Interview: Filmmaker Bruce la Bruce on Gerontophilia

Throughout his filmography, Bruce la Bruce has gained a reputation as one of the most acclaimed and controversial guerrilla filmmakers of our time. So, it should come as no surprise that his latest film should be based around a topic so controversial and shocking as the love between an 18 year old boy and an 81 year old man (as suggested by the title Gerontophilia which refers to the sexual preference for the elderly). Yet, the film is only controversial in its theme. Ultimately, the shock here is that la Bruce has decided to, perhaps momentarily, ditch his old explicit ways and go for a more classicist and romantic style.

 

The film was screened last night at the Venice Days section of this year’s Venice Film Festival and despite it being provocative, it was well received – much to Bruce la Bruce’s own dismay.  This morning, he even joked about it and said “A reporter from earlier said that his friends were disgusted with the movie and I was like ‘oh good…’ If I’m not alienating someone it doesn’t work for me.”

 

There are many elements in this film that are familiar from your previous works – the revolutionary girlfriend and even some of the imagery. Did Gerontophelia give you a chance to portray them in a different light?

I often go back after the same territory and try to re-iterate it in a different form. The revolutionary character is something that repeats in all my films. She’s just a character that I love, a character that is not meant to be totally taken seriously but at the same time she is so committed and so earnest that you have to kind of love her. Also, just imagery, even the pidgeon at the beginning is sort of a reference to the pigeon that the zombie eats in Auto. I have a graveyard in almost every movie I have ever made – usually I have sex with them but that’s not the case here.

 

Was it like some sort of an artistic rebirth for you?

This movie was my attempt at making a more mainstream movie, but I wanted to incorporate the same themes. I wanted to use a controversial theme, but wanted it to shock in my non shocking approach. I wanted to do a complete 180 and present some of the same themes I always present but in a kind of gentler and conventional way.

 

If you take some of my other films like Hustler White for example, even though it had some crude scenes that people thought were very disgusting and controversial, the real impulses behind the characters were the same. They were romantic characters looking for love. So this film is very consistent with my other films, it’s just that I didn’t make it sexually explicit. But of course, some people would crucify me for going in a completely opposite direction, but that’s what I wanted to so. The one thing for a filmmaker has to do is to absolutely dare to do something that is totally out of your comfort zone and that you’ve never tried before. 

A reporter from earlier said that his friends were disgusted with the movie and I was like ‘oh good…’ If I’m not alienating someone it doesn’t work for me.

 

Even looking back at your earlier pornographic and controversial films, there is always something intellectual about them, particularly in their opposition to conventionality.

Yes like, again, the revolutionary girlfriend with her idealisms and all these references to different people and even from literature. With the revolutionary girl, it also comes from how I was brought up by all these strong females and the strong influence they had in my life. This revolutionary feeling in my movies then comes from the fact that I came out of a generation that opposed conventionality and I suppose in a way I represent the spirit of that generation with me.

This is also true in the way I view homosexuality as a way of expressing yourself and your difference. To me it is a much more fluid thing and I often have had characters who often have sex and aren’t even part of the gay community. I absolutely think that gay people should absolutely have equality under the law, but I am kind of ambivalent about gay marriage and buying into some certain constitutions.

I like to think that I am confronting people and their prejudices or their taboos. They think that you can only represent what isn’t supposed to be represented and ultimately I think that I what has allowed me to gain an international audience making guerrilla low budget films.

 

Gerontophilia is a film about a fetishism, yet there is also a lot of tenderness and romanticism.

I had to insist that the fetish always came first. That is his fetish. He has it with another old man, he’s going to have it with another old man, and it was important for me to have that subtle distinction. But it’s also a classicist film. His fetish was kind of incidental. He falls in love with him for who he is and for what he is, and the sex comes after. He falls in love with him, and they have a special bond and he learns a lot from him and from his experience, and that was another thing which drew them together and added to the romantic aspect of the film.

 

In this film and in your previous works, music plays quite an important role in setting the tone and mood.

My films are always very music heavy and I think that music is a nice way of seducing the audience so they can maybe accept some of the more extreme element. In the music video generation I directed ten music videos and I really like the way that music plays with effects and image. Sometimes I use it in an unexpected way and sometimes I try to use it to make the film more contemporary or different styles of music to different effect.

 

As a guerrilla filmmaker, what do you make of the new increase in popularity of digital filmmaking?

Ultimately it doesn’t really matter what you shoot a film on. It has to do with the style and the content. I’ve made films that look like bad porn videos on purpose. Sometimes I use digital and want it to look digital and other times I use digital and try to make it look like film look like film. I had the opportunity to start on 16mm and shoot and edit on 16mm, and cut the tail end of film. In the end I had to adapt to the digital revolution but ultimately it’s about what you’re trying to say I think.

 

-          Matt Micucci, 29/8/2013