Interview

Posted by Loukas Tsouknidas (loukas@filmschoolrejects.com) on April 26, 2007

Dutch director Theo Van Gogh, had aspirations of remaking some of his films in English before being murdered in Amsterdam by a radical Muslim. His film “Submission”, on women’s treatment in Islamic societies, was too much for his latest rivals (islam radicals) to digest. Steve Buscemi, Stanley Tucci and Bob Balaban took up the task of remaking three of Van Gogh’s movies. “Interview” is Buscemi’s attempt.

A serious journalist by the name of Pierre Peters (Steve Buscemi) is curiously assigned with interviewing the beautiful starlet-turned-celebrity Katya (Sienna Miller). She’s late, he’s unprepared, an accident happens and they end up in her Manhattan loft. An interview is the last thing they engage to as their game of hide and seek takes a weird path…

Weird could easily be paired with “ridiculously” since Pierre and Katya try so hard to avoid the cliches they represent that they become exactly those. I was sucked into this movie, waiting for basic human qualities to crawl out of these two obnoxious bastards that wasted my time but no cigar. The joke was on me. And i consider myself a cynic.

I was really pissed off in the end. Is this supposed to be pessimistic? Are people such pricks that they can’t communicate anything more than bitterness and bad jokes? Or is it optimistic in a sense? People manage on their own just fine without the compassion of their peers as the mechanical reaction that it usually is. To hell with this. They really had me for a while.

And who is the winner, the woman who pulls the last trick or the man who, for a brief amount of time, put his guard down and became human? There i go again. Questions are usually good but not so many crammed in such a short while. Buscemi, as did Van Gogh, never bothers to answer.

Dialogue is full of bitterness, self absorption, hypocrisy and hollow wit. Two obviously clever people act totally dumb in order to hide who they really are. And they do it convincingly.

Sienna Miller is fantastic. Maybe its her naughty starlet experience, maybe a pure talent she never showed before, but she’s right at home with the role of Katya, pulling some great mood swings and looking as good as ever. Steve Buscemi is equally great although he also focuses in his directing, trying to follow Van Gogh’s style of filming and add his own flavor in the mix. Evan Lurie’s music helps a lot in building the film’s Manhattan-lofty atmosphere.

But too much wit can ruin a film’s heart. I met a lot of pricks in my life whom i still care about. These two: i wouldn’t give a shit if they bit each other with their fangs… damn vampires.

All good and bad aside, the film’s ending was the easiest way out I’ve seen in a long time. No respect there from me…

Read more articles by Loukas Tsouknidas