the 1970s all-girl rock band’s hit “Cherry Bomb,” wearing a lingerie set that would make Jenna Jameson blush. But that doesn’t mean the 16-year-old Fanning’s willing to sing “Cherry Bomb” — or any song for that matter — in front of an audience of 1,200 people. “See the thing with me about singing, that was one of the trepidations I had about doing [The Runaways] just because I have never thought of myself as a singer and specifically my sister is a really good singer, so I’ve always been the one who wasn’t a good singer and she was,” Fanning said following the screening. “So when I knew I had to sing, I was really nervous about that I was self-conscious and scared. I found that the only way I can do it is if I’m playing someone else, and if I’m hiding behind a character. So Cherie, that costume, and all that gave me the strength to be able to do it. You ask me that, it kinda makes me want to pass out a little bit. I’m just a little afraid I would do that. I’m sorry.” That said, Fanning’s more than happy to show you how far she’s perfecting Currie’s trademark stage tricks with a mic.
Feeling embarrassed for Jonah Hill and John C. Reilly. You would think a hometown crowd — one that is renowned for their love for and acknowledge of film — would come up with some original and meaningful questions for the directors of Cyrus, former Austin-ites Mark and Jay Duplass. After all, Mark Duplass had giddily declared before the screening of their hilarious character study that they had “been waiting for years to have to have one of our movies screen at the Paramount on Saturday night.” Instead, everyone waited so long for someone to ask a worthy question they started berating in jest anyone who dared waste their time. “This is the worst Q&A ever,” Hill exclaimed.
Hearing Ryan Phillippe make a half-hearted public appeal to star in Captain America. Phillippe didn’t say much during the MacGruber panel, though he admitted “It’s totally fun” when asked by moderator and Saturday Night Live writer Akiva Schaffer how it feels to be the MacGyver spoof’s most good-looking cast member. But a panel attendee did query him about whether he would want to play Captain America in Marvel’s upcoming comic-book epic. “Yeah, I would,” Phillippe said with the all enthusiasm of someone who knew the part wasn’t going to be his. “My son would love it. He’s 6 years old. I’m really into it. We’ll see what happens. It would be fun.” To be honest, Phillippe would make a better Captain America than Chris Evans.
Suffering along with Elektra Luxx director Sebastian Gutiérrez. Poor guy. Projector problems at the Paramount ruined the world premiere of his Women in Trouble sequel. A real trouper, Gutiérrez spent 30 minutes onstage entertaining a clearly annoyed audience with his self-effacing jokes and colorful anecdotes. He even brought out four cast members — including his partner Carla Gugino and Malin Akerman — to put smiles on our faces. Unfortunately, the projector could not be fixed so we were dismissed an hour into the film. An obviously apologetic SXSW—which premiered Women in Trouble last year—did right by Gutiérrez by scheduling two additional Elektra Luxx screenings. I’m glad I caught the last showing: vastly superior to the Pedro Almodóvar-ish Women in Trouble, Elektra Luxx offers a very funny and poignant look at the continuing trials and tribulations of Gugino’s pregnant porn star.
Wanting to prescribe Michel Gondry antidepressants. OK, I forgive the French director of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind for dragging himself late to a Q&A before a packed house. It was held the morning after the clocks went forward, so no one was at their best. But Gondry seemed positively suicidal when he recalls, watching in sadness, the audience members who fled before the end of the previous evening’s screening of his documentary The Thorn in the Heart. “Who walked away?” Gondry moaned barely a minute into the Q&A. “I was just there. I saw people walk away. I always want to punish them. Sometimes, when they go to the bathroom and come back, I go, ‘Yes’!” He also seemed quite dejected when people left the Q&A early to catch another panel or to go see a film.
Wishing Red White & Blue director Simon Rumley had an opportunity to answer a question. Rumley’s thought-provoking psychological chiller — which stars Noah Taylor as an ex-military man who resorts to violence when a friend goes missing — contained so many disturbing moments that it left one audience member in such emotional distress that she could not wait to ask the English director what his intentions were with the film. The woman, who seemed to have a problem with the film’s depiction of violence against the female lead, kept interrupting Rumley and eventually got into such a heated exchanged with him and Taylor’s costar Amanda Fuller, that she was told to “fuck off” by the film’s executive producer Tim League. It just so happens that League’s also the owner of the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, where Red White & Blue was screened. League later apologized for his remark, but the women had already bolted. “She was summarily asked to leave,” Rumley told me the next day. “That was interesting. She asked the question. I kinda answered and then she started shouting a little bit. Then Amanda took over and Tim took over. I answer every question seriously that is asked of me. She did not completely seem to understand the film. She asked the question, and I think she started crying. And when she started crying, I thought, ‘Something’s gone on there, she has a personal history that has relevance, that was brought out by the film.’ It’s a film, it’s something I created, I wrote it. It’s a film that I intended to affect people on an emotional level, so I guess in that respect it worked. I’m not trying to denigrate any of the characters. For me, and the actors, one of the main things is we invest the characters—even though they do bad things—we invest them with a warmth. My job as a director and as a writer is to try and get—if at least not sympathize with the characters—at least empathize with the characters. It would be interesting to know what that woman’s story was. It seemed a touch a nerve.”