BIUTIFUL - Alejandro Gonzales Inrarritu Interview
From: Andrea Chase
Series: Behind the Scenes
Length: 10:23
Until now Alejandro Gonzales Inarritu has made films that feature multiple story lines of people in crisis. With BIUTIFUL, he follows one story from beginning to end, but loses none of the complexity or richness of his previous work. It also incorporates part of his own experience of feeling a brush with death. When I spoke with him on October 8, 2010, it was the first thing he addressed. Inarritu, a gregrious man with a hearty laugh and a wealth of ideas, explicated on the film's themes of sex and death, taking leave of this life in tiny increments, and why collaboration brought his vision into sharper focus.
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Piece Description
Until now Alejandro Gonzales Inarritu has made films that feature multiple story lines of people in crisis. With BIUTIFUL, he follows one story from beginning to end, but loses none of the complexity or richness of his previous work. It also incorporates part of his own experience of feeling a brush with death. When I spoke with him on October 8, 2010, it was the first thing he addressed. Inarritu, a gregrious man with a hearty laugh and a wealth of ideas, explicated on the film's themes of sex and death, taking leave of this life in tiny increments, and why collaboration brought his vision into sharper focus.
Timing and Cues
00:00 - 01:22 Intro and first question: When Uxbal get his diagnosis of terminal cancer, it’s like he becomes as much an immigrant in this life as the undocumented aliens he works with and exploits, in that immigrants see places differently than the native born.
01:22 - 03:09 He tells the story of how he had a health scare and when he did, immediately he saw the world in a completely different way, as though he was in the Twilight Zone. Everything looked different, and that’s the way he shot the POV of Uxbal. He shot in 26 frames, so it’s a little bit slower.
03:23 - 04:57 Goes into the specifics of the camera tricks he plays, including a reflection of Uxbal that doesn’t quite match the way Uxbal moves. There are, he says, a lot of secrets. He wanted to do three things he hadn’t done before. An exercise in tragedy in modern times. A metaphysical element. A social commentary with hyper-reality.
05:16 - 06:45 Goes into the thinking of the imagery of the club scene where dancers are an explosion of breasts, on their heads, on their behinds. The juxtaposition of Uxbal’s loneliness and the life around him in this way brings up the contradiction of sex and death, which are entwined in the human psyche. It was a nightmare to execute it technically and cinematically, though it’s his favorite in the film
06:53 - 08:03 Why he uses writing partners after the first draft, how it helps him to focus on his story and make it better as a film. These collaborators were chosen because he hadn’t worked with them before. He also doesn’t like the loneliness of writing.
08:17 - 08:53 Starting with the vibrant wallpaper in Malabra’s apartment, he discusses the dedication he had to absolute authenticity in using real locations and real people, not actors, to fill out the film.
08:55 - 10:15 The genesis of the name Uxbal, and how it incorporates Spanish, Mexican, Mayan, and geographical locations as well as a real person and why it is so right for this character. There is something universal about it.
10:15 - 10:24 Thank you and outro.
Intro and Outro
INTRO:Andrea Chase takes you behind the scenes of BIUTIFUL with its director and co-writer, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu. BIUTIFUL is a spiritual story of one man’s journey from the darkness of his life here on earth, to the light of the after life. The man is Uxbal, a petty criminal, guider of the dead into the light, a loving if impatient father, and a compassionate if also impatient ex-husband to Marambra. He’s a man of contradictions, including trying to protect the undocumented immigrants whom he also exploits. When he receives a diagnosis of terminal cancer, Uxbal is overwhelmed with the seemingly impossible task of tying up the loose ends of his tattered life, including seeing to it that is two children are cared for, while also struggling with the day-to-day problems of living a life on the edges of both society and of the economic structure of his native Barcelona. Tethered to this life, he is also pulled towards the next by the idea of the father he never met, which come into even sharper focus when he and his older brother are forced to have him disinterred and reburied, and the question that starts the film, “Is it real?“ becomes a question about more than just the diamonds in a ring. The film stars Javier Bardem as Uxbal. Inarritu’s previous work includes Amores Perros, for which he received an Oscar nomination, as well as 21 Grams and Babel, multiple award winners both.
OUTRO:Andrea Chase has taken you Behind the Scenes of BIUTIFUL with is director and co-writer, Alejandro Gonzales Inarritu.
