There’s a nice nod to Dog Day Afternoon in casting Al Pacino in this real-life hostage negotiation story of the little man breaking over a loan and sticking it to the mortgage company one frosty morning in Indianapolis. Gus Van Sant’s latest feels as though it’s come from the same era (impeccable seventies production design) and deals with similar feelings of frustration.
In 1977, small-time land developer Tony Kiritsi (Bill Skarsgård) walked into the Meridian Mortgage Company HQ and took the son of the big cheese, Dick Hall (Dacre Montgomery) hostage – looping a ‘dead man’s wire’ around his neck. Attaching the wire to the trigger of a shotgun and to himself, Kiritsi’s crude booby-trap ensured that if he was felled, or his captive tried to escape, Hall would be killed instantly. Kiritsi was aggrieved that Meridian’s CEO (Pacino, with a molasses accent) had ruined his real-estate deals and caused his business to collapse. As cops and the local DJ (Colman Domingo) got involved, Indianapolis was gripped by the stand-off as Kiritsi holed up in his bomb-rigged apartment with Hall.
Van Sant taps into the dark humour of amiable mid-westerners negotiating a high-pressure situation as Tony and Dick are unfailingly polite to each other despite their situation, the cops personally know their perp and unbelievably cool DJ Fred Temple (Domingo, who was made for this role) has chats with Tony during the crisis. In the days before a more coordinated and tech response, the law enforcement and media approach to the situation seems almost quaint. Skarsgård is jittery-righteous as a man who believes that he is making a stand for many people crushed under the boot of big business, while Montgomery exudes the dejected calm of a man who’s got Daddy issues and has never been good enough for his flashy Pa, who continues with his vacation in Florida during the stand-off.
With things to say about corporate America and social media (Kiritsi uses local TV and radio unchecked as a platform for his beliefs), Dead Man’s Wire is both a history lesson on a largely forgotten incident and a reflection on whether we’ve matured as a society since. It’s also a welcome return to form for Van Sant.
Words by JANE CROWTHER Photography courtesy of STEFANIA ROSINI/ELEVATED FILMS Dead Man’s Wire premiered at the 82nd Venice Film Festival Released in cinemas at a later date
Kathryn Bigelow excels at building tension around real-life horror as seen in the bomb disposal squad in Iraq in The Hurt Locker or the countdown search for Osama Bin Laden in Zero Dark Thirty. She raises the bar again with a film so terrifying that you won’t know whether to sob or scream watching it through your fingers. Rashomon-style in the retelling, A House of Dynamite follows different US government workers during twenty life-changing minutes when a nuclear missile is detected launching and heading for the US. Over three repeated chapters, Noah Oppenheim’s detailed script tracks the complex protocols triggered by such an event and the bravery required of personnel when the world looks very likely to end. Of course they’ve trained for this, but when it’s real, when 10 million people will die imminently, when DEFCON escalates from four to one within a quarter of an hour – what is the human response?
Eros Hoagland/Netflix
If that sounds like a standard opener to an actioner, it’s not. There are no easy answers or Jack Ryan figures ready to save the day. Even the sensible president (Idris Elba) is so confounded by his choices when given what he describes as a ‘diner menu’ of devastating no-win retaliation options, fumbles. This is a film that opens with normal people having a normal morning before armageddon begins; in Fort Greenly, Alaska a military team assume that a heatscore on their satallite tracking system must be an anomaly, reporting it to a cool duty office in the White House Situation Room (Rebecca Ferguson) who opens up dialogue with the Secretary Of Defence (Jared Harris), military brass and security advisors. As things become more serious by the minute, the magnitude of being the first to understand the scale of the calamity hits home. And that’s when A House of Dynamite becomes an emotional gutpunch as calm calls to loved ones are made, only select personnel are taken to the bunker to be saved and the time on the clock ticks down.
Eros Hoagland/Netflix
With on-screen captions explaining the acronyms used in the theatre of war and a script that informs without dumbing down, it’s horrifically easy to keep track of the options (or lack of them) in the case of nuclear war. Without knowing what country has launched the attack there is only a choice of escalation or de-escalation, both irreparably changing the world and killing millions. As the situation is viewed from three different levels of leadership the question remains the same to the audience in each chapter: what would you do? And, perhap more scarily, what would current real-world global leaders do?
Sobering, taut and as precision-executed as the White House procedures, A House Of Dynamite is a classy, almost unbearable watch that will make you squeeze family members close after viewing, breathing a sign of relief that, for now, this scenario remains in the realms of make-believe.
Eros Hoagland/Netflix
Words by JANE CROWTHER Photographs courtesy of NETFLIX A House of Dynamite premiered at the 82nd Venice Film Festival and is out now
Have we ever seen Dwayne Johnson cry on-screen? Having made a career as a comedy and action ace, Johnson gets uncharacteristically vulnerable in his first dramatic indie role, the moments where he breaks and sobs as far away from his cultivated ‘Rock’ persona as the face prosthetics genius Kazu Hiro gives him to play real-life UFC champ, Mark Kerr. It’s a welcome gear change; beefed up and raw, without a raised eyebrow in sight, it could be the role that takes him all the way to Oscar night.
