Strange Days Production Notes 2 (continued)

Our Future?

Without delineating cause, no political party can deny a current trend towards what some have called the "third world-ization"of America: the disappearance of the middle-class; the augmentation of the police state; escalating racial tensions; independent militias and apocalyptic religious movements... We are most definitely living in strange days.

Strange. Troubled. Perhaps even desperate. But not without the possibility of redemption. Expanding on James Cameron's ideas on Lenny's redemption, Kathryn Bigelow sees more than a glimmer of hope within the film's seemingly bleak nightworld. And it comes from a main character who is the least likely of sources. "The heart of 'STRANGE DAYS' lies in the emotional matrix and the ability of Lenny Nero to exhibit vulnerability, to show emotional pain that ultimately is the road to his redemption." The director's re-defining of genre is largely responsible for taking the hero in these unexpected directions. "The film certainly has film noir qualities," Bigelow explains, "But then it subverts it to a certain extent. Film noir implies a downward spiral from which there is no return; 'STRANGE DAYS,' on the other hand, offers tremendous return for Lenny and, by extension, for all of us." Beyond re-defining film noir in STRANGE DAYS, Bigelow offers an intriguing fusion of other genres. Thriller. Love story. Social commentary. Ralph Fiennes
elaborates on the film's genre-mixing and genre-bending conventions: "'STRANGE DAYS' is a film noir thriller set against this background of racial tension imagined or anticipated to be happening four years from now," he sums up. "You go through a lot of pain and a lot of horror and a lot of disturbing situations in the film, but the end note, I think, is definitely optimistic. The only hope for us as a society in the next millennium is if we pull ourselves together and try to create some kind of social, racial, economic harmony for everyone. This film hopes and indicates that we have the potential for that harmony."

Angela Bassett agrees with Fiennes optimistic assessment. "At its core, I think the movie's message is, 'Wake up.' We are each other's most precious commodity. We are each other's most precious possession. Be aware. Open your eyes. Look at the possibilities." "The story is so captivating and it is such a fantasy," says Juliette Lewis. "It was such a great 'what if,' you know, about this new drug. That's what a movie should be. It should just take you on a little ride, entertaining you and asking you questions."

James Cameron sees the film in a similar fashion, pointing to some subtle yet significant differences between "STRANGE DAYS" and other films he's written. "The films that I've directed myself, and written for myself, have always been a ride first. And yet, they also have a redeeming artistic value woven into that ride. "But I think this film shifts the balance," he continues. "There are elements that are ride-like -- very intense, suspenseful and action-oriented moments. But they're also tied back to some strong character and political themes. So I think that from my standpoint as a writer, it's probably the most interesting film that I've done because it's so different from everything else."

Designing The Year 2000

"As a designer I try to follow a character through his world," explains production designer Lilly Kilvert. "Lenny Nero is such a wonderful character to hold onto because he's such a tragedy and yet he's so optimistic." "'STRANGE DAYS' is definitely dark and edgy," says Kilvert. "In many ways that's the most challenging kind of film to design, because you have so much latitude in what you can do. But for me it really does have a lot of romantic elements and that's ultimately what wins out. I think that is humanity's best trait: We find the bright spots, even when we have no reason to find them."

"STRANGE DAYS" marks Kilvert's second collaboration with Kathryn Bigelow, having previously designed "The Loveless," the director's first feature. Her rich body of work defies easy
classification, ranging from the post-pop cartoon feel of "Ruthless People" to the deep textures of "Legends of the Fall" (for which Kilvert received an Academy Award(R) nomination). Kilvert and staff faced the daunting task of creating a future Los Angeles that is approximately forty-eight car payments away. "It was very difficult to find just the right amount of change without taking it so far out that it gets suspicious," explains Kilvert. "Highways, buildings and even car design isn't going to change that radically in four or five years. What is going to change are the small things like telephones and computers. Our focus was on the details." Details like universal phone numbers, widescreen TV sets, and multi-media/communications consoles that can transcribe spoken language in real time. In short, all of the sophisticated gadgetry created by people with too much time on their hands for use by people with too little.

Technology, however, was only one of many influences at work. "The emphasis has been less on creating a futuristic look and more on creating the social fabric of the film," explains Ralph Fiennes. "In the story there is an important figurehead named Jeriko One. He's a rap star and a political radical and his murder serves as a kind of symbol for the intense racial unhappiness underlying the belly of the film. I think Kathryn Bigelow, Jim Cameron and Jay Cocks have anticipated a future based on the tensions we have around us now and which we witnessed during the 1992 riots. The film depicts a society that's falling apart with racial tension and violence on the streets." "It just looks like a state of emergency," adds Angela Bassett. "There are armed guards and police in total riot gear. And that's day to day. That's business as usual. It's pretty sad. I just look around and go, 'I hope it's not like this. I hope this isn't coming.' But it's not out of the realm of possibility and that's what's so scary."

