Tetro

[The Perineum Falcon]

anyway, this is going to look kick ass in blu-ray!

And I bet it'll look great in the theater before that.

That clip was absolutely wonderful and I can't wait to see this.

[MacGuffin]

Coppola clan provides grist for director's `Tetro'

CANNES, France - Rivalries are inevitable in a family as big and talented as Francis Ford Coppola's, with so many siblings and cousins and uncles working in film and music.

It was friction between the filmmaker's father, composer Carmine Coppola, and his uncle, opera conductor Anton Coppola, that helped inspire the director's latest film, "Tetro," premiering Thursday at the Cannes Film Festival.

It marks the first original screenplay Coppola has written since 1974's "The Conversation" and continues the director's return to an independent career path from which he detoured after the fame and acclaim of his "Godfather" days.

Coppola, 70, always intended to write and direct personal stories. But his enormous success in the 1970s and colossal financial troubles from cost overruns and commercial flops in the 1980s forced him to take studio work and later retreat from filmmaking while trying to raise money for a big dream project that ultimately fell through.

"Tetro" follows 2007's "Youth Without Youth" as the second film in Coppola's renewed commitment to personal storytelling over Hollywood entertainment.

"That's kind of what I would have hoped to do in my career and didn't really get to do," Coppola said in an interview. "Even though you can say, yeah, well `The Godfather' films are personal. And they are, even though our family were never gangsters, and we only heard about somebody who knew a gangster.

"But still, the real day-to-day reality of the Italian family that was put into the gangster film was based on my family and what I remember as a kid. You can't make films without them being personal to some extent."

"Tetro" is really personal. The film stars Vincent Gallo in the title role as a writer living in Argentina in exile from his family — particularly his father, a cruelly domineering music conductor who has harsh rivalries with his brother, also a conductor, and his son.

There's room for only one genius in the family, the father proclaims.

While the sibling rivalry between Coppola's father and uncle was a basis for the film, the story is fictional, including the father-son estrangement and the journey of Tetro's younger brother (newcomer Alden Ehrenreich) to reconnect with his lost sibling.

"Everything in the film is real and comes from real stuff, but nothing ever happened at all like that. They say that `A Streetcar Named Desire' really is (Tennessee) Williams' expression of himself as Blanche, as someone talented and fragile, fragile in a world of harsh reality." Coppola said. "The story may not really ever have happened, but it's all true."

As with "Youth Without Youth," Coppola financed "Tetro" himself from the fortune he has built from his winery and other businesses.

He keeps tight rein on the budgets to avoid jeopardizing his finances as he did decades ago with "Apocalypse Now" and "One From the Heart," freeing himself to make films about anything he likes.

"It's a wonderful moment to think that it's like a blank sheet of paper," Coppola said. "I could do anything I want, in a way, as long as I control the budget to the amount where I don't have to ask someone else to give me a money."

Coppola also is distributing the film himself, giving it a limited release June 11, the birthday of his father, an Academy Award winner for the score of "The Godfather Part II." His father died in 1991.

While he did not want to show "Tetro" to film companies before its Cannes premiere, Coppola said he is open to a partnership with potential distributors that catch the film at Cannes and want to invest in a wider theatrical release.

"Youth Without Youth," a challenging tale of an elderly language expert (Tim Roth) made young again by a freak lightning storm, failed to find an audience, but Coppola aims to stick with his program of personal subjects that interest him.

"I'm in a unique situation," Coppola said. "I'm like now an elderly retired guy who made a lot of money, and now I can just, instead of playing golf, I can make art films."

[MacGuffin]

Francis Ford Coppola gets personal
The director, 70, reemerges with 'Tetro,' a grand yet heartfelt story of an Argentine family at times reminiscent of his own.
By Dennis Lim; Los Angeles Times

Reporting from Cannes, France -- While the Cannes official selection kicked off last week with "Up," the tale of an old man seeking new pastures, the Directors' Fortnight, a parallel event that takes place at the other end of the Croisette, got underway with a film that marked the creative renewal of an old-timer, Francis Ford Coppola.

A two-time winner of the Palme d'Or (for "The Conversation" and "Apocalypse Now"), Coppola, 70, is back on the Riviera with "Tetro." Billed as semiautobiography, this Buenos Aires-set family melodrama had been considered a shoo-in for the festival. But Cannes programmers denied it a competition slot, instead offering to show the film as a special presentation. Coppola declined, and accepted an invitation from the Directors' Fortnight, a Cannes offshoot with a reputation as a showcase for emerging directors and challenging work.

