Review of Undertow (1996) by Robert R — 22 Jul 2005

[b]Undertow[/b].

My second (and final) excursion to the Auckland Film Festival 2005, this was another great watch, though of a very different kind to [i]Howl's Moving Castle[/i].

The outstanding thing about [i]Undertow[/i] for me was the inspired casting and uniformly superb acting. Jamie Bell, Dermot Mulroney, Josh Lucas and most of the supporting cast (including Shiri Appleby who I remember from [i]Roswell[/i] the TV series) are not obvious choices for the roles but they just work beautifully. Jamie Bell is really great, his Deep South accent is very convincing and he does a great job as the central character of the film, as he did in [i]Billy Elliot[/i]. Shiri Appleby was also a pleasant surprise in a small role. As she is usually cast as popular, pretty, nice girls in teen movies/shows, it was great to see her with hideous tooth makeup, bad hair and playing a character who we feel sorry for rather than identifying with her on a 'girl next door' level. I found her character and performance quite memorable, and the scene where she throws the bottle with her and Jamie Bell's wishes in it into the river was one of my favourite in the film.

Another thing I liked about the film was the realistic, gritty feel. Even though some parts of the story and characters are fable-like or exaggerated, the film always feels very real.

Director David Gordon Green was present at the screening, having been flown to New Zealand by the Festival organizers. He gave a brief introduction before the film and afterwards came back to answer a few questions from the audience. Here are a few that I can remember (note answers are just the jist, not the actual words that David Gordon Green spoke):

[b]How did you think to cast Billy Elliot (Jamie Bell) in the role of Chris?[/b].

DDG: I spent a lot of time looking for non-actors to play the role, which is usually what I prefer to do for roles like this. I searched around schools etc in the South but couldn't find anyone suitable for the role. I liked Billy Elliot so got in contact with Jamie Bell and we hit it off and he hadn't done an American accent before and wanted to give it a shot. He came over to Savannah in advance to train with a dialect coach.

[b]Where did you find the little boy (Chris's younger brother)?[/b].

DDG: Usually for films they cast the pretty boys, so there are heaps of unusual young actors who get filed away. I have a casting director who I will get in touch with, I'm kind of like her charity. We found this boy who was not your typical kid... the weird eyes, the big lips, all that hair... he'd never run before so I had to teach him to run (!) and he'd never gotten dirty so his anxiety was pretty real when she put him down in a pile of pig shit.

[b]When, where and for how long did you shoot the film?

[/b]2 years ago, in Savannah, we shot for 5 weeks.

I saw David Gordon Green walking down the street afterwards, would have said hi but he was being badgered by a creepy interviewer guy who had been present outside the cinema so I decided to let him be.

On Friday night I went to my friends' place, we just bummed around and played a few games and watched episodes of [i]Happy Tree Friends[/i] on the computer... I felt awful that I enjoyed it so much.

Saturday night was another friend's birthday (Joolz, short for Julian) so I went with a group of friends to ten pin bowling, which I won. Afterwards we had a barbecue and ate some sickly cake... sweetest thing I've ever eaten; every bite was an adventure. There was also some really yummy cocktail thing that I watched Scott (Joolz's boyfriend) make out of some Jim Beam stuff, alcohol of some description, Hershey's choc syrup and coffee. I don't normally drink but those things were delicious. I had one of those and also a cranberry vodka drink Scott also made later. Bit of a dry mouth today as a result, I don't think I'll make a habit of drinking a lot. I stayed overnight at a friend's place and in the morning we all went to brunch which was nice. We were thinking of going to the zoo but unfortunately it closes a bit early on Sundays; we settled for playing with Scott and Joolz's cat.