To capture this tense urban environment, Kilvert utilized the city itself, long recognized for its stark visual/cultural/economic contrasts. "You'll get the sensation that we shot entirely on location. It needs to have that feeling. The city can have a wonderful scary look to it and we really wanted Los Angeles to be a strong character. You can't achieve that with backdrops on a soundstage." Lenny's car is his office. He cruises the night in his 1997 model Mercedes (a prototype loaned to the production) with his ear firmly glued to his cellular. Sunset Boulevard. Hollywood Boulevard. The filmmakers spent weeks patrolling the fringes of some of the most famous streets in the world, exploring the line between glitz and grunge.

Location shooting extended to interiors as well, many of which were culled from deserted factories and warehouses in the shadow of downtown. "There are certain things that happen to a building over the course of a hundred years that you can't improve upon," observes Kilvert. "Part of production design is what you choose to leave alone." With subtle choices like these, Kilvert conveys a probable society based on trends we recognize to be happening in our own.

"One of the decisions we made was to translate wealth into space. Space is all there is left to buy, really. With riots, earthquakes, fires and floods, society has become very transient. Everybody has slimmed down their possessions. The sort of settledness that we experienced in America in the fifties, sixties and seventies is really going to disappear." In an ironic twist on materialism, the more possessions you have, the poorer you actually are. Space -- the ability to distance yourself from the huddled masses -- has become the ultimate status symbol. "Philo Gant, for example, has space to burn. And everything in his space is very crisp and very organized. Compared to Gant, Lenny is living in a cardboard box," adds Kilvert. It could be suggested, then, that Lenny's true home is the street. Certainly, the world of "STRANGE DAYS" is one of the street. Teenagers dart furtively between troop carriers, ready to take cover at all times. Shop owners protect their oases of capitalism with flack jackets and Uzis. The only crowds you see are clusters of police and national guardsmen and they don't look at all happy to be here. It's 1999. If you are in a public place, chances are it's because you have no choice. "One element we talked about very early on was crowds being inside instead of outside. Most people watch television or play with the Internet. And, with more and more people working at home, there's a strong trend towards isolation," says Kilvert. "There's a longing to be with people. So we wanted the Retinal Fetish to be this weird place where people come together just to be part of a crowd."

"The Retinal Fetish is full of all kinds of extraordinary visual dioramas and people doing weird things," explains Fiennes. Throughout its cavernous interior the design team placed living
tableaux behind chainlink fences and in cages : refugees around a bonfire; old women ironing; Nazis burning books; blindfolded men and women chained to a wall, patrons forking over precious cash to take shots at them with guns. The Retinal Fetish became a mausoleum for some of the most heinous symbols of the 20th Century -- a post-modern concentration camp/ cathedral, dedicated to the pleasures of the flesh and thepunishment of the soul. Music plays a major role not only at The Retinal Fetish but throughout the entire film as well, becoming an important character in its own right. "The music is integral in two ways," says Bigelow, "creatively and from a narrative through Juliette Lewis' performance as Faith."

Steven-Charles Jaffe also sees the film's sound as a key factor in presenting the near future. "The music in "STRANGE DAYS" helps define this future in a subtle way," he explains. "We didn't want it to be too futuristic," says music supervisor Randy Gerston, elaborating on the music's role in positioning this society. "We really needed vital rock and pop music that would be accessible and understandable in 1995, but with a particular quality that might still exist in 1999."

Giving the music a strong international flavor added to the film's subtly futuristic feel. Says Jaffe: "The world is definitely getting smaller and smaller. The boundary lines are more confused. We're getting used to foreign languages being part of the pop vernacular." The global assemblage of musicians heardon the "STRANGE DAYS" soundtrack is impressive. Australian composer Graeme Revell ("Dead Calm," "The BasketballDiaries"), who was once a member of one of that country's biggest industrial bands, brought the perfect background and approach to the score, utilizing instruments from around the world to provide a hint that things aren't quite what they are (were) in 1995. "There is something subtle going on in Graeme's music that tells us that we're not in today's world," explains Jaffe. Revell also performs a duet with Lori Carson, "Fall into the Light," on the soundtrack. French alternative band Deep Forrest provided additional scoring and collaborated with famed musician Peter Gabriel on the end title song, "While the Earth Sleeps."

