AN AMBUSH OF GHOSTS

        

My Life in the Ambush of Ghosts
(previously printed in 'Fever Pitch' Magazine)

By Nathaniel Drake Carlson

At some point during late 1992 I was turned on to the British synth combo In the Nursery. I was greatly impressed with the first couple of albums I bought, Sense and Duality. The style of these recordings was unlike anything I had heard before. The twin brothers who constituted the group, Klive and Nigel Humberstone, had been creating progressively more polished and sophisticated music for much of the past decade and around the time of Sense and Duality they were really coming into their stylistic own.

At this point the brothers were augmented in their efforts by vocalist Dolores Marguerite C, an even more ethereal Kate Bush, and military snare drummer Q. If this sounds like an odd mix, consider the fact that the style of ITN itself had by then developed to its present state, a strangely successful blend of synthesized classical melodies and dark, unrelenting back beats. In other words, a more winning version of what makes up most of the Projekt label.

In 1993, whilst casually looking for the next ITN release, I happened upon a movie soundtrack they had done. The movie was An Ambush of Ghosts. I had never heard of it. The score, however, was magnificent. Despite many great recordings in the years since, I consider the Ambush album their finest hour.

The score was partially new work and partially reconstituted pieces off of Sense and Duality. Normally this kind of thing doesn't work but somehow here all the older tracks were integrated seamlessly into the whole. They felt as if they belonged nowhere but in this context. There was a definite consistency of tone throughout, which is rare to find anywhere, and the tone elicited could only be described as dour.

It's depressing music, sure, but it's the best damn depressing music you'll ever hear. There is a dark majesty to the score, a grandeur of purpose and intent which is so rare in modern motion picture music as to be virtually nonexistent. The effort is aided immensely by well chosen dialogue extracts, another device which generally doesn't work. Here, however, they are employed sparingly and serve greatly to intensify the mood.

Needless to say, as I listened to this score I grew increasingly excited by the prospect of seeing the movie. This was before I grew up and realized that only mind numbing garbage gets a wide release and great films are often lucky to get a video release. Unfortunately, that was the case this time. Years passed and Ambush has never seen a release, not even on video.

Having spent much of that period researching what little I could on the film, here are a few additional reasons why allowing it to remain languishing in limbo is ridiculous:
First of all, Ambush was a relatively low budget affair, shot in fall 1992 at an average cost of 1 million dollars. Having said that then it is even more impressive to note that the film won the award for cinematography at the '93 Sundance Film Festival. The woman who won this award, Judy Irola, was interviewed in American Cinematographer a year later and shed some light, as it were, on the movie's subject and themes.

In short, the plot concerns a troubled teenager named George living in a suburb of Los Angeles. A decade prior he witnessed the accidental killing of his younger brother by their mother, Irene. In the time since, mom has gone slowly mad, often driving her husband to use sedatives and restraints to appease her.

George, meanwhile, finds another teen boy hiding in the family shed. Evidently Christian has also killed someone by accident, a rival during a fight at the local high school. However, his story is contradicted by vibrant, blood red flashbacks which present another reality altogether.

George attempts to act as intermediary, but finds his situation complicated as he develops feelings for Christian's girlfriend. The film ends with the reality of everything we have seen called into question.

Judy Irola describes the style she and director Everett Lewis crafted as "painterly", specifically derived from the look of such artists as Caravaggio and Vermeer. She also mentions that the whole film was shot in a residential neighborhood of L.A. This suggests an intimate, European feel, and yet the music and plot seem to indicate an experience of vast emotional proportions.

The only actual review of the film came in Variety after the premiere at Sundance. Though restrained by doubts about its commercial potential, the review is otherwise solidly enthusiastic. It describes Ambush as possessing a "sleek, muscular, brooding style some will undoubtedly find overwrought and pretentious, but it is undeniably arresting and makes the picture grippingly watchable". Elsewhere, it praises the "relentless succession of stunningly dark images and sequences", as well as the "extraordinary" musical score. The reviewer even comments on the film's ending, mentioning that endings of this type are generally cop-outs, but in this case it "takes on the nature of a deep, unfathomable mystery".