"Tetro" is clearly the work of an engaged and rejuvenated artist but it is not exactly a young man's film. If anything, it has an almost classical grandeur. Filmed in widescreen, high-definition video and mostly in black-and-white (with a few Expressionist splashes of color), the movie is a sweeping, deeply felt exploration of what one of its characters calls "ancient themes": sibling rivalries, Oedipal conflicts, the gravitational pull of the family.

"It's almost like Pirandello," Coppola said, speaking the morning after the premiere last week. "At the root of the family is a terrible incident that has warped everything. Or in Tennessee Williams, where some trauma has become the secret."

"Tetro" begins with the arrival of a teenager (newcomer Alden Ehrenreich) in Buenos Aires, and his uneasy reunion with his older brother (Vincent Gallo), who left for a "writing sabbatical" years ago. Both siblings exist in the long shadow of their tyrannical father, a renowned conductor, who had a complicated relationship with his own brother, also a musician (Klaus Maria Brandauer plays both roles).

Personal style

In his first original screenplay since 1974's "The Conversation," Coppola incorporated a few elements from his own life: his father, Carmine, was a composer, and his uncle, Anton, an opera conductor. But he cautions against drawing literal correspondences: "Nothing in this movie ever really happened but it's all true."

"Tetro" continues in earnest the project Coppola began two years ago with the ambitious literary adaptation "Youth Without Youth," a long-delayed shift to personal filmmaking, a career path he had envisioned all along. "The Godfather" (in 1972) "was way more successful than I was prepared for," he said. "You have to learn to navigate those woods."

Thanks to his successful Napa winery, Coppola has been able to self-finance his last two films, freeing him from the American moviemaking system that he likened to "this cinema gulag." "It's as if some executive decided that black-and-white films we'll pay half for, and we won't have subtitled films, and all of a sudden that's the law. It's like the dictatorship of Stalin telling Shostakovich what music was."

He considered setting "Tetro" in Detroit, where he was born, but settled on Argentina as a location that made narrative and economic sense. "I needed a country where there was a big cultural tradition and where I wouldn't get killed by the euro or the pound."

Coppola immersed himself in the culture, learning the language and hiring locals as collaborators. "Tetro" also taps into a rich vein of 20th century Latin American literature, which Coppola called "the most important movement in fiction in the last 60 years." The movie feels as old-fashioned as a Greek myth, but with its use of meta-fictional devices and its evocation of a heady bohemian milieu, it also glancingly recalls the work of such modern writers as Julio Cortázar and Roberto Bolaño. One of the characters, a literary critic named Alone, is based on a character named Farewell in Bolaño's novel "By Night in Chile" (in turn based on an actual Chilean critic named Alone).

Like the great Coppola films of the '70s, "Tetro" is a terrific actors' showcase. Gallo, not known as an easy collaborator, gives a magnetic performance. "Everyone told me, don't get involved with him, he's a nightmare," Coppola said. "But he's very bright, very humble."

The actor, who has been notoriously fastidious with every aspect of the movies he has directed, spoke admiringly of Coppola's hands-on approach. (Coppola is releasing the film himself in the States, on June 11, his father's birthday.) "Making a film is so challenging that the idea of not having total control makes no sense to me," Gallo said.

Salinger text

Ehrenreich, who was 17 when "Tetro" was shot (he's now 19), had never before appeared in a feature. For his audition, Coppola asked him to read from "The Catcher in the Rye," a book with enormous personal significance. In his teens, Coppola ran away from military school (as did Ehrenreich's character) and stopped off in New York City on the way home. "I told my brother all the things I did, and he said, here, read this book, and it was 'Catcher in the Rye.' "

"The reason I make personal films is you can learn something," Coppola said. With "Tetro," his big revelation had to do with his brother, August, who's the father of Nicolas Cage. "I never knew that I felt he abandoned me," Coppola said, "and it was over something mundane."

Because the brothers went to different schools as teenagers, he said, "he vanished from my life, which is what I realized when I wrote the story. Now I don't need to go back there again, which is liberating. That's the purpose of writing. I can write something else now."

[Kal]

I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised by this. I thought it would suck, but after hearing Coppola on the Howard Stern Show the other day it made me want to see this anyway. It's pretty good.

The performances are sensational. I love Vinnie Gallo and the new kid will be a huge star soon. The other Argentinean actors and stuff were also solid. Being from Buenos Aires, it was interesting to see Coppola's view of the city. What you see in the film is nothing like the real Buenos Aires, but a very cool 'imaginary' and bizarre version of it.

I'm writing a review and some comments on my blog if anybody is interested >> http://www.andyk.net .

[ᾦɐļᵲʊʂ]

Far and away, one of the most beautiful movies I've seen this year.  Hell, in the past few years, this movie was pretty damn solid.

