When it comes to the tension of a movie premiere, there is Hollywood pressure, and then there is Vatican pressure.
Catherine Hardwicke opened her version of “The Nativity Story” in front of 7,000 of the Catholic religion’s most faithful in late November at the Vatican’s first hosting of an international movie premier. Hardwicke unveiled her baby – a movie about a very important baby – amid a sea of cardinal birettas, bishop mitres, nun habits and other holy icons.
Hardwicke was so disoriented by the big show, and the modern architecture of the “great hall” reserved for the movie, that she couldn’t quite place the sound that erupted when the screen displayed baby Jesus for the first time.
“I thought it started to rain in the middle of the thing, but it was spontaneous applause when the baby was born,” said Hardwicke, in Denver when “The Nativity Story” opened Dec. 1.
“And they just started taking pictures of the screen, thousands of flash pictures,” Hardwicke continued. “I guess they felt they were really witnessing that moment. I think it was exciting for them to see the story told up there in 3-D and alive. A little girl said, ‘Mary speaks!’ Usually they see the (manger) icons, and they don’t think of Mary as a real person.”
In presenting her respectful, unquestioning version of “The Nativity Story,” Hardwicke often has fielded the question, why her? After spending decades as a costume designer for prominent films, Hardwicke’s first directing job was for a script she co-wrote called “Thirteen,” whose frankly sexual depiction of adolescent rebellion alternately absorbed and terrified parents.
Skateboarding story
Hardwicke won the director’s award at the 2003 Sundance festival for “Thirteen,” then went on to direct another movie about restless teenagers, “Lords of Dogtown,” explaining the skateboard culture of Southern California. In short, Hardwicke was associated far more with babes in trouble than with babes in mangers.
Taking on the “why you” question, Hardwicke first says her favorite directors always have helmed a wide variety of projects. She doesn’t want to be typecast after only two rebellious films.
But in a typical combination of self-effacement and confidence, Hardwicke goes on to explain that she got the “Nativity” job in large part because she’s fast. Writer Mike Rich and the producers started showing their script in January of this year, and told all interested directors they would need a finished film by November.
Another script for a nativity story was circulating, and the producers didn’t want another ‘Capote’ situation” where two movies on the same subject are done at the same ti1me.
Hardwicke was ready. “Thirteen” played at Sundance a year to the day from when Hardwicke and the teenage star, Nikki Reed, started writing the script together.
Casting Mary was key, of course; yes, she speaks, but she also would have to possess the face and the spirit that could reflect the hopes and beliefs of the faithful.
“I wanted Mary to be young, and I wanted her to look Middle Eastern, with olive skin,” Hardwicke said. “So I sold them against a Swedish super model. But then, oh my gosh, who would it be?”
Casting directors in six cities took film of prospective Marys, then filed them on the Internet for Hardwicke to review. Keisha Castle-Hughes, now 16 and an Oscar nominee at age 14 for “Whale Rider,” quickly became the first choice.
The ancient controversy of Mary becoming pregnant before she was living with Joseph returned in modern form, when Castle-Hughes announced after filming that she was pregnant with her boyfriend. In Hardwicke’s version of “The Nativity,” local custom would have stoned Mary to death for her pregnancy.
“Keisha herself had to struggle,” Hardwicke said. “She knew that everybody would be gossiping and blogging about her. She realized this was right for her to do, to have the baby. And the rest of the world didn’t matter as much. So that moment when you see her in the film and she says, ‘There’s a will for this child that’s greater than my fear of what others may say or do,’ that’s pretty resonant.”
The filmmakers “never expected her to be a saint,” Hardwicke said. “They expected her to be a good actress.”
Where to film?
Location filming was a challenge, because so many buildings have gone up around Jerusalem that a truly ancient story simply can’t be done there anymore, Hardwicke said. They found remote areas in southern Italy and Morocco to build Nazareth and to shoot the 100-mile journey of Mary and Joseph back to Bethlehem.
Even so, Hardwicke said, it’s difficult to find a spot on Earth not developed in some way by human occupation.
In Morocco, she said, “a sheep would run through the frame with a water bottle in its mouth. And that’s still in the movie! We couldn’t take it out.”
Hardwicke’s next challenge is a final push for a movie version of Edward Abbey’s classic eco-terrorism novel, “The Monkey-Wrench Gang.” Various fans have held the rights for years, yet studios have periodically shied from the content: an eccentric and plucky band of rebels battling Mormons and toppling machinery in Utah.
“People freak out these days at blowing things up, but it’s also an expensive action movie,” Hardwicke said, making big-money financing difficult. She’s gathering nearly enough independent financing to begin, and will scout locations in New Mexico, where tax credits boost smaller productions.
“Hopefully a year from now,” Hardwicke said, “people will be asking me, how did you go from a biblical epic to ‘The Monkey Wrench Gang’ and eco-terrorism?”
Staff writer Michael Booth can be reached at 303-954-1686 or at mbooth@denverpost.com; try the Screen Team blog at denverpostbloghouse.com.