One other element which was singled out, and should be noted here, was the caliber of the acting and who was doing it. Though largely unknowns at the time, the cast was filled out with the likes of Anne Heche, David Arquette and, as George, Stephen Dorff. The Variety reviewer praised Dorff's performance and Detour magazine referred to it as the strongest male performance that year.

One would think that this combination of elements would have ensured the film at least a marginal video release. Since it did not, I made efforts of my own to contact those involved to try and find out why.

Both Judy Irola and Everett Lewis teach at USC and I managed to get in touch with them and develop an email relationship. I had hoped to invite them for an interview in which they could discuss the film, assessing its current state as well as the current state of the independent film market, which provides questionable support for deserving films.

Far better than I could have expected, I was invited to Los Angeles for a screening of An Ambush of Ghosts. The screening was held at the Norris Theater on the campus of the University of Southern California.

Prior to my trip, I visited with producer Robert Shulevitz who lives in Portland, Oregon. We met at an Eric Rohmer film festival and took our conversation down to a local restaurant afterwards. Shulevitz is a very self-deprecating personality, affable and forthcoming with details concerning the stormy production and history of his "lost" film.

The movie concerns a family tragedy and its reverberations throughout time. When George Betts was eight years old he was playing catch with his younger brother Grover in the drivewayof their home. George throws to Grover, who runs behind their mother's car as she begins to back out. He is instantly killed and mother and remaining son are forever traumatized.

Shulevitz commented on the fact that the film had great personal resonance for him as his own brother had died in his youth. The goal of the film then was not ever crowd pleasing entertainment but quite genuine and specifically motivated catharsis. And as much as this kind of thing is embraced by European audiences who are intimately familiar with such intentions, it is summarily rejected in the US for being self-indulgent and naval gazing.

At Sundance the audience was given cards to rate the film on a numerical basis. On a 0 to 5 scale, 0 being poor and 5 being best, An Ambush of Ghosts received a lot of 6's and 0's, indicating the kind of polarized response it would continue to engender.

At the Seattle Film Festival, the film sold out a 600 seat theater on the basis of a blurb in the programme announcing the cast alone. By the end of its 90 minute running time, two-thirds of the audience had walked out. If nothing else, Ambush was never to be met with indifference.

Shulevitz also talked about the actors, calling Stephen Dorff's lead performance as the deeply troubled George a work of genius. Dorff even contributed a piano theme for his character.

An Ambush of Ghosts uses the dysfunctional family/adolescent angst genre as a basis for an exploration of real pain so often glossed over by conventional films of this type. The movie is non linear and operatic in tone which contributes to its effective sense of dislocation.

Shulevitz described how he met Everett Lewis while they were both attending USC and they found that they shared a similar outlook and passion for similar themes. Shulevitz was particularly impressed by Lewis' debut film, 1990's The Natural History of Parking Lots which he considers a masterpiece. That film was very raw and primitive in technique and design; shot in black and white 16 mm. it tells the disarmingly simple story of a relationship between two brothers who have never really had the chance to know one another and attempt to make up for lost time. Despite these seemingly simple ambitions, it succeeds due to the manner in which the material is handled. The characters' subtle psychological shifts are masked by the shallow surfaces of modern L.A. It is also noteable for its elegant framing and use of light. Very much a director's film it signals everything of consequence through the movement of the camera and positioning of the actors. Though the finances and schedule were tight the mise-en-scene was incredibly well articulated, denoting a talent and artistic vision to be reckoned with.

Carl Dreyer, Antonioni and Vermeer were often cited as inspiration for the filmmaking team. Shulevitz described how An Ambush of Ghosts wound up being a very intimate project shared between himself, Lewis and Irola. The film was cut on a flatbed rather than on an Avid computer to increase the personal connection to the material. The film itself cost only a half million dollars to make--paltry even in independent film terms--but its success and the recognition it received indicate that this was a challenge met with great enthusiasm.

