Radmila Djurica

Sarajevo Film Festival 2008 hosted Todd Haynes, one of the most controversial film authors today. Haynes had his films shown every day on the festival in the program Tribute to. His films are social and cultural essay on a sexuality subject in a traditional Christian American society. Social re-examination in his films and redefinition are one of the most important issues in his films. This re-examination sometimes also implies research in its complete absence as is the case with the films “Safe” and “Superstar”.

“However I’ve felt that I needed to deconstruct the patron like well done pat on the back that Hollywood give, which offers as its award and is simply a kind of false identification. There are no rewards of that kind in my films”

The problem of identity and identification that he sees as related and indivisible concept is something this film director also observes through the frame of fame. Films as “Assassins”, “Superstar”, and Velvet Goldmine”and“I’m not there in their different ways tackle the psychological, emotional and even the cultural aspects of the celebrity status. Each on its own way follows and comments on interpretations of different stars, whose actions become subject to numerous analyses.

“Assassins is of course a story about Rimbaud, but was in fact the one that initiated this identification among artists. All you need to do is merely to go to a library and see that there are many, many more books on Rimbaud than by Rimbaud. I wanted to show that you learn more about him through reading the many cultural sources. I felt that this was the point up to which I could get through to him myself. While working on the film, I realized that I could not give anyone this direct experience. If a film attempts to offer you direct insight or a direct answer this means that it is completely fake. The best, and most authentic thing I can do, is to provoke a desire in the viewers to go in search of answers themselves.”

During the discussion Haynes confirmed that he is a feminist and the queer theorist, something that he started at university and have had great influence on his work.

“This influence is present in all my works. The critical thinking and dilemmas are opened by these theories and are the backbone of my films.”

He discovered his love for films as child but eventually realized that he was not interested in commercial film. Experimental narration is the road that he has taken. The difficult struggle through a text and flesh of a film are great challenges for him:

“Every time I begin to shoot a film, I feel completely naked. I am struck by panic as if it were my first time, and as though I have no idea what I am doing. In this case panic is a positive thing, because it pushes me forward. The new films I do are like challenges and opportunities to learn and to deepen my own skill.” How did you get to this idea of Bob Dylan and his 6 different characters? “This is totally ordinary approach to Bob Dylan. I’ve read many books about him; I collected different opinions from people who have deeply analyzed him. From them I’ve made a puzzle and made a film. Probably many people know about concert in Newport when he included electric guitar and everyone gone crazy. His mechanism of surviving happened on the stage and has totally different face which the audience attached him to. If he wanted to keep creativity he needed real faces to keep in secret. ““I like his music and he influenced me as teenager. He is very interesting and he influenced a lots American culture. When I’ve started with work I tried to find way of his thinking and put that in film in different stories with different views on world. I wanted to finish with portrait of America and its Christianity and believe in God, which is a complete opposite from American believe in liberty. Those contradictions in his life made him even bigger American because his country is composed from contradictions itself. “ .It is obvious that Douglas Sirk had great influence on you especially in film „Far From Heavan“? “Everything started in college, I liked Sirk and Fasbinder. Sirk has always been interested with women, as a main protagonist of the film, as well as genre where woman is the main support. I like popular genres and something connected to women seems to be much closer to reality because women facing the problems relating to a household, children and relations with family. In American gangster films genres are clearer and more cinematic and manhood and male protagonists are in charge. They are brilliant too, but female protagonists are facing more social rules and problems, so characters have to find an intellectual solution. This critical perspective of American film has triggered some different approaches.”Why dolls/puppets as main characters in film about Karen Carpenter?” Film with dolls as sort of experiment I wanted to do on college. I wanted to change conventions and provoke emotional reactions and you can do that with puppets. You can identify yourself with actors and with puppets it is difficult. I went to New York with a friend of mine and she wanted to do film with pets, but I wanted puppets/dolls. Sitting in the café I heard “The Carpenters” song that I did not heard since my childhood and I wanted to make film about Karen who died from anorexia, so we agreed to do dolls instead.”