Next Fest is coming to L.A.
in August, and we're excited to screen some of Sundance's coolest movies.
Including the darkly absurd comedy Lemon.
Writer and director Janicza Bravo,
and co-writer and star Brett Gelman came by to talk about what inspired the movie.
>From character to look to editing and
more these are the top ten influences on the film Lemon.
(Music)
Lemon is a dark, absurd comedy.
It is the story of a man who is left by his girlfriend
of ten years who watches his life unravel after she leaves him.
- You basically watch me fail for 90 minutes.
- Number ten, dysfunction, Elevator to the Gallows by Louis Malle, Male, Malle.
I don't know how to pronounce it.
It's 1958, it's black and white, it's beautiful, it starred Jeanne Moreau.
This couple does something very bad and a lot of horrible things kind of happen.
But the score of the piece, which was done by Miles Davis is sensational.
The score ends up being this highly dysfunctional, highly aggressive,
sometimes hostile piece that is kind of in between the two characters.
- Yeah, I'd also say, at that time,
a score like Miles Davis was not used in that type of film.
There is that element to Lemon that you wouldn't normally see
a score like this for this type of film.
- The score in Lemon is very much this sort of character without a voice.
But it's also the story of space, it's also the story of where we're going,
where we'd like to be, to sort of paint what the writing isn't doing,
what the directing isn't doing.
Technically you could watch it with your eyes closed and
you should still feel where we are.
That's like one of the strongest markings of Elevator to the Gallows for me.
- The character that most influenced Isaac was really Buster Keaton.
Isaac has a very vaudevillian quality about him.
You know, he's always in the same uniform throughout the whole film.
And there is this classical symmetry to the way that he moves,
in a very expressionless face that a lot of expression came from.
Even though he's not doing anything physically,
he's screaming from inside through his eyes.
So there's a dead pan quality to Isaac, and
that's very influenced by Buster Keaton.
And those guys knew how to get a lot out of very simple economic actions.
- Our film has a really strong ensemble, and
an ensemble that's sung to both of us is The King of Comedy,
Robert De Niro, Sandra Bernhard and- My god, I just forgot.
- Jerry Lewis.
- My god, yeah, Jerry Lewis, totally lost his face.
The combination of those three, like those personalities don't necessarily make sense
in a Martin Scorsese movie together, but
there's so much harmony in what is wrong with them.
And with Lemon, as far as the casting of our piece,
there are a lot of comedians in the movie.
A lot of people who are known for being comedians or comedic actors and to
play things not seriously I would say but to play them without playing the jokes.
It's like the jokes are in the writing.
They're there or they're not there and let's just play emotional intention,
let's play trajectory.
And that was really fun too, because I think there's something great about
you go into the movie with a certain perception.
You're like, "I already know this guy.
I know what this guy's going to do and then he does something else."
- You don't usually see Michael Cera as
an arrogant asshole.
- But he's so good at being shitty.
- I know, he should play it all the time.
- Yes, he should be shitty more.
(Sound) - The look of the film, it's Minnie and
Moskowitz, which is directed by John Cassavetes, it is one of his best films.
Don't know why it's not talked about more.
- I really wanted to watch things that had been shot in LA that didn't necessarily
feel like particularly LA movies.
And we landed on "Minnie and Moskowitz" because it was just pretty Central LA.
There was just kind of a texture about a Los Angeles without palm trees but
that still felt like this city.
And in terms of building our ensemble and building our world,
like aesthetically, it spoke to me the most.
It was a little it strange, it's a little bit funny.
It's uncomfortable, there's like a theatricality about that, but
it feels effortless.
We thought of a film that was a big influence on "Lemon", that is in a genre,
that is not a comedy, is a film called "The Piano Teacher".
That stars Isabelle Huppert, directed by Michael Hanake.
I mean, definitely how you feel uncomfortable when you watch his film and
how uncompromising he is in what he wants the moment to be
is a huge influence on Lemon, and I would say that things get so
dark at times that they are humorous in a way.
Her character is really in a lot of ways similar to Isaac.
There's a lot of very Direct, simplistic, economical action that she engages in.
- But she's tortured and unraveling from the moment you meet her.
- Exactly, just like Isaac.
- I would say that while she may be hard to root for,
you also get her relationship with her mother and you see this kind of like
inherited trauma, which explains why she is who she is.
And in Lemon, while it may be hard to root for Isaac, I mean it wasn't for us,
but there's a section of the film that you spend with his family, and
you see the environment that he grew up in, which is one in which he disappears.
One in which he is not visible.
One in which he doesn't feel heard.
And that is supposed to be a kind of signal for
the audience of like well this is how we got here.
(Noise) Editing influenced Lemon.
I would say Hal Ashby as Landlord.
It's his first feature, it's fantastic.
It stars Beau Bridges.