Shulevitz described how several distributors have attempted to handle the film but found its tone far too authentically painful to manage a sale. One distributor even wanted to cut the first ten minutes out completely. Others balked at the film's stunningly dark sequences. Video distribution even became a problem when it became clear that the dark palette of the film was outside the legal limits of color contrasts allowed for most US TV sets. Quite obviously An Ambush of Ghosts is a film working off its own unique set of priorities.

When I arrived at USC for the screening I was greeted by Everett Lewis and Judy Irola who both spoke briefly to introduce their work. Lewis mentioned that the film was really comparable only to Peter Greenaway's work and thus to be prepared for a less than naturalistic experience. He reiterated much of what Shulevitz had said regarding the difficulties of assuring the film a release due to its difficult subject matter and style of presentation. However, Lewis admitted that the decision had been made during production to take the far more difficult route rather than simply regurgitating yet another example of the fairly conventional dysfunctional family genre. Distribution difficulties, therefore, were more or less expected. An Ambush of Ghosts was meant to replicate the mental state of a disturbed, even insane individual--hence the final film could not help but be a little insane.

Having seen it now I can attest that all this is true and then some. One is struck immediately by what occurs within those first ten minutes that some distributors had hoped to have dropped. The reason for their discomfort becomes quickly clear. Shulevitz had said that in terms of dramatic heights scaled An Ambush of Ghosts went far beyond even something like Paul Thomas Anderson's Magnolia. Initially I couldn't imagine how that could be but as the film opens it is self evident. Instead of a gradual development toward specific emotional heights Ambush truly does approximate catharsis, hitting us full in the face from minute one with the trauma of the central incident. Dorff as George ten years later and Genevieve Bujold as Irene reel in their own private universe of absolute, enveloping despair. They each share some of the guilt but they are each too far gone to share the burden equally or to commiserate as a way of alleviating the pain. They are condemned to private hell. The exacerbating notion of a decade having passed only adds to our sense of devastation.

The first ten minutes depict how this plays out. We see what we at first believe to be legitimate home video footage of the incident, only gradually realizing that no one would have actually recorded this. It represents how we maintain our memories:in bleeding and blurring still frames of significance. We see Bujold in her dead son's room, still preserved like a shrine. We see her in the white robes of a suppliant, wailing on his bed. We see her lie in the gravel of the driveway behind the car in the same spot and position as her lost child. Later we see her being sedated and restrained in bed with shackles to quell her hysteria. This is encated by the ineffectual father figure played with sublime grace by Bruce Davidson. The father, of course, has scarcely any role here because he does not share direct experience of the pain associated with this tragedy and thus is confined forever to the periphery.

Dorff, for his part, remains locked in medium close-up for those opening minutes, barely distinguishable through a lattice work of shadows. He talks to his dead brother, crying out for him, for his own void to be filled.

Heavy stuff and not remotely commercial. There was something undeniably thrilling about being witness to that, to a true art film of conviction and integrity with no condescension for the bottom line.

Once the tone proper has been established the film begins after a brief opening credit sequence. The main thrust of the narrative revolves around George's discovery of another young man named Christian, played by Alan Boyce, hiding in the family garage after accidentally killing another student in a fist fight. Christian befriends George, mostly as a means to an end, and enlists him to act as intermediary to his girlfriend Denise, played by Anne Heche.

It is here, in this seemingly arbitrary plot development, where Ambush truly takes off. The film implies the connection between George and Christian, both of whom are accidental murderers. But there are disturbing intimations that Christian may have been more cognizant of his actions than he lets on, than he may even consciously know.

