34 MISTER LONELY Screen International February 2, 2007 SET REPORT Samantha Morton and Denis Levant ONLY THE in Mr Lonely LONELY It’s been a long road back for indie wunderkind Harmony Korine, but his new project finds him brimming with enthusiasm and working with a starry cast. He tells FIONNUALA HALLIGAN how the dark years helped create his “best work” t has been a decade since Gummo and a good sional Madonna impersonator) and Abraham Early highs eight years since Julien Donkey-Boy, and Lincoln (Richard Strange). Mister Lonely is being readied for Cannes Harmony Korine is finally back behind the Running through this story, somehow and after a lengthy spell in the film wilderness, Icamera with Mister Lonely. He co-scripted — Korine will not be drawn — is the Panama Korine is definitely back — he has two more the story about celebrity impersonators — the thread which features magician David Blaine projects ready to roll, with which Agnes B wants key characters being “Michael Jackson” and and Werner Herzog. to be involved. Agnes, a grandmother, helped “Marilyn Monroe” — with his younger brother At $8.2m, Mister Lonely is a considerable the troubled 34-year-old get his life back on Avi, the first time the writer of Kids has collabo- step up for a Harmony Korine project, although track after they first met at Venice at the premiere rated on a screenplay. That, however, is possi- admittedly it is only his third as director. It is of Julien Donkey-Boy. bly the least unusual part of Mister Lonely. being produced by the French fashion designer “She let me lean on her. I don’t mean finan- Shot in the jungles of Panama (where Korine’s Agnes B’s production company, Love Streams, cially — she was there,” says Korine of the Paris- parents live), Scotland and Paris, Mister Lonely and her artistic venture with Korine, the UK- based designer. “She let me work myself out.” is about a Michael Jackson impersonator living based O’Salvation (Harmony has recently On set outside Paris last summer, Korine — in Paris, played by Diego Luna, who runs into become a UK citizen, but more of that later). who wrote Kids when he was 19 — is a strong, a Marilyn Monroe impersonator (Samantha The film is executive produced by Recorded enthusiastic presence, energising the cast and Morton). He ends up in a Scottish-based com- Picture Company and billed as a ‘presentation’ crew and working tightly with young Danish mune of impersonators including Marilyn’s by Agnes B and Jeremy Thomas; HanWay has DoP Marcel Zyskind (Michael Winterbottom’s husband Charlie Chaplin (Denis Lavant) and UK and US rights, with Tartan picking up UK, close collaborator). their daughter Shirley Temple, not to mention and Celluloid Dreams is on board for interna- “I’ve enjoyed it immensely,” Korine later tells Samantha Morton the Queen of England (Anita Pallenberg), the tional sales (a key territory already concluded is Screen International during post-production in as Marilyn Monroe Pope (James Fox), Madonna (a British profes- Japan, to Gaga). London. “Before, it was all very easy for me; I graduated high school and I was making my Denis ‘Chaplin’ Levant and Harmony Korine on set first movie. I directed Gummo when I was 23. For this movie, it was so difficult to get back to a point where I could direct again, and I’m not talking financially. I thought if I couldn’t enjoy the process, I shouldn’t be making movies. Let’s just say I’m really appreciative to be making films again.” He admits that in the past “I might not have had the coping mechanisms” to deal with stress- ful situations but it has been different on Mr Lonely, he says. The director, endearingly open and not the disturbed presence press clippings might indicate, is vague about a lot of things in his life, but not in an evasive way. It is hard to get a clear picture of Korine’s last eight years, per- haps because Korine himself does not have one. FEATURE FILMS DIRECTED AND/OR WRITTEN BY HARMONY KORINE 2007 Mister Lonely (director, writer) 2002 Larry Clark’s Ken Park (writer) 1999 Julien Donkey-Boy (director, writer) 1997 Gummo (director, writer) 1995 Larry Clark’s Kids (writer) www.ScreenDaily.com Screen International February 2, 2007 MISTER LONELY 35 Diego Luna recreates some classic Michael Jackson moves He talks openly about having been in rehab. Hours): “He’s the best guy I’ve ever worked Korine’s point of view: “A year,” he estimates. Yes, he says, two of his houses did burn down with, hand on heart.” “But relative to the grand scheme of things, I MISTER LONELY in the US and “I lost everything that I