Conversations with Natalie Portman of JACKIE

SAG-AFTRA Foundation, 2017, 01.21

Natalie Portman, Jackie, Pablo Larraín :

"It was incredible, I hope all of you have the opportunity to work with Pablo one day, because he's really it's like the greatest, it was really one of the great experiences of my life, he's, he has such a unique take, and such... you know, a great director, you guys I hope you agree with me, always has a little bit of perversion in the way that they see things, like they just don't see things the way anyone else does, it's always like from this side, and he was just the kinds of ideas he would have... and I don't mean perverted in a sexual way, and I mean it in... like in... like a just very unusual way of looking at things, very unusual way of looking at the world, and he just always took us into unexpected directions, and really, really loved the actors I think in a way that he let us be very free. He created a scenario where the, all the lighting, the entire space would be lit, and the camera was improvised, and on the camera operator who was also our cinematographer shoulder, so we could go wherever we wanted, and continue the takes as long as we wanted, and improvise, and if we messed up we could start over again, we could go back in the scene and it just really left it us and trusted us with that and it was an incredible gift, and I think you know allowed us to be really free and try things in different ways."

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FilmComment - Do you see your films as being personal in that sense, as a way to explore darker parts of yourself?

Pablo Larraín : "You wouldn’t believe how fast it happens. You’re telling a story that has nothing to do with you, and then suddenly it gets down into something extremely personal".

FilmComment - I ask because there’s a deep perversity at the heart of your films.

Pablo Larraín : "If there’s no perversion, there’s no beauty. Forget it. The word perversion comes from Latin. It means to see the reverse. Per-version: a different version of the story. It doesn’t necessarily refer to the actions of what we typically call a perverted, evil person. A bad priest, say. Or Donald Trump. It’s an oblique way to understand reality. And it becomes personal. Cinema is personal, man. The filmmakers that you or I admire were very personal".

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