Sisters remake - Exclusive Interview with Douglas Buck, Part Two

Staci Layne Wilson/Horror.com: For a hard hitting sort of edgy horror film, Asia Argento would have been perfect casting for the "sisters". I heard she was hired and then you had to recast a couple times. What's the story behind all that?

Douglas Buck: Well… Asia, she was attached for a couple of years actually during the whole raising of the financing part of the movie. She was attached. She is a friend of mine who I've known for a number of years and she agreed to do it. But the producers never signed her so, when another film came along that was a little more concrete as far as dates, she went with that one. That was understood. I mean it was a Catherine Breillat film. I'm a huge fan of Catherine Breillat so when she told me and let me know that she was going to do this other film I was very disappointed, but I completely understood. I mean we didn't even have dates quite worked out and we didn't have a contract signed after two years, so I couldn't really hold it against her.

Then we went with another actress who actually was one of my first choices. I always knew she was right there as the number one choice with Asia Argento; Anna Mouglalis who was the number one Chanel model for a while in France but she also has done a number of really, really interesting, very edgy ... actually more than edgy, she's totally ballsy films in France and she's a really good actress. So she, along with Asia, was a other number one choice. But I knew right away the producers were going to go Asia Argento, "We can definitely sell her name." They didn't know who Anna was, so...

We had already brought along Chloë [Sevigny] at this point and Stephen Rea was attached, so now we could afford not to have a super star in that role. So I called Anna, and she was very excited to play the part. We were talking all the way through preproduction and talking about how she was going to play it, talking about the character and all that kind of stuff.

Then about four days before production I got a phone call from Ed [saying] that for various personal reasons, she had to drop out of the movie.

Q: Whoa! That's a phone call you don't want to get four days before...

Douglas Buck: Oh my God! Of course it was a nightmare… I mean it's so long ago, I've forgotten how incredibly depressed I was for the two days or whatever it was. Just sort of shattered because in certain ways I was envisioning that you know we lost Asia but then we got Anna and maybe we ad made a change for the better. I was starting to fall in love with Anna as the character, and I started to really believe in it and then ... and then she called and jilted me.

So I was thinking, "Well, what are we going to do?" We had very few options, and one of them was Lou Doillon who is a French actress who is wonderful. She comes from film aristocracy actually. Her father is Jacques Doillon, quite a well-known French filmmaker who's actually had retrospectives done on him. He's quite well-known. Her mother is Jane Birkin and quite a well-known 60's career. Her half-sister is Charlotte Gainsbourg. So I know she came with a very interesting past. I thought maybe she would be someone interesting in the part. But we had no choice, it was like "Ok let's go with her".

Alessandro Camon, who is Ed Pressman's working producer on the film, [suggested her]/ I got to know him working together on the script and everything for the last three years and I trust his artistic integrity. I mean, not to the point in which I wanted him to really make decisions for me, but we were ready to shoot on Monday and it was Friday he told me he met her and he said "Douglas, I promise you that she will work in this part."

There was no one else so I said, "Ok, we gotta go with it". Still wasn't sure, but by the second week of production the way the dailys were turning out, how she was looking, how people were responding to her. Now I'm really excited about her. Now I don't know quite how Anna would have been. Actually when I look back on it I think "Would it have worked as well?" Because Lou brought something really special and she's really very interesting for the part. I'm not bullshitting, either. Maybe I'm just lying to myself. [laughs] But I think that the way that everyone has been responding to her, it has been really something interesting. I think there's a very good chance we could break her in the states, which is what she's kind of looking for.

Also the interesting thing is her mother, Jane Birkin, was in Blowup. Blowup was one of the early antecedents for Dario Argento when he did The Bird with the Crystal Plumage. Do you know that film?

Q: Yes, I do.

Douglas Buck: Bird with the Crystal Plumage was definitely an influence for Blowup. Bird with the Crystal Plumage was one of the first giallos. One of the things I did with this Sisters, is I definitely have giallo influences everywhere. About [to] the halfway section of the movie I play around with a lot of giallo stuff, like rack focuses and strange movements and quick movements and that kind of stuff. I had a lot of fun playing with giallo stuff. So I thought, "Well, that link is kind of an interesting link." It turned out to work really well.

Q: Well, I'm happy to hear that. That sounds really exciting and different. Especially giallo for these days!

Douglas Buck: Yeah, well you know it's kind of like one of the things we did with the film. The film is really broken up into three acts. I won't describe them exactly to you if you don't mind. I want to keep some things a mystery. The first act of the film, we wanted to be very romantic and sort of like sweeping and kind of everything is normal, shadowy but normal. Then the second act is much more of an investigative part where we're following a character in effective cops which is all very giallo-like. You know someone has witnessed a murder, the cops aren't helping, and there's these strange characters that are following her. So in that whole second act I said "Let's do it like a giallo." you know. Lets like really watch some giallo. So me and my DP watched a lot of giallos in preproduction and sort of implemented a lot [toward] the same sort of film. I won't call them tricks, but film style that the giallos did. Then the last of the film is just when it goes wacky -- all hallucinations and kind of really weird stuff and there we just played around with a lot of different stuff.

Q: And how about your version of the twin sisters? Is one much different from another or is there a separate style of dressing? Does she have a French accent for one and not for another or... ?

Douglas Buck: No, no, no. They'll both have French accents. One is a much more mysterious shadowy figure, of course. One mostly has short hair and the other one has long hair, that's basically the main distinguishing factor. They actually both have short hair, but the one wears a wig.

