Independent Means

In a society where a film's success is all too often judged by box office grosses, it is rare to find a filmmaker who has the ability to tell gripping stories without concern for dollars earned or publicity gained.

But Atom Egoyan wouldn't have it any other way.

Fiercely independent and critically adored, Egoyan is a filmmaker from Canada best known for films such as The Sweet Hereafter and Felicia's Journey. He has largely avoided the mainstream in recent years by continuing to make only the subtle, deeply unsettling films that have characterized his nearly 20 years behind the camera. Much of Egoyan's early work, which found a home on the film festival circuit, was obscure, edgy, microscopically budgeted and seen only by the most obsessive American art-house addicts.

But cinema aficionados, recently converted Egoyan followers, and those new to his work will have a rare opportunity not only to view a sampling of Egoyan's films this weekend at the Harvard Film Archive, but to also hear him discuss the evolution of his work. Next of Kin and Family Viewing, two of Egoyan's earlier films, will be shown, as well as a series of less well known short films.

The Early Years

Nothing about Atom Egoyan is easy to peg or categorize, including his background. Born in Egypt in 1960 to Armenian parents, Egoyan relocated to Canada when he was three, but didn't begin speaking English until four years later. Egoyan's unique name reflects his dual heritage, as he was named "Atom" in recognition of the first nuclear reactor ever to be built in Egypt, and his last name was shortened from Yeghoyan upon the family's arrival in British Columbia.

Isolated from his Egyptian roots, Egoyan set out to reject his ethnicity and assimilate himself into Canadian culture. "I think there's a real distinction between Canada and the United States if you're an outsider," Egoyan says. "When people immigrate to the States, there's a real sense of wanting to be American, and that comes before any other sort of identity. Canada is much more ambiguous. There's an emphasis on keeping heritage in the community but the choices of where to live are much greater. My family chose to locate to the West, where assimilation was very important."

During his teen years, Egoyan worked at the ritzy Empress Hotel in Victoria, an experience he often likens to the art of filmmaking. "Both the hotel business and the film business are concerned with creating and sustaining illusions," he explains. "In a hotel, you make up a room and create a place that is supposed to be reminiscent of a home. And a hotel staff function much like actors do, putting on a performance of serving people." Indeed, the world of hotels functions prominently in two of his films--Speaking Parts and The Adjuster. Although being a busboy is far less glamorous than directing movies, Egoyan says the experience was invaluable. "Hospitable trade is a wonderful place to examine human interaction and to learn about human nature. You meet all sorts of people, experience all sorts of personalities. It really was an incredible experience."

Egoyan chose to major in international relations at the University of Toronto, yet he always had a connection to the arts. "Although I was studying international relations, I was part of the film club and, most importantly, had access to film equipment," Egoyan points out. "I loved drama and playwriting and I became totally fascinated with the different ways [that] you could tell a story. And when I began to actually shoot things, I became convinced that the camera was like another character-I found film to be an incredible means of expression."

Early Artistic Visions

In 1984, Egoyan released his first feature film, Next of Kin, which received funding from both the Canada Council and the Ontario Arts Council. The complex story deals with a disillusioned young man who, while undergoing video therapy with his parents, sees a tape of an Armenian family wracked with guilt over giving up their son to a foster home years ago. The protagonist, Peter, craves a new role in life, so he presents himself to the family as their long-lost son, an act that leads to dark visions concerning cultural displacement and the line between role-playing and reality.

Egoyan followed Next of Kin with the disturbing Family Viewing, a 1987 film about the psychological struggle between Stan, a video equipment salesman, and his son, Van. Stan has driven both Van's mother and grandmother out of the house, and now he is symbolically eradicating their memory by taping over home videos-a practice that Van is painfully opposed to.

Family Viewing, which ultimately deals with Van's oedipal conflict with his father, helped make Egoyan a known commodity in the film world. This visibility was increased through a highly publicized incident at the Montreal Film Festival, in which veteran director Wim Wenders handed first prize to Egoyan after winning for Wings of Desire.

"Of all my films, I still love Family Viewing the most," Egoyan says, which might surprise those familiar with his recent work. "It was an incredibly personal expression on my part and I'm still very proud that I was able to execute it so early in my career. I think it has a genuinely heroic character with a rich reward to gain, I just love the humor and I think the format is particularly interesting." Egoyan notes that he's looking forward to the screening of Family Viewing at the Film Archive, because it will be a 35mm print being shown on a large screen. "The projection of this film is very important, especially in terms of format and the way it was shot," Egoyan states.

The Film Archive will also be screening five of Egoyan's short films-Howard in Particular, Peep Show, Open House, En Passant, and A Portrait of Arshile-on Saturday night. Although these films were basically released "off the radar" as Egoyan puts it, they are still important works to him on a personal level. "I've always been interesting in the way thinking has become a kind of ritual and how we do many things without being consciously aware of it. I think there's certainly a facet of absurdity in human nature and I wanted to explore its impact on human nature, especially in works like Peep Show and Open House."