Cheryl Dunn/A24
Written and directed by Benny Safdie, the film follows free-style wrestler Kerr during three tumultuous years when his involvement in the sport was pioneering and shaping the UFC behemoth we know today, and when his personal life was a challenge. We meet him in 1997 as an undefeated fighter with an addiction to painkillers, and a relationship with his girlfriend, Dawn (Emily Blunt) as punishing as anything in the ring. From the off, Safdie and Johnson zone in on Kerr as a gentle giant; he’s a beast when the bell rings but also asks after injured opponents, talks sweetly to kids and grannies, asks for the window shade on flights to be opened so he can appreciate the sunset and likes to prune cacti. Rage is reserved for interactions with Dawn, who knows how to push his buttons to the point of ripping doors off hinges. Though the love between them is clear – beautifully played within the real-life friendship and familiarity of Blunt and Johnson – neither the drugs or the romance are productive. That’s evident to Kerr’s bestie, Mark Coleman (MMA fighter, Ryan Bader) who trains his friend and is another sweet man in a cage-fighter body. As Kerr negotiates his first loss, the rules and pay of the UFC, rehab and police run-ins, he learns how personal experience informs the sport and the teaching moment in not being invincible.
It’s the classic arc of a sports movie and one we’ve seen many times before – with Safdie even popping a Rocky beanie hat on Johnson and giving him steps to run up during a training montage – but the wins are not necessarily about reinventing the wheel. The pleasure here is in watching Johnson disappear inside another person, impressively unrecognisable in a wig and prosthetic nose/brows, his heart on his sweaty sleeve. Blunt is equally delightful as the perma-tanned Dawn, bringing a brightness to the brittle as a woman who wants neither the drug-dulled sweetheart who collapses nor the snippy, sober killjoy she gets after rehab. Safdie also chooses to bring the real-life Kerr into proceedings, giving him his due in a third reel segment that tracks him as he cheerfully does his grocery shop, a curiously moving moment. A standard biopic then, but one that awards bodies will likely reward. Voters love transformation from a performer and Johnson provides that not only in his physically immense muscle mass but also in his decisive reinvention as an actor. That the story mirrors elements of his own hard-scrabble background and fist-bought success can only add to the narrative.
A24
Words by JANE CROWTHER Photographs courtesy of A24 The Smashing Machinepremiered at the 82nd Venice Film Festival and is in cinemas now
Photographs by GREG WILLIAMS Words by JANE CROWTHER
Jude Law arrived on the Venice Lido to premiere his latest role as Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Olivier Assayas‘ taut political thriller The Wizard of the Kremlin and shook off suggestions that the modern-day ‘Tsar’ might not like his spot-on portrayal. He told the press. ‘I felt confident, in the hands of Olivier and the script, that this story was going to be told intelligently and with nuance and consideration. We weren’t looking for controversy for controversy’s sake.’
The film is based on Giuliano da Empoli’s 2022 bestselling book by the same name, and fictionally tracks Putin’s rise to power through the eyes of a theatre director-turned TV producer-turned spin doctor, Vadim Baranov (Paul Dano). A created character based on real people surrounding Putin, Baranov relates his story to an American reporter visiting Moscow in 2019 (Jeffrey Wright), explaining the manipulation of Russian voters via vertical power and the background to world events (the Ukraine revolution, the sinking of the Kursk submarine, internet sabotage). Along the way Baranov betrays friends and lovers – including Tom Sturridge’s billionaire and Alicia Vikandar’s performance artist.
Law wears a wig and light prosthetics, and adopts the gait, expressions and mannerisms of Putin so that it’s difficult for audiences to tell the difference between historical footage and the actor. ‘The tricky side to me was that the public face we see gives very, very little away. There has been a term for him and that is ‘the man without a face’. There’s a mask. Understandably, Olivier would want me to portray this or that in a scene with a certain emotion, and I felt the conflict of trying to show very little.’
After The Wizard of the Kremlin premiere where the film received a 12 minute standing ovation, the actor was back to his open, real self as Greg Williams joined him on a boat heading to the AmfAR gala. At the event Law presented director Julian Schnabel with a tribute award of inspiration.
The Wizard of the Kremlin premiered at the 82nd Venice Film Festival and will be released at a future date Jude Law wears Brunello Cucinelli
Guillermo del Toro has been yearning to give life to Mary Shelley’s classic story of reanimation, morals and monstrosity for decades and it shows in the care and attention in this ravishing retelling. It begins with a bang as a 19th century Royal Danish ship trapped in ice near the North Pole discovers wounded scientist Victor Frankenstein (Oscar Isaac) being pursued by a super-human ‘thing’ which can dispatch sailors with ease and is relentless in its mission. ‘What manner of creature is that?’ asks the horrified captain. ‘What manner of devil made him?’