It's this comedy about gentrification in Brooklyn in the late 70s.
It's edited so beautifully.
It's really, I'm gonna use the word effortless again.
That's gonna be my word of the day.
I particularly remember this scene where Beau Bridges' character meets this woman
in the middle of the conversation, they're now on the street.
And then in the middle of that conversation, they're in the diner.
And it's the same conversation the whole time.
It's like this five minute exchange, and
the location just keeps changing right in the middle of the scene.
And it's so magical, and it has this sort of rush and
the emotion of when you meet someone and you have feelings for them, and
how time moves and space moves, and yet it's still this one conversation.
There are scenes where you're in the film and then you're in this void.
"Beau Bridges" is in this void where he kinda speaks to camera, and
it just is pretty seamless.
We have it on DVD and we like rewound it.
- Yeah. - We were like wait a minute,
did that just happen?
- And you didn't question it.
It was so seamless, you could almost just not notice it.
(Music)
(Sound) And
a new movie that influenced Lemon would be Robert Townsend's Hollywood Shuffle.
It's surreal, it's fantastical, it's theatrical.
It's about the business,
like an actor's journey in trying to become himself, become a performer.
It really deals with what it means to be a success, what it means to be a failure,
the fear of failure, and those are huge themes.
- But for me 'Hollywood Shuffle' it feels more like a personal journey.
You deserve a spot.
That you deserve a seat at the table, and so the manifestation of that film.
That film was made for $100,000 and he just fucking did it and it's brilliant.
If a movie like that didn't exist, I don't know if there would be space for
a film like Lemon.
That that existed, for me, was like the door's slightly open,
I'm shoving myself in and saying I belong here.
Absurdest comedy, I would say Fassbinder's Beware of the Holy Whore.
It's actually a comment on the film he made right before.
Which was a total fucking nightmare.
And it's the drama of a film crew,
like sexual tensions and bad vibes and people not paid enough.
And this one hotel where there seems to be nothing,
they're very much on an island, but it's super absurd, so ridiculous,
it's making fun of the nightmare that it is to make work.
How difficult it is, this is not breezy it wasn't like this is fun.
I mean, it's tough.
It's really, really tough.
I think for both of us the movie was a therapy and like it's okay.
It's okay, it's gonna be fine.
You'll get there.
- Also, I think a lot of people would watch it and find it very disturbing.
- It's super stressful.
- Yeah, it's really stressful.
I mean a lot of the humor comes out of what brutality human beings
are capable of and deep human flaws and- - Yeah,
it's like people being pushed really, really far.
And right before the leap off the edge they physically assault.
- It's funny that Fassbinder was facing
the darkest recesses of himself as he wrote this film.
In which we also were doing in many ways.
(Music)
Our choice for dark comedy is not a film, it is a television show.
A television show by the name of 'Enlightened', in our minds,
is one of the best pieces of art ever made.
It was created by "Mike White".
- Genius.
- Total genius, huge hero of ours.
- It's like our favorite kind of protagonist.
It is a character that ultimately means well, but
that has almost no tools to actually exercise meaning well.
Laura Dern's character in that is like this kind of woman, strong willed, and
completely unaware of how her choices are not only not welcome, but just really off.
He does such an amazing job, especially through Laura Dern's character of showing
somebody being completely selfish in their selflessness.
Such an amazing example of an artist who really lets the moment be the moment.
If it's funny, great.
If it's not, great.
If it's disturbing, great.
If it's sad, great.
And that was definitely a way in which we approach our work.
The audience has more of a chance of a really rich experience,
especially right now with where we're at.
By not really being able to put your finger on what it is we're saying or
what genre this film is supposed to be.
Mike White, obviously, from his work really does too.
- Yeah. Yeah. You're not playing the humor.
You're playing the feeling.
And if you laugh, that's great, and if you don't, it's also okay.
It's just like playing feelings.
(Sound) I would say the number one film, and I feel I also need to preface it
by saying that the maker of this piece is debatable, I understand.
The film itself though has made a massive impact on my life.
Annie Hall. How that film treats New York or L.A.,
how that film treats women.
This kind of flailing male protagonist and
the woman "Diane Keaton's" character soars while he stays behind.
That was something that was very sexy to us.
And then just the humor of it, and
it's also so beautiful it's really stunning and effortless, word of the day.
- This was the biggest expression of him coming into his own and
drawing comedy from dramatic situations.
Bringing comedy out of a deep flaw that he had and
I would say too that it's a very composed comedy.
It's not improvisational.
Everything is very deliberate and
that's what I would say about your work in general, but also this film.
- Thank you, darling.
Thank you for watching.
Those are the 10 films that influenced 'Lemon.' We will be playing August
11 as part of Sundance's Next Fest Festival, and we open August 18th.
You can find us in theaters and on-demand.
(Music)