There is, for instance, an early scene--brilliantly played--in which Christian attempts to convince George of his relative innocence, that things just got out of hand. But intercut throughout are red tinted flashbacks portraying what we can only imagine is the objective truth--Christian's brutal attack, viciously assaulting the other boy on the hood of a car in an empty parking lot. What is so electrifying here is the potential for viewing this supposedly objective material in so many ways. Is Christian a liar trying to save himself or is he blocking out the real incident or is he far more calculating than that, far more deviously dangerous? Or, perhaps, is his guilt really a projection of George's own perceptions of himself and his own accountability? The implications are vast, made all the more painful because they are never elaborated upon, left to writhe in the back of our minds.

The depth of what is accomplished within this simple set-up, can't be overstated. George believes Christian when he says that he came to him because he feels he can confide in George. George is so emotionally stunted that he grasps at even this transparent manipulation as sincere because he so deeply needs to believe it. He goes on to form an unhealthy attachment to Christian and to Denise later, who, as girls are wont to do with younger boys who are clearly awkward around them, flagrantly flirts with George in an attempt to disarm him. He, of course, takes it as the real thing.

There is an incredible funeral sequence for the murdered boy, almost entirley without dialogue, but a virtuoso display of moving camera work, scoring by In the Nursery and highly affected and nuanced acting. George holds Denise but it is evident in the gesture and the inflection of body language that he is not comforting her--he is at his own brother's funeral and he is comforting himself.

As the picture winds down, Christian prepares to turn himself in, reasoning that it is the only thing he can do. George cannot deal with the prospect of abandonment yet again. While embracing Christian farewell he plunges one of his mother's sedative needles into Christian's arm, proceeds to strip him down to the waist and shackle him to the wall with his mother's wrist restraints. The scene is played at a furious, high pitched level, mostly in theatrical long shot, lit Vermeer like with pools of light in surrounding darkness. All of which leads one to the inexorable conclusion--as George holds Christian's unconscious body on the floor, rocking and embracing him--that this movie never exactly had much hope of getting on a double bill with Roland Emmerich's The Patriot.

The movie even goes so far as to include a scene in which Christian awakens, toys with the idea of escaping, then reflects back on things George has said--how much he needs him, and basically decides to stay and remain George's prisoner in the shed. But is he a prisoner of love, lust or just desperation? Ambush leaves these kind of questions tantalizingly open, suggesting perhaps that the answer is all of the above.

Dorff manages to carry his character so far into psychosis as to become truly harrowing and real; real even in the midst of the gorgeous if overwrought spectacle of the film itself. His job is impossibly difficult for he has to be weak and indecisive and yet selfish, ravenously insecure and needy, victimizer as well as victim, sometimes all at the same time.

An Ambush Of Ghosts ends with a sequence akin to the finale of Gilliam's Brazil in which George finally goes completely over the edge and we see--in an altered version of the seemingly objective opening home video style flashbacks, this time with George at 18--that he can alter the history of the event that destroyed his family's peace. He can rush to rescue his brother and salvage his mother's sanity for all time. The ending is happy in the same way as Brazil, as a glimpse of respite from an unendurably hellish existence. But the questions remain. Is a happy ending always illusory? Does it have to be? Is it even an ending? There is also the additional question as to how much of what we have seen functions solely as a projection of George's fractured psyche. Or is it a case of subjectifying all experience as in Eyes Wide Shut?

It is a great loss to us all that Ambush remains unavailable due to the kind of legal complications that always seem to dog films of this caliber. It is a shame for a great many reasons, each connected respectively to the contributions turned in by Lewis, Irola, the actors, ITN, et al. With all facets of filmmaking craft at the top of their game, An Ambush of Ghosts could stand as one of the true high water marks for independent art cinema to aspire if only fate would cooperate and it could be seen. For in order to be admired and appreciated it must be seen.

Everett Lewis
Interview by Nathaniel Drake Carlson

Q: Let’s start with the script. You were hands on involved in so many aspects of production on your previous film The Natural History of Parking Lots, ranging from obvious directorial chores to editing and screen writing. What drew your attention to Quentin Peeples’ script?
A: Robert Shulevitz, the producer, drew me into the project. He offered me a great deal of freedom. I was not initially attracted to the material. He indicated that the material was open to manipulation. I turned the project down; Robert felt that I would do something he liked and he kept coming back to me. I agreed, with the caveat that the script be rewritten, extensively.