Ken Woroner/Netflix
Those are queries del Toro seeks to explore as we flashback to Victor’s unhappy childhood at the hands of his corporal punishment dad (Charles Dance) and grief at the demise of his beloved mother (Lauren Collins). Determined to conquer death, we next meet Victor as a dandyish rebel showing off his latest experiments to appalled surgeons in Edinburgh. As a gasping, bloodied thorax and arm flails around with electric currents (impressive and gross physical effects), the dodgy doctor attracts the attention of arms dealer Heinrich Harlander (Christoph Waltz) who supplies cash for further experiments, a gothic tower to harness lightning and another psychological wound in the shape of his niece Elizabeth (Mia Goth). Dressed like a bird of paradise with a mind as sharp as her tongue, Elizabeth is betrothed to Victor’s little brother (Felix Kammerer) but her extraordinary empathy for others makes her an intrigue to the callous cadaver collector – and the heart of the story when she encounters the product of Frankenstein’s master work; the ‘monster’.
Ken Woroner/Netflix
Del Toro keeps audiences waiting an hour before the arrival of this patchwork creature made up of the dead from battlefields that he’s sawn, snapped and sliced asunder (also pleasingly gruesome). When he appears he’s a pale wraith with huge eyes, a cowering animal that can only utter one word. Buried beneath prosthetics that make him look like living alabaster, Jacob Elordi manages to convey a wide range of emotions with his singular utterance and a performance that lives in the physical. As Frankenstein commits the sins of the father, abusing his ‘son’ and punishing him for a lack of perfection, it’s clear who is the true monster in the scenario… Gorgeously designed – sets and costumes are painterly in detail, gothic and sumptuous – Frankenstein boasts some explosive set pieces that rival action movies and themes that still resonate with world politics all these years after Shelley first published. Just as then gods and monsters are often interchangeable, Man is the cruelest creature on earth, we are what we do and a powerful man hurling insults is often only describing himself. It’s a faithful – perhaps too faithful for some – adaptation with an awards journey that starts at Venice. It is, both literally and figuratively, bloody good.
Ken Woroner/Netflix
Words by JANE CROWTHER Photographs courtesy of NETFLIX Frankenstein is in cinemas now Streams on Netflix from November 7
Luca Guadagnino’s latest is about cancel culture writ large – its opening titles recall Woody Allen and a bar jukebox plays Morrissey, while a philosophy lecture focuses on Foucault’s theory of a Panopticon state where all are under surveillance from society. Those under watch here are a group of intelligentsia; Alma (Julia Roberts) a Yale Yale philosophy professor hoping for tenure who is married to a snarky therapist, Fred (Michael Stuhlbarg), and friends with a flirty department colleague, Hank (Andrew Garfield). Alma, Fred notes, likes to surround herself with people who worship her on bended knee, so the faculty party at their elegant home is also attended by her starry-eyed PhD student, Maggie (Ayo Edebiri). Academia talk immediately turns gendered and political when Alma’s incoming promotion is questioned for whether she will get it for being worthy, or for being a woman. It’s against this primed beginning that Maggie makes an accusation of sexual assault against Hank, prompting a spiral of secrets, lies and social politics that will destroy careers. Especially as the school’s Dean of humanities admits to being ‘in the business of optics’…
Amazon MGM Studios
Directing a script by Nora Garrett, Guadagnino’s deliberately provocative film which provides no real answers focuses on hands as characters talk, confess and argue; as though their physical communication tells more truths than their verbal. With this much philosophising and privileged chatter there’s certainly plenty to unpack. And there’s numerous layers to the portrayal of each of the flawed players. Stuhlbarg, so good in Call Me By Your Name, continues to scene-steal with monologues from sofas as a surface-patient man who hides a bitterness and petulance from participating in a marriage that isn’t all it seems. Garfield’s turn from Byron-esque hot teacher to snivelling mess, and possibly worse, is a gradual disintegration that feels the most authentic, while Edebiri manages to sell the ethical twists required of her character, a rich girl whose entitlement is indiscriminate. Chloë Sevigny’s supporting role as a faculty therapist is a study in quiet betrayal.
Yannis Drakoulidis/Amazon MGM Studios
But the picture, unsurprisingly, is Roberts’. Dressed in Princess Di white jeans and blazer, her hair a blanching blonde, Alma, in her hands, is a switch-and-bait, a mystery, an ice queen and a woman dropping balls. Yes, she can eviscerate a student who questions her in class and tell the younger generation that ‘not everything is supposed to make you comfortable’, but she’s nursing a secret and an illness that are both incrementally weakening her. And she’s afraid of the consequences despite her philosophical filibustering. By turns Roberts is seductive, morally dubious, sympathetic and ultimately vibrates with rage. It’s the sort of compelling performance that awards bodies will likely recognise even if the film is difficult to parse. Garrett and Guadagnino are not interested in easy answers and their ambiguity frustrates as much as it intrigues.
