the bohemian aesthetic eZine :|: advanced notions

There are people who unknowingly shape you—whose chosen paths in life and work you recognize and lay claim to as your own. There are filmmakers whose voices you look to while discovering your own personal obsessions. Their stories are your stories; inside their images, you catch your own face.

I was eleven years old when I first saw Louis Malle's Lacombe, Lucien at a movie theater on the Champs Elysées in Paris. There were no English subtitles; so, as the end credits rolled, my mother leaned over and asked me to explain a few details that she hadn't caught. I remember that responding was inexplicably difficult for me. I didn't want to talk about the plot or visuals or who was related to whom. I wanted to talk about the characters, their behavior, the pain even they weren't conscious of. I was fascinated by the young boy in the film, who just wants to belong—who becomes a fascist, during the occupation, in order to feel that he's worth something. Even the most shameful acts can reflect deep-rooted longings—a human face that we all share inside, that gets confused somewhere along the way. As a young moviegoer, and aspiring filmmaker, I left my first Louis Malle film that day and said, "That's it. That's what I want to do."

Little Man Tate, my first film as a director, is inspired by Louis Malle's coming-of-age classic, Murmur of the Heart. I loved the awkwardness, complexity, and pain of the adolescent boy in the film. He wasn't just a cute little prop filled with ironic witticisms. He was suffering and became impossible because he couldn't name his fears. In the end, when the offending taboo comes to light (his incestuous feelings for his mother), he is finally released from the curse. It was the shame that was killing him—the not knowing, the lying in bed at fourteen thinking no one will ever understand or forgive you for who you really are. That was what I connected to in Murmur of the Heart—not camera angles, editing tricks, or rich landscapes. Louis' stories are told from the inside looking out—from the sad beckonings of our true natures.

When I made my first film, I had never met Louis and was terribly worried about what he would think of Tate. So, I made sure that he and his wife, Candice Bergen, were invited to an early screening. Would he take it as an inferior rip-off of Murmur or as a personal exploration through hommage? Would he have grown beyond my simple fascination with character films? Would he expect plot twists and cleverness? For some curious reason, I really wanted him to be proud of me. When he finally spoke to me of how much he liked the film, I noticed the twinkle in his eye. "That's my kind of music, Jodie," he said, referring to Mark Isham's acoustic jazz score. I took it as a wink—as approval of a path he had once taken and, perhaps, moved beyond long ago.

Many have eloquently revisited Louis' great films, from Phantom India to Vanya on 42nd Street. But I can't stop thinking about the future Louis was moving toward, and how unfair it is that he's not here anymore.

Midway through his grave and cruel illness, I went to visit him and his family at a summer house they had rented by the beach. Candy had brought us all ice-blended coffee drinks, and it was a perfect Southern California day. Their young daughter, Chloe, was bodysurfing with her big half-sister, Justine. Candy was sitting in a lounge chair with their shaggy dog, Lois. Louis and I sat, side by side, with The New York Times Arts and Leisure section in front of us. One by one, we dissected the film advertisements. Though Louis' speech and body were very weak, everything inside his head was as sharp as ever. He cracked me up with detailed stories—movie talk associated with those entertainment pages. But, at a certain point, he looked up, very quietly, and seemed to observe his life: two amazing daughters laughing in the surf; a brave and talented wife relaxing in her perfect one-piece; a salty, sandy weekend day at the beach. This was his beloved life he was watching. And he couldn't really be a part of it. And that hurt me so much to see. He had spent his life's work with an eye toward healing a sense of alienation—of not belonging. He did that by learning and understanding characters that were otherwise cast off, vilified, marginalized by society. To know them is to humanize them is to forgive them is to love them. The most human truth lies inside what we are most ashamed of; to own and forgive our smallest, most reviled and uncontrolled selves is the most important step toward becoming better instead of worse. Isn't that the point of being an artist? That's what I took from Louis, anyway.

The last time I saw Louis, our afternoon turned into a raucous play date for our three dogs. During my visit, my puppy (Lucy) and theirs (Larry) kept running around his bed, rolling over each other, doing a Keystone Kops routine with the older dog (Lois), who was trying desperately to keep the chaos, around Louis, in check. With every yap and snort, Louis' eyebrows would arch with an exasperated but amusing French sigh. When the dogs finally took their mischief elsewhere, he looked to Candy, who was holding his hand. Then, he suddenly smirked, ironically, as if to say, "What's next? Elephants?" That was the side of Louis I treasure most. If I could be in a room with him today, I'd like to see him starting to shake with slow laughter. And, soon, we would all be laughing and not able to stop, just like in the last scene of Murmur of the Heart. You think the film is going to have a tragic, morally tortuous ending but, instead, the family can't help but celebrate how banal and human their situation is. They have to laugh because it's all too absurd, too painful, too tragic, too worth it.

Louis Malle was more than just an influence on my work, more than a master director with an impressive biography, more than an obituary can say. For me, his work opened up a glimpse into humanity that I had never seen before—an eye toward forgiveness that no other person, place, or thing had ever presented to me. With that breath of life, I knew where to find my questions as a filmmaker and, more importantly, that I wasn't alone in asking.

Thank you, Louis.