Q: How much revision went on and how did it effect the tone of the project?
A: I felt that very little of the original script was believable, or motivated. I also found the treatment of minor characters, like the girlfriend, to be not very enlightened in terms of the representation of females in the film. The script was constantly under revision from the moment I agreed to direct the project all the way through shooting. Many of the scenes in the film were being written and rewritten as they were being shot. All of the stuff inside the shed, all dialogue was rehearsed , and then rewritten just before shooting.
Tone. Hmm. I don’t know quite what you mean here; the tone of the finished film, the tone of the set, etc. I think that Quentin Peeples imagined something like a movie of the week, with perhaps more polish. I felt that a movie about madness should itself be mad to its very core. Those are very different goals.

Q: Would you say that you have a recurrent set of thematic pre-occupations and if so, what would they be?
A: I have wanted, in my work, which is the work I write, to do things that I haven’t seen onscreen. At the time of the movie in question, I was very interested in male intimacy, close relationships between man. Perhaps that’s why Robert was interested in me, I don’t know.
I don’t really work through these things consciously. I may think I do, but I don’t. I don’t see what films are about, really, deeply, until they’re done. I work on creating layers of meaning in them, but what I think I do and what I do seem to be different. People saw a lot more in Parking Lots of the whole male thing than I intended, for example. It was a big gay event film that year. I didn’t intend it that way at all.
Robert sees things in recent scripts that suggest meanings that seem intended, but are unconscious on my part. I have, for my part, tried like hell to avoid repeating myself. It doesn’t work, though. I like smart characters, male relationships, some sort of search, and in the end, an attempt to work through a sense of personal isolation. Our most recent picture, in post, Luster, actually achieves these objectives positively.
Robert, on our newest project, sees me in the lead character, which was not conscious at all. I simply felt that I knew this guy’s motivations and wrote what I understood, coping, holding it together, repressing, anything to keep things going. I was shocked when he saw me in it; I wasn’t aware I was there. So I guess that it’s not preoccupations, but a single creative mind at work. I’ve never been interested in the whole genre thing, so I sort of recreate the wheel each time; in that light I guess it’s no accident that the wheel I invent has a mirror on it. Sigh.

Q: Talk a little about your reception at Sundance. I know that your cinematographer Judy Irola won the camera award for the film that year. What was the whole festival circuit and screening experience like for you?
A: Ambush deeply divided people. The script was so melodramatic and the direction and the shooting so dark and uncompromising that the two things can basically be separated. People who like pictures really liked the picture and people who like words really hated the picture. I think. What do I know? I felt, myself, that while the picture was full of wonderful stuff, that it was deeply flawed. I felt very awkward about the whole thing and even though I did it, it didn’t feel like I did it, I felt like it did itself. I supported it, got out and worked for it, but it was an ambivalent experience at best. I always feel ambivalent at festivals, period, and at screenings of my work. Showing something that you make, if you’re serious, that isn’t necessarily like something else, even though you like it or parts of it, and knowing that people basically want to be entertained, is a very difficult process. I can’t imagine Rothko going out and smiling and talking to people after looking at his pictures. That’s sort of how I feel about it.
These things are very personal and hard, and it’s very strange to have to get out there and smile and whatever. Festivals are hard.

Q: The film has an extremely unique and idiosyncratic feel–encompassing the contributions made from all those involved. Having said that, these are not necessarily qualities that are embraced or even encouraged by the establishment or the independent film marketplace supposedly so open to experimentation. It must have been extremely difficult to get this financed let alone distributed. Do you feel the pressure to ever concede to current standards or expectations regarding film form and structure?
A: Um, yes. Sort of. But you have to do your thing. Thank god for digital. Although, I must say that Skin and Bone, made after Ambush, is wildly experimental, got a distributor, is on DVD and video and went to festivals, mostly without me, thank god, all over the world. I think that it depends on one’s guts, the nature of the film and the desires of the distributor. They have to do something to sell. Weirdness can work, if it can be spun.