Words by JANE CROWTHER Photographs courtesy of Amazon MGM Studios After the Huntpremiered at the 82nd Venice Film Festival and is in cinemas now
Last year Yorgos Lanthimos bowed the divisive Kinds Of Kindness starring Jesse Plemons and Emma Stone, an imprenetrable triptych that dared one to like it. At this year’s Venice Film Festival the trio debuted a linear, grimly funny and ultimately profound cosmic comedy that explores the horrors of humanity and the perception of powerful women.
Atsushi Nishijima/Focus Features
‘Bugonia’ – though not explained by the film – is an ancient Mediterranean ritual where the carcass of an ox was believed to be able to recreate bee life. A death of a greater beast was required to give life to the pollinating, essential apinae. Lanthimos’ film begins with the bees, as Plemons’ Georgia warehouse worker and amateur apiarist, Teddy, describes their integral role in the world and the need to stop the poison that is killing them. As we watch Teddy prep himself and his sweet cousin Donny (Aidan Delbis, delightful) for the event they’re planning in their squalid farmhouse it becomes apparent that the duo subscribe to web conspiracy theories, are emotionally damaged by Teddy’s opioid-abusing mother (Alicia Silverstone) now being in a coma after a medical trial, and are intent on kidnapping big pharma CEO Michelle Fuller (Emma Stone). Believing Fuller to be both responsible for the stasis of Teddy’s Mom and an alien from the Andromedea galaxy, the duo hope to save humanity with their plan – comedically doing yoga on filthy towels, shopping for Jennifer Aniston masks at Goodwill and chemically castrating themselves in order to be ‘neurologically free’.
Atsushi Nishijima/Focus Features
Fuller is a precise businesswoman who complains about too much use of the word diversity in a diversity training video and mandates a 5.30pm clock-off time for her workers while also reminding them of the need to meet quotas. She wakes at 4.30am, trains ferociously, wears a stiletto-heeled daily uniform and appears to have no private life – an alien MO to the societal expectations of feminity. When she’s kidnapped by the duo (in a laugh-out-loud physical comedy sequence) and tied up in their basement she continually, coolly, asks for ‘dialogue’. And that’s what Lanthimos provides, as Teddy and Michelle verbally negotiate, power shifting forwards and backwards, audience belief in the truth flip-flopping with every turn. Is Teddy a delusional crackpot with abandonment issues? Or has this random man actually got a point?
Atsushi Nishijima/Focus Features
Based on the 2003 film from South Korea, Save the Green Planet!, this is nonetheless a Lanthimos film, so darkness creeps into every facet of the process like the black mould seeping across Teddy’s kitchen ceiling. Teddy may not get his ‘news from the news’, but he is complex, bright and riddled with heartbreaking trauma (seen in weird monochrome flashbacks and hinted at by the local sheriff). Donny is driven by love and a need to escape his life, his compassion tempering Teddy’s more ruthless instincts as they torture Michelle. There’s an element of Ed Gein and some shocking blood splatter moments. Throughout though, there is humour and humanity; Plemons has never been better as the product of broken America while Stone’s large eyes (enhanced by a shaved head) and machine-gun cadence convince as both heartless CEO and credible ET. And the more dialogue the two engage in the more an audience is drawn in – not only to the ideological duel that demands a viewer take a stance, but to larger ideas of environmentalism, global accountancy and the sins of man. By the time the final reel is playing soundtracked by Peter, Paul and Mary’s plaintive ‘Where have all the flowers gone?’ you have to agree with the refrain and sentiment; ‘when will they ever learn?’
Words by JANE CROWTHER Photographs courtesy of FOCUS FEATURES Bugonia premiered at the 82nd Venice Film Festival and is in cinema’s now
Noah Baumbach and Emily Mortimer’s gentle ribbing of Hollywood begins with deliberate artifice: movie star Jay Kelly (Clooney leaning all the way into his public persona) is filming his martini shot on his latest flick, a death scene set on New York’s waterfront but actually carefully concocted in a Hollywood soundstage. As he utters his last line he asks for his co-star dog to come in later, and for another take. His team – Adam Sandler’s manager, Laura Dern’s publicist, Mortimer’s HMUA – flutter around him. But when he shuts himself in his trailer we see his interior life; one where he admits his existence doesn’t feel real, that he nurses regret, that ‘all my memories are movies’. After a failure to connect with his teen daughter (Grace Edwards) and a stinging meet-up with an old roommate (a scene-stealing Billy Crudup) Jay reassesses his cosseted, infantalised life, deciding to embark on european odyssey as he reflects on relationships with his neglected elder daughter (Riley Keogh, also bringing personal insight to her role), a co-star (Eve Hewson) and his acting class friend (Louis Partridge). Along the way there’s meltdowns, a lot of cheesecake, kookie Italians, central-casting Brits and a tone that veers between absurd and nostalgic, with nods to Fellini and Wild Strawberries. Baumbach deploys physical sets to interplay between present day and memory, and a heightened sense of realism that feels intentionally fake to reflect the inauthenticity that has crept into all aspects of Kelly’s life. Is his train ride through Italy really filled with morose German cyclists and cor blimey tourists or is this how he’s filtering it for a story on a late night talk show?
