|
 Married Life, starring Pierce Brosnan and Chris Cooper, represents a major shift for its out director, Ira Sachs.
The contrast couldn’t have been stronger. Inside the Marriott in Hyde Park, SX was talking about sexual fluidity with the quietly spoken, openly-gay director of Married Life. Outside, a noisy pod of flag-waving pilgrims had paused for another rousing chorus of Christian exuberance. It was during the dying moments of an erroneously named World Youth Day and their timely if dichotomous presence gave us reflective pause. It was a similar confluence of conservative ideals that had got us here in the first place.
Ira Sachs’ third feature represents a major shift for the forty-something Memphis native. Delta Boy (1996) and Forty Shades of Blue (2005) were unambiguous products of his surroundings. Inspired by New York’s queer cinema of the day and filmmakers like Todd Haynes, he was one of several filmmakers ready to change the world. He started with a deeply personal coming-of-age tale (“closeted white teenage boy runs away with a half-black, half-Vietnamese gay immigrant teenager on the Mississippi river”), yet both dealt with abstractions on sexual longing and empowerment.
“Delta Boy ended up being a film about the nexus of race, sexuality and class,” Sachs told SX.
Yet taking the step from credit card-rebel to a professional director took time. After a Joan Crawford/Bette Davis movie marathon with his then-boyfriend, Sachs found familiar, tantalising themes in the crime novellas of John Bingham. He, like Crawford, resonated on another level.
“I found it extremely contemporary and I liked the fact that the women were as passionate and lusty as the men,” he said. “The question of what people reveal is very interesting for me. Particularly as a gay person, sexuality and romance is learned in secret. Those issues of secrecy, and how they affect the quality of intimacy, are very central.”
Sachs had his eye on cinema from an early age. “I always wanted to be a fireman,” he joked. “Then when I directed a play in high school, I knew I wanted to work with actors”.
He got his wish with his latest film, Married Life. It features a superior cast in Pierce Brosnan, Oscar-nominee Patricia Clarkson, Oscar-winner Chris Cooper, plus David Wenham in support.
“I like actors, and I kind of think they like me,” he said then, after a pause, “There’s a moment when you think – ‘I’m going to meet Pierce Brosnan for lunch!’ Then you’re just having lunch”.
Married Life is, among other things, a cobalt comedy of sexual proclivity and propriety dressed in floral prints and beige slacks.
“It’s interesting how people read the end of the film,” he said. Sachs sees elements of Bringing Up Baby in two divided people choosing to get back together. “I’m compelled by the idea of deceit and its place in relationships – the structure of secrets and lies.”
-Colin Fraser
Married Life is in cinemas now.
 |
Sachs and sensibility
Subscribe to this comment's feed