Q: How do you encourage your students in the face of these pressures?
A: Do what you want, but make it whatever it is to the nth degree and people will respond. People don’t respond to middling treatment or material.

Q: Any anecdotes about distributor hell?
A: Not from me.

Q: The film did get released in Europe, didn’t it? How was it received there?
A: I don’t know. In general, I get a really good response from Europe–England and Greece anyway. They always seem to get it. I was in Greece for a festival and turned on the TV and on the Athens TV station was a clip from Skin and Bone, where one hustler teaches another how to use a whip and a riding crop. I was surprised, to say the least. And the best review for that film, one which totally got it was British, got the layers and all the metaphor, and there’s a lot, didn’t know if I meant it all, but the reviewer still got it and encouraged people to go, because he couldn’t imagine anything like it coming around again. On the other hand, Sight and Sound dissed it, contemptuously.

Q: I’ve got to ask you a little about the actors involved in Ambush. One of the most fascinating elements of all this is the fact that your film features performances–great ones–by a number of young talents who went on to later success. I’m thinking here of David Arquette, Anne Heche and, of course, Stephen Dorff.
I’m still stunned, even after having seen the picture and taking into consideration all the inherent difficulties that selling it involves, that there hasn’t been more demand for this film to be released in the light of these early performances.
Specifically I’d like to single out Stephen Dorff–who succeeds in giving what amounts to an almost impossible performance. He has to be weak and needy and desperate and yet play victimizer as well as victim. What was your experience with him like?
A: Stephen was so eager and wonderful. He wanted to really stretch and go all out for something. He also had to be likeable enough so that you stay with him throughout the picture. It is really an impossible part.
He rehearsed, stayed late, came early, helped write scenes, took the whole thing so seriously. He loved the film, too, and showed it to everybody he knew. He really went to a lot of trouble to become the character and support the film.

Q: I understand he even contributed a piece of music to the film.
A: The piano piece over the first ten minutes, which becomes a theme. He was so into the character that he began writing music as the character. It was one way Stephen sort of unconsciously found out who the character was. I asked to use the music; he called it Georges’s Theme when he first played it for me. I found his wonderful openness and desire to be great really touching and moving.

Q: The challenge of the piece is that it’s both ambiguous and operatic in texture. How did you find the proper balance? Does it have the proper balance?
A: I took each scene apart: acting, script, art direction, blocking, camera position, lighting. Considered each part in terms of the whole and in terms of each scene. Each moment. Pushed each to the edge (and the poor technicians, too; it was a hard shoot). Reassembled them in front of the camera. Each element is calculated to bring out as much as possible. I think most movies, and certainly mine now, let some things ride and prioritize what elements surface in each scene, allowing only a few to become visible (a very modulated experience); in Ambush all the elements of the scene go hell for leather. There is no prioritizing; that’s partially what makes it operatic. It is an assault on your senses and sensibility.

Q: Can you talk about what you were attempting to establish in the opening ten minutes?
A: As the editing progressed, it became clear, to me anyway, that the script attempts to justify the activities and behaviors of the characters were pallid. These were mad, insane people. I had to make the film itself “insane” and communicate both madness and backstory. The opening, played as a sort of symbonic mnemonic melody of the past madness, sets the audience up for the characters, the events and the style of the picture. The experience, as it were. (I kept saying that the picture was “phenomenological”) I know it’s unusual, and was probably the biggest stumbling block to distribution of the picture, but watching the picture with you, recently, after a couple of years, I was surprised and pleased at the beauty and strangeness of that 10 minutes. That sequence was the most cut and recut in the picture, and the sound and score took a lot of precision and patience to create.

Q: Another quality of Ambush which has long fascinated me and served as my entry way into the picture is the astonishing musical score by In The Nursery. It’s such a strong, evocative work that really creates pictures in the mind. What brought them to your attention and what was the process of working with them like?
A: The music supervisor brought them on; I had temped the picture with music from a band called Dead Can Dance.