Peter Mountain/NetflixPeter Mountain/Netflix
Based on Baumbach and Mortimer’s own experiences in the film industry (they met when Mortimer’s son, Sam, starred in White Noise), Jay Kelly recalls other insider-baseball studies of Tinseltown (Entourage, The Player, The Studio) without particular bite. This is an affectionate look at coddled talent who say they are always ‘alone’ just as staff hand them a drink, the way that famous, wealthy people expect full commitment and loyalty from their entourage without giving it back, the disconnect of a star complaining how hard they work while living in a palatial mansion and travelling by private jet. When it’s the affable Clooney essaying such narcissism Kelly’s selfishness and black hole effect on his team’s lives reads as somewhat charming and unintentional. Dressed in perfectly pressed suits, that world famous crinkly smile hiding the pain beneath, Clooney walks a performance tightrope of showing everything while simultaneously holding back. A moment where he watches his real back catalogue of film manages to convey the wonder of cinema, the bewilderment of a star whose life is chronicled by projects, and the impressive career of Clooney to date. Aiding him in this endeavour is Sandler, rumpled perfection as manager Ron who facilitates, parents and apologises for his client while trying to juggle his own work/life balance. He has a minor love story with Dern but the real romance here is the one between Ron and Jay, both men having spent decades married to each other as a work family, missing out on personal commitments with their real nearest and dearest. And it’s seeing Jay through Sandler’s teary, loving eyes that helps us an audience connect with him despite his shortcomings. Though somewhat meta in its depiction of the star ecosystem, Jay Kelly is generalist in poking fun; at its best it showcases the finesse of its players. This is particularly true of Crudup who is masterful in a scene where he Method-reads a menu. Across the table, Clooney/Kelly’s eyes light up in delight at the magic trick performed in reciting entrees and it’s one of several moments that celebrate the artistry of cinema, as well as the sense of community and awe fostered in those who love to sit in the dark and watch it.
Peter Mountain/Netflix
Words by JANE CROWTHER Photographs courtesy of Netflix Jay Kelly premiered at the 82nd Venice Film Festival and is in cinemas now
Photographs & interview by GREG WILLIAMS As told to JANE CROWTHER
Actor and producer Dakota Johnson explores London in a vintage Bentley with Greg Williams to discuss growing up in a Hollywood family, how she’s learned to trust herself and why Sean Penn calls her the ‘truth machine’.
This is very old Hollywood,’ I say as I photograph Dakota Johnson reclining in a marbled bathroom in a suite at the newly opened Chancery Rosewood Hotel in Grovensor Square in London. The building is the former US Embassy (complete with golden eagle atop its roof) and Dakota is wearing a gown by Annie’s Ibiza, white feathers cascading across the floor. ‘Is it?’ she jokes, a Boucheron diamond cat ring glinting on her finger. ‘This is me on a regular Tuesday…’
It’s the first week of July and Dakota has flown into London from Karlovy Vary Film Festival in Prague where her films Materialists and Splitsville were shown, with the latter receiving the president’s award. She’s meeting me at this storied building to tell some stories of her own. Now the founder of a production company, TeaTime Pictures, as well as an actor and a book-club figurehead, she’s the child of movie actors (Melanie Griffith and Don Johnson) and the grandchild of a Hitchcock star (Tippi Hedren). Old Hollywood seems to run through her veins, in the way she moves through the world. ‘I think I carry myself as just myself. I also grew up around my mom, who’s an actress, and my grandmother, who’s an actress, and it’s very intense the way they move, the way they interact with people. I guess I must have absorbed a bit of that. But I try to not try to be anything.’
Is she close to her grandmother? ‘I saw her on Mother’s Day. And I try to call her every week. You know, she’s 95 but she has wild fashion right now. She gets these long nails. And the last time I saw her, they were marbled green. And she was wearing red lipstick and red eyeshadow. It was a strong look. And a tie-died green t-shirt that had lions and tigers all over it…’ Hedren of course is famous for her dedication to animal welfare, establishing Californian big cat sanctuaries, the Roar Foundation and the Shambala Preserve, appearing in the film Roar and having a menagerie of animals living with her at her home. She was famously photographed for Life magazine in 1971, hanging out at home with Neil, a 400lb male lion who padded around her pool and kitchen, and shared a bed with then-teenager Melanie. ‘At her peak she had 70 lions and tigers that she had rescued, and two elephants. She had a black leopard that had three legs, and his name was Boo. And she had snakes. Everything. She just rescued these animals,’ Dakota says. ‘By the time I was born, they weren’t out of their compounds. But my mom grew up with them in the house. If I go to the preserve now, there’s a few lions that, if I lean against the fence, they’ll rub up on me. Who knows what’s going to happen in life? I may inherit some lions and tigers…’
As she begins to brush her teeth I ask her about her relationship with London, a city that her grandmother visited often and that has been a regular stop on her travels since she made her movie acting debut in The Social Network. ‘I love London,’ she tells me through the toothpaste. ‘I actually lived here as a kid. My mom and Antonio [Banderas] got married here, and we lived here. My brother and I were tutored. And I had two Irish nannies growing up. We lived in a house where I had a room in the attic – I loved it.’ Though she filmed Austen adaptation Persuasion in the capital, she mostly visits now to promote her work. I ask what she’s working on right now. ‘Myself,’ she smiles through the mirror.
