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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
Actress Toni Collette talks about her "intense" desert-romance flick "Japanese Story" -- and why she likes weddings almost as much as Muriel Helsop.
Jan 13, 2004 | Toni Collette is not the sort of actress to let herself be typecast. Since bursting onto the screen as ABBA-loving, matrimonially inclined Muriel Helsop in the 1994 surprise hit "Muriel's Wedding," she's played everything from the loving mom of a strange child ("The Sixth Sense") to the strange mom of a loving child ("About a Boy") to a woman whose life is destroyed by childlessness ("The Hours.")
In "Japanese Story," for which she recently received an Australian Film Institute award (but which is just opening in North America), Collette plays Sandy Edwards, an aggressive Australian geologist whose life is permanently altered by a trip into the desert with a Japanese businessman, played by Gotaro Tsunashima.
On a recent winter afternoon in New York, Collette met up with Salon to chat about the difficulty of shooting a movie in the desert, the surprising joylessness of packing on the pounds for a role, the time she got her appendix taken out for no reason at all, and why she loves weddings almost as much as Muriel does.
I understand that "Japanese Story" just cleaned up at the Australian Film Institute awards and that you won the AFI for best actress for your work in the film. It's your fourth AFI award, right?
It was such a strange night. I had hay fever at the time. I don't take drugs of any kind for anything, not even aspirin, and I took a Zyrtec, which is to clear your sinuses and stuff. I felt like I was on some weird acid trip. I had to get up and talk in front of people and I couldn't think, let alone speak. It was so scary.
But to tell you the truth, this film was really hard for me to make. And it's hard when it comes to awards in any art form, because how can you say that one performance is better than another? They're all so different. But I was standing there thinking, this is actually quite gratifying, because it was so bloody hard that it's really nice that people are not only supporting the film but appreciating what we've all done.
What made it so difficult for you?
It was a combination of being so isolated, which in a way was good and bad. The desert is so inspirational and gorgeous as well as being arid and hot beyond belief -- and that was winter! At the same time, it was a comfort because as an actor you are so inside your head most of the time and being able to look out over this vast expanse and have everything fall into place and just prioritize itself and give you a sense of relief is clearly great.
It was also the emotional content of the film, because it was on such a constantly changing turbulent scale. But that was also the reason that I wanted to do the film. The stuff that was most difficult for me was the best part of it as well.
What was it about the emotional stuff that appealed to you?
When I read any script I can tell whether I'm going to do it or not. I start feeling things as the character's going through whatever they're going through and having clear images, and I get it. And if I don't, I set it aside, no matter how good it is, and let somebody else do it because it's clearly not for me. But with this it was such an immediate response; it just resonated. I have certain fears that are addressed in the film, and that interested me. I mean, for any actor, let alone a female actor, to find a part that really runs the gamut and experiences so much change throughout the course of the story is really exciting.
[Sandy] starts out as someone who's so aggressive -- and I wanted to make it clear that she wasn't inherently aggressive, but it was just this defense mechanism because she clearly had already experienced some kind of pain, and now she was in shut-down mode. She was closed and numb and threw everything into her work because that way she could avoid real life. The whole exchange with Hiromitsu in the desert is about her opening up, and he ultimately becomes a catalyst for having to face everything that she has had stored and not wanted to address for so long. I think that in life there are certain issues that are bubbling there, no matter how much you repress them. And life is just going to keep presenting ways of getting your attention so that you have to deal with them before you can actually move on and be free of whatever's burdening you.
What were the fears that you felt you shared with Sandy?
Well, I can't really tell you because it gives away the film.
That raises an interesting question. Why is it so vitally important to keep the movie's plot twist a secret?
It's so unexpected. When I was reading the script I was like, What? It's not even halfway through the film and this person has had such a huge impact on the lead character. How can it eventuate this way? And it's really just unusual in terms of storytelling. In terms of formulaic filmmaking, it's really not adhering to anything that's ever gone before, you know? It's its own thing.
So you feel that -- beyond the surprise of it -- it marks an advance, a departure in filmmaking?
I think, yeah. It's not like boy meets girl equals happiness. It's boy meets girl and things go askew, and in this case the girl is left with having to face the rest of her life as a changed person. You know, this one little interlude, this exchange which is so unexpected, is actually changing her life forever, and it's not that kind of complacent ending of the Hollywood films where you meet the love of your life and live happily ever after. It's feeling even more uncomfortable, in fact feeling a lot of pain, and yet knowing that you're going to have a richer life because of it.