So much eye candy that I think I have diabetes now.

[Ghostboy]

The movie was pretty good, but I have to say - Vincent Gallo was fucking amazing in this. Performance of the year, hands down.

[Bethie]

I need to see this soon.

[john]

An absolutely gorgeous film - from the first frame to the last - I was immediately taken by this film. The closest comparison I can give in the Coppola cannon is Rumble Fish, both aesthetically  and thematically, and it practically rivals that film in emotional vitality. The fact that they're similar certainly doesn't surprise me, and I am not trying to make the comparison between the two films a revelation - it's not, they're similarities are obvious. But the fact that Coppola that return to such artistically exciting territory without seeming repetitive or abundantly nostalgic is a testament to how well this film works.

[MINOR SPOILERS]

I was worried Coppola would go the easy route and insert some sort of romantic rivalry between the brothers for Miranda's affection. It was a great relief when this didn't happen. Or, at least, that whatever romantic tension between Tetro and Bennie It may be argued that it is still there, but it is there is a much less tangible form that I dreaded.

[DONE]

I can't say enough good things about Vincent Gallo's performance, either. It's so great to see him in the control of a competent, accomplished director again. I really wish more director's would take the opportunity to use him because he has one of the most equally sympathetic and intimidating presences in modern cinema. There are moments in this film where he's almost frightening to watch, and other moments where he is heartbreakingly fragile. The image of him clutching his manuscripts, in the flashback, sticks with me. Even the way he walks, or descends a staircase is mesmerizing.

There is not a moment in this film that isn't visually stunning. It's a really infectiously exciting film.

And, in case you're wondering, Walter Murch is still the shit. Motherfuckers got skills.

[samsong]

i don't get it.  it's an overindulgent mess that has little to offer.

i was unimpressed by everything that's been said to the film's credit, be it the aesthetic or vincent gallo's performance.  (personally i think maribel verdu gives the praise-worthy performance)  the film's "revelation" is asinine and invalidated the whole thing for me; after that it was a matter of waiting for the film to be over. 

[Stefen]

haha. I really can't wait to see this. It's been awhile since a love it or hate it type of flick has come around.

[ᾦɐļᵲʊʂ]

You all are sounding like two old women I heard discussing this movie shortly after seeing it.

Old woman #1: What did you think of Tetro?

Old woman #2: Ugh.  Too arty.

Old woman #1: Too arty? In what way?

Old woman #2: They just did all this stuff with the lights and the acting... I didn't care for it.

Old woman #1: Maybe those things were intentional?

Old woman #2: I don't care, I didn't like it.

Old woman #1: Me neither.

[Pas]

So anybody else saw this or what? I'm downloading it right now, looks good. Looks like the kind of film we should have seen here 

[Pubrick]

So anybody else saw this or what? I'm downloading it right now, looks good. Looks like the kind of film we should have seen here 

perhaps you should read the posts above you. there are at least 5 ppl who saw it on this page alone. all with fairly passionate opinions about it.

[Alexandro]

In a very distinct way this felt like watching Funny People again. For something like an hour and a half Coppola turns into COPPOLA and delivers a truly fantastic film. In fact, saying he becomes his old self would be putting it mildly, cause this is actually a transformation into a new, young and bold director. Everything feels so vital. The screenplay drips of personal relevance, there is a sense this is so close to the bone for him, it almost hurts. As everyone has said here, Gallo channels his usual fury and love/hate persona into something that illustrates what a great actor he can be in the hands of a good director. It almost feels like no one else could have played this character. And the cinematography makes a strong case for watching the film in mute and still be fascinating.

Yet in the final 40 minutes the ships starts sinking in front of our very eyes, the characters lose their initial edge and mystery, contrived revelations and conclusions come, and even aesthetically the film does some very questionable things with the use of color (There was a couple of initial technicolor sequences that looked awesome, but the last one looks cheap and fake in the worst possible way).

In a way, Coppola really becomes a young director who shows promise but doesn't fulfill it here, going a little too far in the last act of the film. Also, he becomes a young director in the way he clearly shows his influences; this film feels strongly like a Pedro Almodovar melodrama, complete with twist and turns through the years in the story, the underworld of the argentinian stage, some drag performances and a few hot sexual scenes.

Despite it's flaws, this should set an example for all the other old movie brats who seem so comfortable now in their studio financed little world. They all should go out and finance a movie of their own.

[modage]

Watched this finally.  What the shit was that about?  I just couldn't get over that the same guy who did The Godfather and Apocalypse Now is now doing these amateurish indie movies.  I would buy it if this was from one of his non-famous kids, but I can't believe he did this.