In truth she seems consumed with a number of projects, not least the ones she’s producing with TeaTime. Shepherding films through production to release, shaping them and contributing to the conversation about film is something she says is invigorating. ‘You know when something happens in your life, and it unlocks a part of your brain, and your creativity – that you’re like, “Oh my God, I knew you were there, but I didn’t know how to access…” I feel like a switch has flipped, and I’m so inspired all the time. I’m thinking all the time about the development, and the inner landscape of women of all different ages.’ That passion has led to reading Jungian psychology at the moment. ‘There’s a book by Robert A. Johnson called She, and it’s about the feminine psyche. I really want to tell stories about the truth of women, and I think there’s so many truths. Like, where do you even begin? There’s a movie that I’m going to make that my friend Vanessa Burghardt is going to be in. She is an incredible actress, artist and musician and she is autistic. She wrote a movie about her life as an autistic girl. It’s pretty amazing.’
I think I carry myself as just myself. I also grew up around my mom, who’s an actress, and my grandmother, who’s an actress, and it’s very intense the way they move, the way they interact with people. I guess I must have absorbed a bit of that. But I try to not try to be anything
She clearly recalls the catalyst for this obsession but tells me she doesn’t want to tell me the details of it. ‘I saw something happen, and I was obsessed with it for days. I still am. I think about this thing all the time. I think I’ll probably write about it, or put it in a movie of some kind. Normally I’m inspired by other people’s ideas. This was kind of foreign territory for me. I don’t quite know what to do with all these thoughts and feelings and images. I’m not really confident enough in writing yet. I think I just have to stop being a bitch about it! I’ve always felt inspired by characters that are written by other people, and I now feel inspired by these things that exist in my heart and in my head and in my soul. I’m bursting at the seams with ideas.’ I ask if this feels like an artistic evolution. ‘Yeah. It feels like I’m learning and interrogating myself so I can grow and evolve.’
We decide to go for a drive in a beautiful vintage Bentley I have borrowed, in a nod to her grandmother’s time in London when she shot to international fame thanks to her starring roles in Hitchcock’s The Birds and Marnie. Hedren then stayed in London while filming Charlie Chaplin’s last film, A Countess from Hong Kong, at Pinewood with Marlon Brando and Sophia Loren. We climb into the silver 1952 R-type Continental and take a spin around the streets of Mayfair. ‘This makes me love London even more,’ Dakota enthuses. ‘Today is like one of those perfect, glorious days in London. It’s just sweet. Tomorrow will probably be muggy and rainy, and I’ll be like, “Oh, this is one of those perfect, muggy, rainy London days…” She’s enchanted by the car and asks the driver to toot the horn for her. ‘That’s the most beautiful horn. Can you imagine if that’s what it sounded like in New York? People would be so much happier.’
Before I can ask Dakota anything else she’s talking to the driver, getting him to open up about his family in beautiful detail. ‘How did you draw all that out of me?’ he marvels as he turns onto Piccadilly. ‘It’s my gift,’ Dakota laughs. ‘It’s just a thing that happens. I think people feel safe with me. Sean Penn calls me a truth machine. When we were making Daddio together, he came up with that. I won’t take bullshit, you know? If somebody’s talking nonsense, I’ll just be like, “OK, nice to meet you. Bye.” And I don’t really like small talk.’
Dakota has a reputation for truth telling and no BS – influencer Blakely Thornton calls her a ‘little Caucasian chaos demon’ thanks to her refusal to be anything other than herself in interviews. I wonder if she’s always been this way, so assured in her own skin, and she shakes her head. ‘I’ve had to teach myself that for sure. I’ve had to learn the hard way. I was a teenage girl once, you know? And that’s, of course, when I think you’re trying everything. You’re trying: “Who am I?” But then it’s very exhausting. I would rather know myself more and more, and be as unique as possible. I don’t want to try to be something else.’
That confidence is something that would lend itself to directing, and Dakota has started down that road by directing a music video. Later this year she hopes to direct the film she’s producing for Vanessa Burghardt. But she’s reluctant to say she’s directing a feature film. ‘I don’t know why I don’t want to say, “I’m directing a film.” It’s just a thing that I’m making with my friends and amazing, talented people, and we’re making it together.’
We head to The Wolseley for a martini and caviar (which the gluten-allergic actor eats on sliced cucumber). I ask about growing up with Antonio Banderas as her stepfather (her parents split in 1994 and Melanie married Antonio in 1996) and what he might have taught her. ‘They’re not married anymore, but he’s still my stepdad, I would say. He’s extremely disciplined with prepping movies, prepping his roles. But also taking care of himself. He’s always warming up his voice and his body. He’s very disciplined with diet and exercise. He’s always studying movies and theatre. He’s obsessed with theatre.’ Is that discipline something that rubbed off on Dakota? ‘I think so. I’m very disciplined with my health and wellness. I’m bad at texts and emails!’
