When acclaimed director Michel Gondry declares “Porky’s” one of his favorite comedies, perhaps he’s intentionally trying to leaven the surreal, melancholic reputation of his work.
No matter. The 43-year-old Frenchman, who shared the 2004 best screenplay Oscar for “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” is as engaging and whimsical in conversation as his movies are on screen.
Gondry wrote and directed “The Science of Sleep,” opening in Denver this week and starring Gael Garcia Bernal as Stephane, a struggling expatriate artist in Paris who can’t separate his dreams from real-life challenges. The signature script incorporates animation and wildly inventive art pieces to illuminate Stephane’s childish mind. We spoke with Gondry about the origins of the story and his fondness for sad characters.
Q: Working on “The Science of Sleep” script, have you had different scenes in your head for a long time?
A: It started from a three- page treatment, then 10 pages, then I left it aside because I was doing “Eternal Sunshine.” I initially wanted to go explore some dream mechanism; but I really needed to get deeper with the character. I incorporated more of my own experience. Later on, I had dreams that I used in the film, so it became both more personal and more general about dreams and real life, and how they interact with each other.
Q: You seem to be attracted to characters that are wounded by reality. Clearly the people in “Eternal Sunshine” were flinching away from the world. And Stephane obviously has the same problem. Why do those kinds of people appeal to you?
A: I think that I identify with them. Not that I’m completely damaged or destroyed, but I’ve been wounded in certain relationships, and the unbalance created by a sad breakup or frustration. It gives you more creativity, or more of the urge to express yourself, than perfect happiness. I hope I’m going to do something more optimistic and happy; the next thing I’m doing actually is a comedy. When you’re in a happy relationship, you unfortunately don’t stop and say, I’m so happy with my girlfriend. You just live it until something goes wrong, and then you say, oh, I was so happy with her.
Q: Stephane is very childish. Americans tend to look down on adults that retain that kind of childishness. Is it the same in other cultures?
A: Maybe a little less in Europe, it’s hard to generalize. I think some people accuse my character of having the sexual life of a 6-year-old. I think that’s unfair; Stephane kisses a Gothic girl, in a bar. I didn’t kiss any Gothic girls when I was 6. He has the sexual life of somebody who kisses a Gothic girl in a bar, so that’s not zero.
I think by definition romantic love is immature. And I think there is a feeling of deep romanticism in him, and not much to do with maturity. Maturity is much more in control; it’s about what’s good for you, if you put yourself in a certain situation you’ll feel miserable or happy, so you make your choice. I guess that defines maturity. I think “romantic” means you don’t figure out the consequences.
Q: His friend from the office (Alain Chabat) who seems so outrageous at first, grows more sympathetic and a rounded person as he goes along.
A: His character existed; he was this very obnoxious rude person. He would eat his lunch and then walk behind me and burp in my ear. He had a lot of girlfriends. It turned out he was a very good friend, he really cared for me, and he was very wise. Even when he’s rude to Stephane, he’s trying to put his mind off the romanticism because he knows romanticism is not getting Stephane where he wants to be. In the end he really cares for him.
Q: One of the most remarkable scenes in the movie is an elaborate animation of a town seemingly made out of cardboard tubes. Where and how do you create those sets?
A: The cardboard town was about the size of two dinner tables, 12 feet by 5 feet. My cousin is an architect and he helped us make it; he’s reconstructed it for an exhibit we’re doing in New York.
I like to take the smallest of sets and put them on the big screen, use a projector and the camera to blow up images.
Q: Gael Garcia Bernal is so much in command of three different languages, and of very wide emotional ranges in those three languages.
A: I kind of adapted the story to him – the fact that he’s Mexican, obviously – because I liked him as an actor and a person. And he’s like me, living in a country where he does not belong and developing relationships with people from different countries.
And that’s something that defines Stephane: He’s even an expatriate from his own dreams, because in reality he doesn’t find his marks as well as he does in his dreams.
Q: Growing up, what movies made you laugh?
A: I remember watching “Porky’s”; I don’t know why. It’s intoxicating when people start to laugh when the theater room is full. I remember laughing so hard at that movie, and I know it’s very middle of the road. I guess I am a little boy.
Q: Are you interested in directing a more linear plot, reality all the time instead of a flight of fancy?
A: Yes, I would be interested in doing something that is just straightforward, no flashback. And where it is not so much about the storytelling, but where I’d be free to just work on the characters and what they do together. I will go there, because I don’t want to repeat myself.
