Animal Kingdom Director David Michôd on the Ups and Downs of His Acclaimed Debut
Nearly seven months after his debut feature Animal Kingdom wowed Sundance, found American distribution and repurposed Air Supply's "All Out of Love" in the most harrowing way possible, writer-director David Michôd is readying for the rest of America's reaction to the Australian crime-family drama. If the critics are any indication, he has nothing to worry about -- except, maybe, how to follow it up.
After all, it takes a fairly special import to make instant Stateside stars out of inveterate Aussie actors like Jacki Weaver and Ben Mendelsohn, who appear as two-fifths of the bandit clan into which young Josh (rookie James Frecheville) is inducted after... well, no spoilers here. Let it suffice to say Michod's tale of power, desperation and revenge in Melbourne is one of the best first films in recent memory -- a rich synthesis of character and vision that rewards multiple viewings, and an exquisite cinematic expression that belies the decade Michôd needed to hone his chops on the page and behind the camera. The investment was worth it: Animal Kingdom will no doubt be around long after this Friday's limited release and the upcoming awards season where it promises to make a showing.
Movieline caught up with Michôd during one of the filmmaker's recent New York stopovers to discuss his debut success, his very prolonged development process, keeping his distance from Guy Ritchie, and his follow-up philosophy.
I just want to tell you I've had "All Out of Love" stuck in my head since Sundance.
[Laughs] Well, that's good.
Where did that scene come from?
I knew I just wanted to have a scene in the film where that happens. It's Ben Mendelsohn's character having this psycho-emotional episode. I knew I wanted to involve him watching on a television something about a childhood that was probably pretty toxic, but also reminding him of a time that's gone and the melancholy you associate with that. But he's also looking at a world he just does not understand, and the darkness that brews in him. For me there's no better way to do that than to find a song that is both strangely arcane -- and almost kitsch -- and yet really quite emotive and beautiful at the same time.
And yet there's this drone beneath it that really ups the horror.
Yeah, really just to unsettle the whole thing, you know?
You worked on this script for years. Is that the kind of thing that comes out of years of development? These little ideas here and there that finally just all fit?
It took me 10 years on and off. I did a lot of other stuff in that time. But an element like that came relatively late in the piece. A scene of that nature had been in the script for quite a while. At one point, it was just Baz, Joel Edgerton's character, just strumming an acoustic guitar. Drunk, just doodling on the guitar. At some point it changed from that into a song and a video. I don't think "All Out of Love" even came up until pre-production.
So 10 years off and on... When did you know you were finally ready to make it?
When people starting telling me the script was good. Or at least when people started telling me I needed to make the script. It was after years of going through that process that I assume so many writers have been through before -- giving the script to people to read, to get their feedback, and just having them sit you down and tell you everything that's wrong with it. And I had assumed that that's the way the process always works -- that it's never going change, and at some point I needed to decide for myself when the thing was ready make. Strangely, I did work into a draft that stopped eliciting criticism. People started saying, "This is great. When are you making it?" But between that and making Crossbow -- the short that played Sundance in 2008 -- it was really no longer a matter of me feeling ready. Even if I wasn't, the thing was going to happen. It felt like the train had left the station and I was powerless to stop it.
How and when during that time did the ensemble come together?
There were a couple of people, like Jacki Weaver and Ben Mendelsohn, who I knew I wanted. I wrote their characters for them. Even Joel Edgerton, though he was slightly later in the process. Guy Pearce was my first choice for his character, and we met with him maybe a year before we shot. That was a confidence-builder because he said "Yes" rather quickly and rather enthusiastically. The rest of it is really just putting together these bits and pieces and this mosaic of characters. Some of them were actors I was familiar with; some of them had changed. Some of them I'd never seen before in my life. Some of them were just the kids. There's that wildly nerve-wracking but exhilarating, open [period] where you hope that kid will walk through the door. Luckily, I think they did.