Did Antonio’s dedication to his art give her the drive for a creative 10-year plan of her own? ‘I just want to move in the direction of my soul and my heart,’ Dakota says. ‘I don’t have a 10-year plan or a five-year plan.’ What perspective has growing up in the film industry with actor parents given her? ‘Maybe a sense of not taking it so seriously, and also knowing that it all could go away any second. It’s all just silly. I mean, it’s serious, but it’s also silly. I take it seriously, but I don’t take myself seriously. Growing up inside of this world, I’ve observed it for so long that it’s all just kind of ridiculous, but I’m also in love with it. So it’s just fun, and, at times, gruelling and hurtful and difficult. You know, when I don’t get a job that I really want. And it happens all the time. But you just kind of get used to it.’
We find our table at the restaurant and order gin martinis with a twist while Dakota reflects again on the tough side of the film business. ‘Some people just have creative genius in their minds. But a lot of us have lived through certain difficulties or traumas. Like, I’ve been in therapy since I was four. Because my family was so famous. My parents were so famous. I’m always guarded, talking about them, because I don’t want to bring their personal lives into the world. But it also was always in the press. They both struggled with addiction, which is not news to anyone. And I think growing up in a very public family with that going on inside the home, was challenging. But it led me down a path of being so curious about developing myself – learning and growing and interrogating myself constantly so that I can grow and heal.’
We share steak and lobster, and Dakota tells me more about her experience of producing and why she finds it so inspiring. ‘Not only can I curate what I’m making, I can curate the people that I’m working with, and make sure that everybody gets along, and is collaborative and kind. And if not, I can say, “This doesn’t work for us. I wish you the best of luck.” So I help create the world, obviously, of the movie for writers and directors. And then I build around them people that protect them, uplift them and support them. I just really don’t like being on sets where nobody knows what’s going on, and that happens a lot. And it sucks. It makes you feel unsafe as an actor. You can’t do your job, and it’s the worst. Like, this business model doesn’t work, and it could be better.’ Though TeaTime doesn’t have a mandate, Dakota is clear in the type of art she wants to make. ‘I like films that are provocative in some sense; emotionally, intellectually or visually. And I like films that have female characters that are explosive or subdued or complex or quiet. It’s not; hot, blonde, 24, wears glasses so she’s smart and nerdy. Like, “She’s hot but she doesn’t know it.”’
Dakota feels she has never fitted neatly into a casting box. ‘I think the industry might be a little confused by me, so I appreciate that. I like that. I think they know I can deliver in a comedy. They know I can deliver it in whatever sense. But there are movies that I’d love to do like The Lost Daughter or Suspiria or A Bigger Splash or The Peanut Butter Falcon. I don’t know what people expect of me. No actress is one thing, but no woman is one thing…’
I don’t know why I don’t want to say, ‘I’m directing a film.’ It’s just a thing that I’m making with my friends and amazing, talented people, and we’re making it together
When we’re done with dinner, Dakota gets changed in the back of the car outside the Ritz, slipping into a silver fringed dress that moves like water. It has turned dark outside and we walk to a street corner under a lamp to catch the light dancing across her as she moves. ‘I feel like this corner works for me,’ she jokes as she twirls and passing motorists shout encouragement out of their car windows. ‘This is my new job!’ As we walk through the twilight I pick up again on the trauma Dakota talked about earlier, asking her if she has an age she reverts to now, the source of her psychological make-up. ‘If I revert to an age, it’s four,’ she says decisively. When I ask if the circumstances are a secret, she nods. ‘Everything is a secret in my life, sadly. I wish I could say everything, but I just can’t. I think some artists are able to be like, “This happened, and this happened, and this is why this happened.” And I just can’t. Not because of the fact that my family is known, but I just don’t think it’s anybody’s business, honestly.’
Is childlike innocence important to her craft? ‘It’s all play. It’s make-believe. So you have to have it. I really respect actors that are in it all day. And I just can’t do it. It just makes me laugh. The whole thing makes me laugh. Even scenes where I’m devastated make me laugh. Because it’s ridiculous. I feel like childlike play means being open to the universe and inspiration and imagination. For me, if I become so focused on a thing, and if I have to be a certain way, it makes me not do my thing well. So I have to do both. I have to be focused, and also allowing for the bullshit to come through.’ She corrects herself as the dress shimmers in the half light. ‘It’s not bullshit. It’s magic.’