Q: Did they see a finished product first before they composed the score? So much of the film feels composed to their music, a la Peter Greenaway and Michael Nyman.
A: The picture existed before the composers came on. I wanted to make the picture seem as intentional as possible, and so I wanted a high degree of correlation between picture and music, to match even the footsteps sometimes, and to sustain sequences and refrains. We worked really hard to sync up the images and the music. In The Nursery was enthusiastic and wonderful. They totally understood what I was up to with the film and abetted me in my crimes.

Q: What is your opinion of the place of narrative in fiction films? I ask because it so often feels willfully displaced in your work.
A: You shouldn’t confuse narrative and formula. Narrative seems to me a rich and interesting method of constructing meaning. I don’t really feel that anything I’ve done is non narrative. It may be that the narrative is more explored than is usual in film fare, and it may be that I find interest in applying the narrative form to the same kinds of exploration that I would take a character through. What I don’t do is formula, or traditional three act structure (though actually I do, it’s often just not that easy to read). I think that I am more interested in the people than the plot. So when I direct I give precedence to the vagaries of performance of character more than plot. The plot is there, but it doesn’t drive me as much. I also think audiences are smarter than filmmakers let on and while my perception may be mistaken, I cannot shake it. So I like to jump over places that seem dull and move on to more interesting material. This may be perceived as non narrative; I just think it is non boring. I am also just contrary, but I feel I’m doing the best things for the picture, I guess.

Q: So much of the power of Ambush derives from the application of the operatic tone to relatively conventional domestic drama. This material could easily have become a movie of the week on Lifetime. In speaking to Robert Shulevitz, he indicated how the original script may have been fairly standard but you and he saw potential in the personal elements rather than the political ones. Robert talked about how the central tragedy reflected tragic elements in his own youth. How much of the intensely personal feeling on display here did you feel you were channeling from your past?
A: Actually, I think, a lot, but since I am still unraveling that past, I cannot clearly articulate what those elements are. My attraction to death and darkness and isolation and a desperate desire for closeness are obviously about my past. I now think that the thing about being an artist is that you channel these things without knowing quite why. If one is lucky enough to be in situations where one has ideas, one shouldn’t question them, but act on them. I’m talking art, here, of course. Ambush is one giant rush of ideas and feelings.

Q: The relationship between Dorff’s character and his mother, played by Genevieve Bujold, is particularly compelling in its emotional nakedness. Was this an aspect that was as pronounced in the script or did this require you to tap into your own ambivalent attitude regarding family connections?
A: The script made her a lot more “wacky” and she wasn’t quite understandable as a character. Genevieve and I made her mad. Really mad. We went way off the page in terms of the script. Now that you ask, I always felt and still feel naked somehow about this movie. I loved the actors, but there is something of a question about how I got them to do these things and how I knew I wanted those things done. I can’t really answer it, but there are deep connections there, obviously.

Q: The house which acts as the primary set piece for so much of the interior action is so well articulated as a living space it becomes a character of its own. I assume some of this played into your own background as an architect.
A: Actually, it played into the idea that every element of the script had to have weight; my own background allowed me to see architecture as having meaning.
The house was a metaphor for the family; they were restoring this old house when their son was killed. (None of this was in the script, by the way) The restoration stopped that day, they never even moved the ladders and paint cans. The house is them; it is a record of their family’s desires and destinies. It also, in best Gaston Bachelard Poetics of Space fashion, is like a living organism that represents the human body. Upstairs is the head–the memory, downstairs–the basement, with the sewage and hidden plumbing. This house is a dark, shadowy brain, disordered, mad, and potentially dangerous.

Q: Now for a very typical question, but one I am curious to know the answer to anyway. What films and filmmakers have been and continue to serve as inspirations for you?
A: Bresson, Dreyer, Altman, Alex Cox. The oeuvre of Buster Keaton. Lately, Unzipped. Cow and Chicken is particularly interesting this year. Space Ghost. I like Chungking Express. I don’t go to many films in first run lately, just in revival or video.

