I suppose the story is about redemption, but it's also about the difficulty of designating what redemption is, or whether someone should be redeemed. I used to spend more time trying to figure out what's right and wrong, what a character deserves. Now I try to look closer and without prejudice at the way the world appears to be...at the fact that there is injustice and unfairness all over the world, but that there are also miraculous gestures of simple kindness and charity.
The film also explores the nature of exploitation. It's a real issue for me because I am aware that I am using the actors and that, as a filmmaker, to some extent I have control over other people's lives. But I am aware that I am a product, too--the shadow of economics hangs over all of us.
Religion, sex and money are themes common to all my films. I have a hard time making sense of this world if I don't see it in terms of money or faith. People who really accomplish things in a larger sense are people who refuse to be owned. My films are about people who have lost material possessions and because of that, become free.
Isabelle Huppert has a wonderful ability to say something without expression, without obvious interpretation on her face. There's a mysteriousness about her which says things, yet keeps a distance. That appeals to me--it gives the audience just the right amount of information. I don't like cheap sentimentality that tells you everything and expresses everything for you and all you can do is sit and watch rather than conjecture.
Isabelle was intrigued by the story of "Amateur," and I think the comedy in the script appealed to her. She says that nobody would ever have given her this role in France. It goes against the preconceptions of who she is and the kind of work she does, and this was an opportunity for her to break out of that.
I met Martin Donovan on "Trust" and found him very interesting. Since then he's played the lead role in "Surviving Desire," and supporting roles in "Simple Men" and "Flirt." I wrote "Amateur" for Isabelle, Martin and Elina. I like to use specific actors. I know these people, their characters, their bodies, their fears and hopes and I utilize that. It is a collaboration. They bring things to me that they might not even realize.
A good actor has the ability to turn abstract ideas into concrete action, but they don't always know what it is they're doing, until they see the end results. I'm interested in what actors don't know, just as in writing I'm interested in what I don't know about characters. I'm less and less interested in explaining and I'm not particularly interested in motivation.
Some people say my work is an amalgam of American popular movies and European films. I like both and I'm skeptical of any qualification. I've been affected by many things and I honestly appropriate whatever interests me. I appropriate things from Spielberg as well as Godard, from TV, from novels. Recently, I've been absorbing ideas from clothing designers, choreographers, magazines, advertising, and I've realized that my work is an aspect of being a designer. I design movement in space like a choreographer, and I design color and light with my cinematographer, Mike Spiller. I really do design words on the page like a copywriter.
I hope my films are funny but I don't necessarily think about making comedy when I'm working. My response to the world is to see the funny side, but I'm not really interested in talking or thinking about anything that's not serious."
"Amateur" is superficially different from my other films but it's still part of an on-going process of work. The films are all separate stories, but my conversation with the audience continues. I can't say everything worth saying about relationships in modern America in one film. The process of being in the editing room for six months with stories and characters you have created makes you pay really close attention to what it is you are saying and portraying and it affects what you next piece of work is going to be.