We climb back in the Bentley to head for a stroll alongside the Thames and it reminds me of a car ride in London with Dakota in 2016. She was nominated for BAFTA’s Rising Star award and we shared a car from the hotel to the event. ‘Didn’t win,’ she smiles. ‘It was like when I didn’t get into Juilliard. I didn’t want to go to college anyway. I worked instead. My dad told me that if I didn’t go to college – he likes to say this in press, so I will quote him – he says that if I didn’t go to college, I would be off the payroll. So I said I’ll apply to one college only, and it was Juilliard. And I got an audition. I went in there to audition with 200 kids, and you do this group warmup. And I was just like, “Fuck this shit.” And they asked me to sing. I didn’t know that you had to have a song prepared. So I didn’t have a song prepared. But Radiohead’s In Rainbows had just come out and so the song Nude was stuck in my head… which is just impossible to sing if you’re not Thom Yorke and a horrible choice in audition song. So I really fucked that up. And you’re supposed to go and get asked for another audition, and they were like, “You’re not going to have another audition.” And I said, “That’s fair.” So I moved out of my house.’
The move from the family home and out on her own was facilitated by a supermodel. ‘I was at an airport with my mom, who’s obviously a famous person. We ran into Naomi Campbell when I was 16, and she said, “Your daughter should model” because I was gawky and skinny and weird-looking. And I was like, “Yeah, I should, I should, I should, I should.” Because I wanted to make money so that I could leave my house. And so she called Ivan Bart at IMG, and I got signed to IMG. And then I did two jobs that made me enough money to support myself until I got a job. So I moved out of my house at 18 with my dog Zeppelin and supported myself.’
I like films that are more emotionally provocative or intellectually provocative. And I like films that have female characters that are explosive or subdued or complex or quiet
She didn’t model again but she did live the struggling actor life as she tried to get her foot in the door. She lived in a ‘shitty’ West Hollywood apartment, her car got broken into all the time, and she had cockroaches. Now she’s shimmying to No Broke Boys by Tinashe on her phone on the banks of the Thames, under Somerset House. The London Eye winks across the river. ‘I feel like I have always belonged here in a way, and I don’t know where I belong yet,’ she says of London. ‘I’m always drawn back. And I would live here if I needed to. And maybe I will. To me, London is the central part of the world. There’s such an incredible mixture of people and it also feels removed from the world in a way. Most of my favourite musicians have come out of the UK, like Led Zeppelin, the Stones, the Beatles, Blur, Oasis and Pulp… the list goes on.’ She laughs and leans against the car. ‘And I’m putting my ass on a Bentley. You know from Betty Blue where she says, “I’m warming my ass?” I’m warming my ass.’
Now it’s late, it’s time to head to a mutual friend’s premiere party. We get back in the car and continue to talk as we travel to Claridges. Dakota is a frank person and I notice that she brings that frankness to her two latest films. Celine Song’s Materialists sees Dakota play a NY matchmaker caught between two romantic options: Pedro Pascal’s millionaire and Chris Evans’ penniless actor, and talks honestly about the role money plays in love. In Splitsville, two married couples explore open relationships with a candour that is disarming. ‘I think as an actress I’m quite frank, but I think I’m drawn to filmmakers and writers who are very honest – brutally, radically honest in their writing. So the frankness is kind of inherent. It’s provocative to me, and it makes me feel alive. It makes me feel seen. I see people being drawn to movies that are a bit more direct, not skirting around the truth of life and love. Materialists is certainly frank in one direction, and Splitsville is very frank in the other. But, truly, I think it’s just about honesty. I think there are so many honest paths of love, and it doesn’t matter what they look like, as long as everyone is happy and not hurting anybody else. I think it’s interesting that these movies are coming out a couple of months apart. But I just am so interested in love and relationships, and how people are choosing to love each other. We’ve been swiftly moving into a phase of humanity where some people are lucky enough to be really themselves, and love the way they want to love, and be true to themselves, and honest with themselves. I just want to try to represent the vastness of the human condition in film. Materialists is, “Who do you marry?” The person that represents the life you think you want, or the person that may not have all of the material assets, but truly sees you and loves you and just completely wants the whole of you?” Splitsville is, “How do you just really live your life, and also commit to another person without unnecessary rules or boundaries?” And neither is the right answer. It’s just: to each his own. Her own.’
I think as an actress I’m quite frank, but I think I’m drawn to filmmakers and writers who are very honest – brutally, radically honest in their writing. So the frankness is kind of inherent. It’s provocative to me, and it makes me feel alive
Do you think there’s a right answer? I ask as we arrive at our party. She smiles at me with that trademark mischief as the street lights illuminate her face. ‘I don’t think there’s a right answer at all…’
Photographs and interview by GREG WILLIAMS As told to JANE CROWTHER Materialistsis out now Splitsvilleis in selected cinemas today and everywhere from 5 September Dakota Johnson wears Gucci
Hair: George Northwood, ℅ Management Make Up: Valeria Ferreira, The Wall Group/Make Up Assistant: Gabbie Lee Styling: Kate Martin, The Wall Group/Styling Assistant: Pia Aung Thanks to David Clark for the loan of the Bentley R-Type Thanks to the Chancery Rosewood Hotel, Mayfair, London. Dakota and Greg shot in the Diplomat Suite (bathroom), the Deluxe Mews Suite (balcony), the atrium and outside the front facade rosewoodhotels.com/en/the-chancery-rosewood