Q: Are you heartened or disturbed by the state of independent film these days?
A: What independent film? That was over by 1995. By the way, I feel lucky to have been part of that movement.

Q: Parking Lots was such a raw, primitive film in style and technique. Ambush, by contrast, is sleek and elaborate in its design. I’m curious what compelled you to return to the former technique with the film that followed Ambush, Skin and Bone. Was it a shift motivated out of necessity or because it reflected the tone of the material?
A: Well, Skin and Bone was about hustlers. I wanted to do a lot formally, cutting-wise and so forth and I wanted a lot of freedom. I don’t feel that Skin and Bone is very like Parking Lots, actually. Both have film grain, but Parking Lots has a lot more “style”. I didn’t want “style” for Skin and Bone. I wanted to layer past and present, imagined and real, ethical behavior and unethical behavior, trust and betrayal. It’s rough on purpose and rough practically so that I could explore a lot of stuff I didn’t quite know how to do before doing it. I did a lot of improvisation and reshooting on Skin and Bone. It took a long time and a lot of experimentation and work. In Parking Lots I shot the script, added one shot and it was just as I imagined it would be. I’m sort of anti-style now. I just want to have the frame show the action. I’m interested in the complexities inside the frame as opposed to the complexities of the frame itself. Maybe I’m just older, or maybe therapy is paying off. I don’t know.

Q: On a side note, in the published script to Gregg Araki’s The Living End, he describes one character as being a “tall, Everett Lewis like figure”. Robert Shulevitz mentioned that the two of you used to work together at an arts center in L.A. Got any stories?
A: I admired Gregg for awhile, and we were friends. Like any lively, competitive artists we had a falling out. I prefer his early work, the first three pictures, anyway. We’re not very alike.

Q: Finally, what are you working on now and what’s up next for you? And, of course, is there any hope at all of Ambush ever getting a video release?
A: Robert has produced a new film, Luster, which is in the final stages of post, thank god, and casting another picture, called, for the moment, Blonde. I think Blonde has the potential to be the best thing I might ever do. It could be really good. I’m starting a script for the next picture, but it’s untitled and not even close yet, but it follows ground I’m establishing with Blonde.
Video? It should be on IMAX, 70mm., PBS, at Blockbuster, on TV every night!

AN AMBUSH OF GHOST (1993)

Stress Fiesta Films presents An Ambush Of Ghosts, a dark, brooding, hallucinatory voyage into the mind of George Bets (Stephen Dorff), a Los Angeles teenager. Ten years ago, George's innocence was shattered when he witnessed the accidental killing of his seven year old brother by their mother Irene (Geneviève Bujoid). The following decade unfolds with all the clarity and logic of a nightmare. The family has tried to carry on, but Irene's denial of losing a son has pushed her to the brink of insanity. George's ineffectual father, Bill (Bruce Davidson) is often forced to rely on restraints and sedatives to subdue his wife.

Through a twisted series of events George hooks up with a possible murderer. Although George tries to lead a normal teenager's life, he is unable to escape the haunting shadows of his past. Just like his mother, George goes over into his own internal world - a world where he can protect his brother. Mom is happy, and everyone is okay.

DIRECTED BY EVERETT LEWIS
PRODUCED BY ROBERT SHULEVITZ & LAUREN GRAYBOW
WRITTEN BY QUINTON PEOPLES
CINEMATOGRAPHY BY JUDY IROLA
MUSIC BY IN THE NURSERY

STARRING: STEPHEN DORFF, GENEVIEVE BUJOLD, BRUCE DAVIDSON, ANNE HECHE, DAVID ARQUETTE, ALAN BOYCE

WINNER OF 'Best Cinematography' award at Sundance Film Festival - 1993

for more information on An Ambush Of Ghosts write to faqsfilm@gmail.com