Oh What a Tangled Web We Weave: The Adjuster and Exotica

In the 1990's, Egoyan began to explore the complex web of human relationships, as well as the dark secrets lurking behind those relationships, in two particularly disconcerting films: The Adjuster in 1992 and Exotica, a twisty thriller that many view as his breakthrough, in 1994. Neither film should be watched with the expectation of a story that moves fluidly from point A to point B. Egoyan's focus is on the complex connections between his characters, and thus, the normal conventions of time and structure take a backseat to this desire. "I wanted to make a film about believable people doing believable things in unbelievable ways," Egoyan has always said about The Adjuster. After seeing the film, a wicked black comedy that involves an insurance adjuster, film censors, an ex-football player, a lamp merchant, a podiatrist, and a butterfly collector among others, critic Roger Ebert mused that Egoyan must love puzzles, paradoxes, and card tricks.

"I vaguely remember Roger saying that, but it's completely untrue." Egoyan laughs. "I really don't have the patience for those sort of things. I don't try and write my screenplays as if they are puzzles-rather, I start with the pieces and work from there. I know it's a stereotype, but there is the sense that many Armenians like making rugs. It's actually true in my case. I like to see The Adjuster and Exotica as more of weaving a tapestry than putting a puzzle together."

Exotica, which takes place in the forbidden world of an erotic dance club and also brings together an eclectic group of characters, was celebrated by most critics as Egoyan's final maturation into one of the industry's foremost independent filmmakers. Although Egoyan keeps a special place in his heart for his early films, he does view Exotica as a kind of culmination. "I definitely saw Exotica as a summation of many of my recurrent themes-at the time, I believed that I had gone as far as I could with original material and it was time to move onto something new. Interestingly, Exotica was probably my greatest commercial success (rather than The Sweet Hereafter) and it really gave me my first taste of how the Hollywood system works."

The World of Books: The Sweet Hereafter and Felicia's Journey

Believing that he had exhausted his ideas for original material with Exotica, Egoyan decided it was time to turn to the literary world. Egoyan eventually chose Russell Banks's The Sweet Hereafter, a relentlessly bleak story about the aftermath of a tragedy in which fourteen children are killed in a school bus accident. The result was an infinitely subtle and heartbreaking film that found its way onto over 200 top ten lists.

The Sweet Hereafter proved to be a landmark film for Egoyan because, against virtually all odds, it garnered Academy Award nominations for Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay. For those who think that independent filmmakers look down their nose at the Oscars, Egoyan serves as a striking contrast to that notion.

"The morning of the nominations was like a dream," he fondly recalls. "I viewed it as such a triumph-for this small, independent film to get recognized like that, I was truly honored. And the whole period between the nominations and the awards show was just wonderful. Plus, it was pretty obvious that Titanic was going to sweep, so I didn't feel any pressure."

"Of course," Egoyan laughs, "as soon as I lost, I was immediately forgotten again. But that's okay. I'll always be thankful that the industry chose to recognize me with those two nominations."

Egoyan's experience shooting Felicia's Journey, released last fall, was unique in that it is the only film he has shot outside of Canada. The filmmaker originally planned to relocate the story to Canada, as he did with The Sweet Hereafter (originally set in New York), but decided to keep it in Ireland due to the insistence of the book's author, William Trevor.

"In the end, I realized that the crux of Felicia's Journey is rooted in the Irish culture," Egoyan admits of the tale about a pregnant woman searching for her lover who falls under the sway of a morally conflicted serial killer. "There were many small elements of the story that contributed to the decision as well, such as the fact that abortion really is still illegal in Ireland."

Felicia's Journey also differed from Egoyan's other endeavors in that it was handled by Mel Gibson's Icon Productions, and thus was the first Atom Egoyan film to have a firm Hollywood connection. The director is quick to point out, however, that the difference in funding did nothing to change his style or approach to storytelling. "Mel was very great about it," Egoyan says. "I had the freedom to tell the story exactly how I wanted to tell it and never felt the slightest pressure to make the film more marketable or viewer-friendly. Although Felicia's Journey was tied to Hollywood, it was still a very small-scale, independent feature." In a lesser director's hands, Felicia's Journey could easily have devolved into a standard Hollywood thriller, but Egoyan's thoughtful approach to the material and his sense of subtlety and restraint made it a complex and powerful work.

At the end of our interview, Egoyan muses on the most important subject of the day-the recently announced Oscar nominations. He expresses disappointment that Bob Hoskins didn't receive a nod for his work in Felicia's Journey, but admits that the category of Best Actor was very crowded this year, with many deserving candidates. "I was kind of surprised The Cider House Rules ended up with a Best Picture nod," he says. "But I was very happy to see The Sixth Sense recognized. I also thought Topsy-Turvy might have gotten more nominations."

The world of filmmaking has changed radically in the last decade, Egoyan notes. "When I made Family Viewing there was definitely a firm line between commercial and independent movies that seemed immutable. But today, that's all changed. I think it really began with Soderbergh's Sex, Lies, and Videotape-a title I still wish I'd thought of first, incidentally-which proved that features which were artistically ambitious could still meet with commercial success."

When asked whether he would ever consider coming to Hollywood to make a big-budget, artistic feature such as Anthony Minghella's The English Patient, Egoyan admits that he "would definitely be open to it. It all depends on the situation. Having complete control and final cut is a very important element to me. At the same time, I am definitely aware of the possibilities that the world of Hollywood offers. I haven't yet wanted to tell a story that required any kind of sizeable budget, but it's a possibility that could definitely arise in the future."