The United Kingdom is also represented. British group Skunk Anansie's song "Selling Jesus" is heard during the end credits, and reggae rapper Tricky contributes "Overcome." From Belgium comes the popular underground band The Lords of Acid performing "The Real Thing." In addition to these cutting-edge music talents, two performers better known for their thespian skills made important contributions to the "STRANGE DAYS" soundtrack. Along with Juliette Lewis' aforementioned renditions of P.J Harvey's "Hardly Wait" and "Rid of Me," actor Glenn Plummer, who plays rap star/activist Jeriko One, performs vocals on Me Phi Me's provocative "hereWecome."

The Mother Of All Parties

The peace symbol. The smiley face. The dollar sign. Every era has its icons and the millennium will be no exception, certainly. In direct contrast to the racial/economic tension the
story portrays, the filmmakers created a positive vision of what the future should be in the form of a fictitious "Faces of the World" ad campaign seen on billboards and subway standards throughout the film. As Kilvert explains, "It's a remarkably optimistic campaign because it deals with faces from around the world -- Arabic, African, Russian, American, South American." The production utilized journalists' photographs from across the globe to give the campaign an undeniable sense of realism. "And with them I use different languages. So on every billboard you have a face and a language and they all say '2000.' It's interchangable in so many ways, but at the same time it's very
constant." For the climactic millennium celebration, the design team transferred the icons to banners, cups, hats, T-shirts and video screens -- a loud and universal declaration of "we made
it!" There are two schools of thought about when the new millennium actually begins. Most set its start at January 1st, 2000. Purists contend that since there was never a Year Zero we must offset its start to 2001. Whatever you believe, no one can deny that when the odometer finally kicks over, there's going to be one helluva bash. "When I first read the script, aside from being taken by the tour-de-force writing and characters, there was one page that stood out in my mind as a producer," explains Jaffe. "It caught my breath, took it away and sent it spinning. It said 'IT IS THE MOTHER OF ALL PARTIES.' There must be 100,000 people jamming the closed streets of downtown L.A.' I kept thinking, 'How am I ever going to do this?'"

In staging the event years ahead of schedule, "STRANGE DAYS" provided the City of Los Angeles with nothing less than a full-scale dress rehearsal. "We had several hundred people organizing this, from our crew to security people to the police," explains Jaffe. "It took a behemoth effort to pull this all together." Four city blocks were closed off near the world famous Bonaventure Hotel. Kilvert-designed Millennium banners were hung from lamp posts. Stages were erected. Two stadium-sized video screens were trucked in to show celebrations around the globe as the new century marches across the time zones. "When Kathryn and I first started on this project we had the optimism and foresight to go to various places on New Year's Eve with cameras," Jaffe remembers. "She went to New York. I went to Madrid. We had crews in London and other places and we shot all this New Year's Eve footage. We made signs for people to carry around saying, 'Happy New Year 2000,' and 'Feliz Ano Nuevo,' and many other languages. And the fruits of our labor played on these huge video screens. What's really exciting is that on a movie this big we've been able to do very personal things, like just go off and shoot like that. As I'm very fond of saying to everybody who has worked on this movie, this is the biggest little movie ever made."

The filmmakers needed a crowd of ten to twelve thousand people to complete the scene and bring the party to life. "We could never have afforded that many extras, so we had to figure out a clever way of getting them to attend willingly," smiles Jaffe. "And through the efforts of event promoters and extras casting we came up with a plan to organize a concert." The "Millennium" event was advertised in print and on local radio stations, and attracted Angelinos from all walks of life. Live music kept the energy high while the production raffled off trips to Hawaii and other door prizes. The countdown for the last minutes of 1999 was shot when the crowd reached critical mass in terms of size and energy. "It turned into an incredible celebration," explains Jaffe. "Several hundred fireworks went off, two thousand balloons were released, the Goodyear blimp flew by, and about a half-ton of confetti came down." In order to maximize production value, the filmmakers tracked down the confetti manufacturer who supplies Times Square. "It was actually the same confetti that they use in New York so we could match the footage that Kathryn shot there. Any footage that didn't specifically i.d. New York was used to enhance the size and scope of our celebration here," Jaffe confides. "Even though we had over ten thousand extras, there's no way we could create the look of a hundred thousand without at least some tricks of the cinema."

"Everybody needs to take a walk to the dark end of the street sometime. It's what we are. But now the risks are outta line. Sex can kill you. The streets are a war zone. So you slip on the 'trodes, you get what you need, almost as good as the real thing and a lot safer." -- Lenny Nero

Strange Days Production Notes were taken from the Strange Days Press Kit

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