had ever Given she has just produced heavy make-up don’t know if that’s a long time. It felt like a lot. Directed by Harmony Korine owned”. Also it is true that he left America to live for 17 iconic characters on a budget of $15,700 My other films were always under $2m from a Written by Harmony Korine and between Paris and London, although he does (£8,000), that is quite a compliment. But single source and I always felt like someone was Avi Korine not have a home in either place and is still living Korine’s leading man and lady, Luna and Mor- saying, ‘Here kid, you wanna make a movie? Produced by Nadja Romain out of a suitcase. He now has UK residency. ton, both attached to the project from an early Take a million.’ I’ve never ever been told what (O’Salvation, UK) But working on Mister Lonely, he says he stage, are equally complimentary. to do on a film. So this time, there’s a little more Executive producer Peter finally has the emotional stability he lacked. “His work has always moved me incred- expectation, and a lot more structure.” Watson (Recorded Picture He started collaborating on the script with Avi, ibly,” says Morton, looking remarkably like Says Recorded Picture Company’s Jeremy Company, UK) eight years his junior, more than two years ago. Marilyn Monroe in a take on the classic hal- Thomas: “I was fascinated by Harmony’s pre- Presented by Agnes B and “I needed additional motivation or somebody terneck dress designed by Agnes B herself. “I vious films, Gummo and Julien Donkey-Boy. Jeremy Thomas there to help me get back into the discipline said yes before I read the screenplay, but when When an opportunity arose to join the Mister Director of photography of writing,” says Korine. “For me to say I lost I did read it, I honestly thought it was the most Lonely project, which had an amusing and perti- Marcel Zyskind interest in making movies would almost be like beautiful movie I’d ever read.” nent central theme, we did so with enthusiasm.” Editors Paul Zucker, giving myself too much credit. The implica- As far as shooting goes, she says: “Sometimes Although Mister Lonely is scripted, scenes Valdis Oskarsdottir tion would be that I had a choice in the matter, it’s incredibly tight with what he needs to be being shot in an old people’s home in the Ville Production designer Richard when the truth of it is somehow it left me, if that shot and the way he’s constructed his canvas, de Bonnueil, an hour outside Paris, and the next Campling makes any sense. and sometimes incredibly loose. But Harmony day in the Luxembourg Gardens and Mont- Music composed by Jason is very sure what he wants to get; it doesn’t feel parnasse, show typical Korine improvisational Spaceman, The Sun City Girls Desperate hours random at all.” touches. In the retirement villa, where ‘Michael’ Costume designer Judy “I’d been making movies since I was virtually a Shrewsbury kid, and it had always come very easily. At a cer- Hair and make-up design tain point after the last movie, I started to have ‘I always felt like someone was saying, Here Jo Allen this general disconnect from things. I was really miserable with where I was. I began to lose sight kid, you wanna make a movie? Take a million’ MAIN CAST of things and people started to become more Harmony Korine Diego Luna Michael Jackson and more distant. I was burnt out, movies were Samantha Morton Marilyn what I always loved in life and I started to not Copy cast first meets ‘Marilyn’, Luna is dressed as a Dan- Monroe care. I went deeper and deeper into a dark place Diego Luna, in particular, was struck by the gerous-era Jackson, delivering some trademark Denis Lavant Charlie Chaplin and to be honest movies were the last thing I project from the get-go. Not a particular fan of whoops around some seriously aged Parisian James Fox The Pope was thinking about — I didn’t know if I was Jackson’s as a child, he trained with an imper- senior citizens, singing, “You’re never gonna Werner Herzog Father Umbrillo going to be alive. My dream was to evaporate. I sonator in Mexico, “trying to get a few moves die, I want you to live forever,” as the residents Leos Carax Renard was unhealthy. Whatever happened during that together” and working on his make-up. fall asleep in their chairs. Morton proceeds to Anita Pallenberg the Queen time, and I won’t go into details, maybe it was “As an actor, it’s an amazing role to do, and comfort a nonagenarian non-actor who appears something I needed to go through.” with a director like Harmony, it’s a dream,” he to be hitting himself with a plastic hammer.