Boxoffice-September.1997

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//CONFIDENTIAL" CHAT
Bomandraisedin L>s Angeles. Curtis Hanson was
a natural to direct the screen version of James
Eltroy's novel "LA. Confidential. " In culdition to
being a native son, Hanson was also a longtime fan of
Ellroy's work And thougli he'd never directed a period
movie before, lie was on familiar ground with the story's
motifs ofdeception, betrayal, and violence.
Han.son. whose previous work includes "The Bedroom
Wmdow; " "Tlie Hand Tliat Rocks the Cradle, " "Bad
Influence" and "The River Wild," is a writer/director
who .specializes in exposing the dark iindercunvnts beneath
.seemingly calm surfaces. So great was his ajfmity
for the project tliat Hanson signed on as director, coscreenwriter,
co-producer, and music superxison The
director says the result is his most personal film to date.
BOXOFFICE: How did you approach the task of
adapting such a dease, complex novel to the screen?
CURTIS HANSON: 1 was fortunate to find a gifted
collaborator in [co-scripter] Brian Helgeland. Brian had
been pursuing "L.A. Confidential" independent of me.
and in fact he was going to pitch it to Warners. But then
he learned that I was already doing it. So he came to me
and we talked it over. And it was a huge advantage because not only is Brian a really talented
writer, but he also loved Ellroy's book. When we were working together we"d be each other's
watchdog. We would try to be as mje as we could to the characters and sacrifice what we needed
of the plot without sacrificing the moments of character And 1 tliink that's what impressed
Elli-oy—the script was still in his voice, which was important because that's what brought us
there in the first place.
BOXOFFICE: How important to you was the look of "L.A. Confidential"?
HANSON: It was important that it seem authentic, but I didn't want the period aspect of the
story to overwhelm the audience. When I started out, every time I met with a potential
collaborator, I gave a photo presentation of archival shots of L.A. from the 1 950s that essentially
represented my vision of the film. Once we were in preproduction, I would show the creative
team a film a week, such as Nick Ray's "In a Lonely Place" and Robert Aldrich's "Kiss Me
Deadly"—films that were contemporary to the time.
BOXOFFICE: With urban crime, police corruption and amoral characters, you're
dealing with a lot of film noir themes here, and yet clearly you decided not to go with a
noir-.style mise-en-scene.
HANSON: That's tnje. We were very deliberately not doing a film that was about a noir
mood. True noir, of course, expresses a certain attitude that is dark and full of fatalism, but also
an attitude that was organic to the time that it was made. To do that tcxlay would be phony. The
worid is different today, and I wasn't interested in doing an homage to something that doesn't
exist anymore. The point was to create a story that, like Ellroy's book, is set in the past but not
(rf the past. The "SOs was actually a very forward-looking period in Los Angeles, and I wanted
to show in the film.
BOXOFFICE: The film's masic Is also typical of the period. What guided your selection
process for the songs?
HANSON: I had picked many of the songs before we started shooting, because I wanted
them to help define characters and enhance themes. Also. I'm fascinatetl w ilh the difforoncc
between ap^arance and reality, and to me the songs were a goixi way of undcrscorinj; ihis
difference. For iasuuice. in the beginning when Danny DeVito is mirrating about the clitTcrciKc
between the image and the reality of Los Angeles. I have Johnny Mercer singing "Accciiluaic
the Positive" in the background.
BtJXOFno:: What led to the decision to cast two Australiaas Russell Crowe and Guy
Pearce, in the central roles as American cops?
HANSON: It was imix)rtant tlnU we have actors in these roles who the audience could lake
at face value, and Russell ;ind Guy were relatively unknown. They were also believable. When
you meet these characters you make certain assumptions about them, but as the story goes along
you start to question your assumptions and reevaluate them.
BOXOHKK: What is the essence of Los Angeles to you?
HANvSON: L.A. is a city that's almost famous for its appiircnt disregard of its own past, and
yet the past is everywhere, which we found when we were scouting ItKations. There are a lot
rf cities that it's easy to get a handle on: New York. Paris— you sec them and you're blown
away. L.A. isn't like that at all. You get here and you wonder. "Where is itr' I think L.A. is what
you make of it. And it's challenging in that way, because to understand this city you really have
to woik at iL—Lael Loewenstein
career in several obvious—not to mention intricate
and intriguing—ways.
It is nonfiction, first of all, and, singularly
for a writer who says his idea of good writing
always includes the biggest imaginable social
and historic canvas, it revolves around a single,
unsolved crime. It is also the book that is the
key to all the others, a searing, ahnost masochistically
detailed look at the event which, according
to EUroy. is "certainly the pivotal event
in my life. That's what shaped my intellectual
curiosity, and more than anything else, that's
why we're sitting here talking to each other
right now."
The crime in question is the bmtal murder
of Ellroy's mother. Jean, back in 1958, when
Ellroy was just 10 years old. That occurrence
explains not only Ellroy's deep fascination
with criminal behavior but the current of almost
inexplicably savage violence that runs
through his work; his obsession with the details
of police investigatory procedures: even his
fixation on '50s Los Angeles, the town where
his mother did much of her living, and just a
little bit east of which she ultimately did her
dying.
Ellroy had already dealt with his mother's
death in fictional form: his breakthrough
novel, 1 987 's "The Black Dahlia," imposed an
imaginary solution on one of L.A. "s most notorious
unsolved murders and was dedicated
to his mother's memory. "My mother was not
Elizabeth Short," Elbx»y says of parallels with
the Dahlia case's victim. "I used Elizabeth
Short and her death as a symbiotic stand-in for
my mother and hers. But they were different
women—markedly so. In some ways I thought
I had dealt with my mother when I wrote 'The
Black Dahlia' I was mistaken. 1 had to go out
and confront the literal woman."
To "confront the literal woman," Ellroy
brought his considerable research skills to bear
on the original investigation and mounted a
new investigation of his own, then orgimized
the resulting data into an account he calls "my
autobiography, really." The press the book
received was both ecstatic
and sensationalist—a
combination which sells a lot of copies.
The more interesting question, though, is the
personal one: namely, did writing "My Dark
Places" help Ellroy lay anything to rest?
"Well no, it didn't resolve anything," he
says. "There'll never be any closure, and as I
say in the book, closure's a preposterous concept.
I wouldn't want closure if I could have it.
I think my relationship with her will ever
mutate.
May end with the cessation of my
consciousness when I die, and may continue
onto some wild-ass plain after my death. No.
It was a great conftxintation. and now my
mother is with me. and that's all to the gixxl."
"My Dark Places" went even further than
the grim details of Jean Ellroy's death, chnmicling
Ellroy's own youthful slide into alcoholic
and chemical oblivion as well as his
perverse career as a petty criminal iind "panty
sniffer." Surprisingly. Ellroy lived out an early
life that is a lot closer to the pathologies of the
criminals who wend their way tlirough
his
fictions than it is to his police protagonists. "I
never hated cops," he says. "I never blamed