Conversation with “Rumours” directors Guy Maddin, Evan Johnson & Galen Johnson

Winnipeg’s legendary trio of filmmakers: Guy Maddin, Evan Johnson and Galen Johnson are celebrating the local premiere of their newest film “Rumours”.

With stars like Cate Blanchett, Alicia Vikander, Charles Dance and Canada’s Roy Dupuis, Rumours premiered at Cannes Film Festival in May of this year and received a standing ovation of nearly 6 minutes.

The trio sat down with CityNews’ Joanne Roberts on Wednesday to talk about the film ahead of their Winnipeg premiere, where audiences see G7 leaders getting lost in the woods and facing danger as they find their way out… all while drafting a statement on a global crisis.

Joanne: How did you come up with the concept of having a film take place at a G7 summit?

Guy: We had a bunch of scripts that we’d been working on for a few years. The G7 was just a tiny sub-plot in them. Every time we took another run at the scripts, the G7 plot got bigger and then we realized our plot was too sprawling. A 700 page script, that’s 700 minutes approximately. So we would throw it in the garbage. But the G7 kept coming back. We decided just to go simple: 7 characters, 1 location, lost in the woods. It got a little more complicated after that, we added a couple more movie stars. So there’s basically 9 characters but it’s one big, nocturnal forest location … Shooting the movie was anything but simple as it turns out.

Joanne: I did notice at the beginning the producers had thanked G7 leaders for their help in the film. Did that actually happen?

Evan: No. There’s this quality that sometimes, you see it in films … from the 20s and 30s. Like films about the FBI or other federal police forces and they’ll thank the FBI at the beginning of the film and we always found that kind of, boot-licking behaviour, funny. It was just basically a gag.

Guy: Just another boot to lick.

Joanne: You have an incredible cast of characters. Cate Blanchett, Alicia Vikander, Charles Dance and my personal favourite, Roy Dupuis. I find that the G7 leaders are all questionable as people. But I was wondering, is there a trait that one of the characters has that you feel like you can relate to?

Evan: If there’s any one trait that any of these leaders have that I identify the most with, it’s the general air of not being up to the task that I sort of always identify with. Immediately, when someone is a failure, it just humanizes them to me and I sort of love them.

Guy: Yeah, those loveable war criminals. I guess I identify with the sleepiness of the American president, because I’m pretty good at just falling asleep. Even standing up, I can fall asleep if I need a nap. I can just lean against a tree or climb up a few rungs of a ladder where no one can see me and take a quick nap … But I remember my ardent youth enough to identify with Roy Dupuis’ temper tantrum and attention-seeking gambits.

Joanne: It’s quite beautiful to watch Roy.

Galen: He’s a specimen. He’s quite a specimen.

Guy: Yeah, he can just do anything and look great. That’s the way it is for movie stars.

Galen: What Evan said, just the general of not being up to the task of making a statement or a movie. There’s this frustration of working together to try and create something. It’s probably universal. As back as far as grade school, you’d do little group projects with your friends and you’d start off all confident. And then you’d fight and then the deadline would come and you’d have to present whether you liked it or not, that’s just a universal experience I think and I hope that people will identify with that.

Joanne: Which G7 leader would you rather be stranded in the woods with?

Guy: If I wanted to survive, it probably wouldn’t be the Italian prime minister (played by Rolando Ravello).

Evan: He has food, at least.

Guy: He does have food, you’re right. Because he’s also the cuddliest and warmest and funniest and sweet.

Joanne: He’s the heart.

Evan: He’s the heart, yeah.

Guy: So, maybe him.

Evan: Even though he seems to be an admirer of Mussolini?

Guy: It was just a costume for a Halloween party.

Evan: Yeah, Roy Dupuis, the Canadian prime minister, we deliberately (wrote) as a kind of almost action adventure hero. Like he thinks he’s in Lord of the Rings sometimes. Of course, he’s emotionally volatile and prone to running off crying, so I guess he’s not (an) ideal companion for being lost in the woods. I’ve been lost in the woods once actually, as a child, and had to be rescued by a search team. I don’t know why I bring that up.

Joanne: So you just don’t need anybody with you. You’re good.

Evan: As long as you send out a search team to find me, I’ll be fine!

Guy: Well there’s no search team in the script you wrote … So you might have tapped into some primal fear from your childhood there.

Galen: (I’d rather be stuck with) Roy, obviously.

Guy: Yeah, he could cut down a tree with his fingernails.

Evan: And carry you when you get tired.

Guy: Of course. Why didn’t I say that?

Joanne: What was it like working with Cate (Blanchett)?

Evan: She always has more energy and good spirits than anybody else in a room, even if there’s a hundred people in the room. She’s always the energy. If you’re in a bad mood, she cheers you up. Someone else is in a bad mood, she cheers them up. If she’s in a bad mood, you wouldn’t hear about it. Never heard her being even remotely in a bad mood, even in the middle of the night on day 19 in the middle of the woods. Never ever ever did she seem like she was even the slightest bit grumpy. I’ve almost never experienced anyone like that?

Galen: She’s just very good at every aspect of being a movie star. The acting, everything, the directing. As if three aren’t enough. She’s so experienced working out a scene. If she was here sitting with us, she’d be so good at answering your questions. So much better than us. She’s A plus across the board.

Guy: She also directs herself a lot. We’d say, “That was fantastic, Cate.” And she would come back and look at herself on the monitor, the previous take and go, “No!” … And we’d just go again.

Evan: I feel like I should stand up for us though. We also directed her sometimes as directors. That did happen.

Guy: She’s so smart and so observant. Like a lot of these actors. Denis Ménochet is like that. They can see through you and into your soul. They’re not entirely normal people, great actors.

Joanne: All of you serve as such great inspirations for filmmakers all over the world, but especially here in Winnipeg as you know, you’ve been with the Winnipeg Film Group. You’ve walked our streets … For filmmakers that want to create these surreal and eccentric and dream-like films, is there a piece of advice big or small that you would give to an aspiring filmmaker that one day does want to end up at Cannes (Film Festival)?

Galen: Just learn how to do everything yourself.

Guy: That’s actually the first piece of advice I got from a local filmmaker, John Paizs, like 42 years ago. Just learn how to load the camera and do it. It’s just one less person to rely upon … and then also just do it.

Evan: Yeah, don’t wait around. Try not to wait around for somebody else to do it for you. Just do it.

Guy: And don’t just talk your movie idea out into the café night air.

Galen: No, don’t talk about your movie at all until it’s finished.

Evan: And then move on and do another one.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.