MASTER GARDENER: The Paul Schrader Film

What did I just watch?

Also, friend of mine who worked on Light Sleeper said Schrader originally wanted to use and maybe did use, Springsteen songs, but couldn’t afford it so then said “eff it!” and just went with the other guy, but I’m not sure if I really believe this.

I liked certain things about this, the look, the vibe, the titular character, but something about the story didn’t sit well with me.

Wikipedia:

Schrader had originally intended to use songs from Bob Dylan's album Empire Burlesque, but Schrader and Dylan could not agree on which songs to use and Schrader decided to use songs by Michael Been instead.[6]

Ah, okay, now that makes total sense. Feel like if it had been The Boss a way would have been found to make it work.

the world missed a chance to re-acquaint itself with "Clean Cut Kid" and "Tight Connection to My Heart."

I wish Schrader had been able to convince Randy Newman to change one word of his biggest hit, for the theme song to Cat People.

It's weird to me that this is the case, but Schrader and Springsteen are friends, I don't know from how far back, but they maybe could have worked something out. But yeah it was Dylan songs.

Honestly can't quite imagine that film with Dylan songs though, I think it required music which had a certain moodiness. Like how Neil Jordan deployed Leonard Cohen's a thousand kisses deep a couple times in The Good Thief.

Thought that Sigourney Weaver was okay but her character was kind of stock. Like maybe a similar character played by, say, Isabelle Huppert would be more interesting or at least tougher in an interesting way. Maya character was very well-acted but maybe underwritten and overdetermined. Finally, feel like I would have preferred if the ending was either more or less violent.

This is on Hulu now and as discussed above, I like a lot of Schrader's movies, but I think this one's gonna take a while to get through because it's just...too much of A Paul Schrader Movie? The first half hour is him doing a greatest hits show, and I feel like he's capable of more.

It's worth looking for his hilarious explanation as to why he gave his main character that shady past. I saw him explain it during a Q&A for the film, but I'm sure he's said it in interviews. It also explains the stunning posts he made about wishing he could cast Kevin Spacey long after his years of misdeeds were exposed. (Master Gardener hadn't been announced yet, or possibly cast.)

xps And Schrader talks about licensing Dylan's songs for Light Sleeper towards the end of this clip from his 2008 interview at the Brooklyn Academy of Music - pretty amusing:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0z0dUluZcE

Paul on a movie of close to the same title:

ALL OF US ARE STRANGERS. I was slow to see this spectuclar film because I assumed it was another gay love story, instead of the poem of memory and loss it is. An example how the democritization of filmmaking--lowering of production costs--not only creates a lot of junk but also a few gems which would have been inconceivable thirty years ago.