It's Angelique and Annabelle. Angelique is the one who we meet at the beginning who wants to get away from her crazy twin sister. They both have short hair but Angelique wears a long haired wig to kind of differentiate from her sister in certain ways. At other times she wants to be closer to her sister, so she takes her hair off.

As far as their dress, I would say the one, Angelique's is a softer look. It's softer in her wardrobe and it's softer in her appearance. Annabelle is much harder. She's harder in everything she wears and in her style of clothing and in her look.

Q: Stephen Rea is one of my all time favorites. I'm wondering what the extent of his role is, and what it was like to work with him.

Douglas Buck: Well, obviously he was the one that was most intimidating by his presence on the first day. He's been around and he's done some really impressive stuff. He's been nominated for an Academy Award. He was a really, really interesting guy. A very method actor, took it very seriously, very intense. His role is quite big.

Really what I see this film is about for me, if I describe the movie, it's about two women verses a repressive patriarchal world order. That's really what it comes down to. I mean it's very interested, I would say it explores a lot of feminist ideals which… I'm not saying the film is feminist, but it explores a lot of feminist topics and ideals. I think the first film touches on but this film really explores them he's the doctor who happens to be the full representative of the repressive patriarchal world order. In many ways you could call him the villain, though I don't think there's any real villain in the movie. He's the closest to the villain.

He also is the very... I think Stephen and I both agreed that he would be very human and he's very tragic and sad character and I think that he's possessive and all those, you know... He's possessive which is his great flaw you know, his great tragic flaw. He wanted to play him very tragic and very real and that's exactly what I agreed with so that's the way he played him.

Stephen is very intense and he questions every single thing. If you want him to cross the street, he wants to make sure that it makes sense to cross the street. I'm totally fine with that. I can imagine that other directors or some people, I won't even call them directors, some people may call that difficult. I would call 'difficult' like someone who's saying that his trailer isn't as big as someone else's. If someone is challenging you and wanting you to have good reasons for everything you do that make sense to the character and therefore make sense to the story, I find that exciting and I find that invigorating, rather than frustrating or anything like that. So I found him to be challenging but in all the right ways. That's not just bullshit director speak, I would rather the actor be that way than just... I actually find it a little laugh inspiring when the actor just says "Ok Doug! You want me to cross the street. No problem." The dude crosses it and in the back of my mind I think "Yeah, but you know, it doesn't really make sense that he would cross here, just because it says it in the script." You know what I mean?

Stephen is someone who would never allow that to happen. Stephen is going to question you on every bit. Of course it gets a little tougher when lets say for whatever reason, your stuck on this location and you need to do something which doesn't necessarily make sense but it's the only way to get you to the next scene. You've come up with some location that unfortunately doesn't quite work out but you just want to get and you're hoping, "Well, no one in the audience will really notice," but there it's a little difficult because Stephen's gonna notice and he's gonna say "No! I can't do that." But he will in the end run, if you say, "Listen Stephen, we really need you to do this. I'm sorry, I wish we could do it another way." He will say "Ok, I'll do it." He will just you know, he'll just challenge you. But in the end run, if you really need him to do something, he'll do it for you. So It was all great with him. It was all great with all the actors actually.

Q: Chloë is another favorite. But… How do you pronounce her last name? [laugh]

Douglas Buck: Seven-Yee.

Q: Seven-Yee. My goodness. I've heard lots of variations on that. Thanks for setting me straight. As an actor, she always does some really interesting nuances to all of her roles. What did she bring to the role of Grace Collier?

Douglas Buck: What did she bring? Well, one thing I would say is, she definitely prides herself on being prepared, and prides herself on being professional. She's always professional and like, she's always there, she's eminently directable. She'd always have a take on the part. I mean, there wasn't much time. This is the unfortunate thing like I said, the far too short preproduction period. We didn't really have time to rehearse, and I've never done that on a movie before. We'd at least sit and go over all the scenes. Or at least the major ones, to really talk about character. We never really had time to do that cause it was four weeks preproduction and we were behind. I mean basically we were still in preproduction during production.

The fortunate thing is that people like Chloë came in. Chloë and Stephen and Lou, they had a take on their character you know, and they had a take on each scene. So basically it was like we would just block the scene, call action, and they would give something. They would give. Chloë would give. Then at the worst cases I'd say, "Nah, I think we should, we should be maybe a little less here, a little more here," and she'd go "Ok, all right, lets try that."

I think one of the things with Chloë is that she'd never really done a film like this before. She has moments of suspense where she's supposed to be witnessing something. She's sort of like an indie girl you know. She's always kind of coming from a very traumatic place in character. Boys Don't Cry, and things like that. I love all of those movies, I love her in that. This is sort of a different thing. What I said to her is, "No, I want you to play it as if it's one of those dramas. Play it like that." This isn't a different kind of film. This isn't just a one note suspense movie. I want your character to have real character. I want it to have tragedy. I want it to have all of these things that will eventually link you into a very sad and perverse world or definitely intrigued by one.

So she brought that and she trusted that. The one thing I sense about Chloë now, is that she says she's going to do a movie she, as a professional, entirely trusts the director and brings something. If you ask her to change it she will change it. So she's just eminently directable. She was great to work with, really great. I had a great time with her.

Q: Yeah, she really is good. Everything from Kids, to American Psycho, to now her series on HBO.

Douglas Buck: Did you see Broken Flowers?

Q: No, I didn't see that one.

Douglas Buck: She's in the movie for like, thirty seconds, yet she creates a total character in that thirty seconds. It's quite amazing. I think she's great in Broken Flowers.

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Be sure and read interviews parts one (the making of Sisters) and the (the director's thoughts on horror remakes)