Michelle Trachtenberg

Interview: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Brady Corbet and Michelle Trachtenberg. FilmForce talks to the three stars of the new Gregg Araki flick, Mysterious Skin.

June 03, 2005 - Gregg Araki movies are not for everyone. As a director, he’s daring and unconventional, unafraid to show the world as he sees it. His latest film, Mysterious Skin, may actually be one of his most accessible works to date. Based on the original novel of the same name by Scott Heim, Skin is unrated and without apology. For those willing to submit and be ready for the unexpected, the film is also a rewarding journey.

The story is set in the small town of Hutchinson, Kansas. Neil McCormick (Joseph Gordon Levitt) and Brian Lackey (Brady Corbet) both grew up in the town and are now 18. They lead radically different lives, but share a connection they don’t yet realize. Neil is confident, brash, good looking and reckless. He discovered his homosexuality at a young age, and has played it to his utmost advantage, hustling older men in the nearby park at every opportunity. Neil’s mother (Elisabeth Shue) is relatively promiscuous herself and aloof to her son’s dark life. Neil’s best friends are Wendy (Michelle Trachtenberg), who has long been his confidant, and Eric (Jeff Licon). Brian, in sharp contrast to Neal, is still much like a small boy. His mother watches over him like a hawk and he doesn’t really mind the attention. Brian is a bookworm and a sci-fi fanatic obsessed with the idea that he was abducted by aliens as a young boy. At eight years old, he lost five hours from his life, which is when he believes the abduction took place. As he struggles to find answers for this missing time, he ultimately connects to the name of Neil McCormick. He believes he might have the answer to the mystery he’s been trying to solve for ten years.

FilmForce recently sat down with the films three stars, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Brady Corbet and Michelle Trachtenberg to talk about the controversial project.
 Tartan Films

Gordon-Levitt (right) and Michelle Trachtenberg in Mysterious Skin

"I was really looking to do something good, which sounds obvious," says Gordon-Levitt. "But there’s a lot of stuff that’s not made with the goal of being good. It’s made with the goal of making money or doing what other people tell you to do. When I first read the script, I just said, ’My God, whoever wrote this really cares, loves and believes in what they’re writing.’ And it’s so rare... It is a really different role for me, and I’ll always be really grateful to Gregg for believing that I could do a role like this. I’ve played the nice kid, and the smart one or funny one and even the angry one, but Gregg was the first one to call me sexy, and I’ll always be really grateful for that. But what I think is really special about this character, he is sexy on the outside, but there’s underneath that he’s really having a lot of problems. A lot of movies show a sexy character, someone’s who’s attractive on the outside and they never really go beneath that. You’re just expected to sit there and be attracted to this attractive character and feel inferior sitting there in your seat. This movie is not about that. It’s about where did his callous front come from and what are the consequences of it. Where will it end up?"

"It was pretty clear from the book," Corbet adds. "[From] the script and from Gregg, minutes after saying ’Hello’ I realized that this was a guy who cared about his story, cared about his character and was going to treat them with a delicate touch and with respect and care."

"I loved the script," Trachtenberg gushes. "I had been looking at independent scripts for a long time. I had been offered some really cool roles, but just nothing that I ever connected with. And then Mysterious Skin came along and I was actually filming in Prague, a big studio movie. I thought, well, this is such a sweet way to sort of slide into the world. It’s very shocking but it just read so well and it felt so beautiful just on the page, so I thought, ’Well, this must be some great effort,’ so I immediately wanted to do it. So I just thought, ’Why the hell not?’

Gordon-Levitt’s work in the film is easily the best of his career. Beyond mere acting chops, the role also required a complete submission and trust in Araki’s direction during some extremely intense sexual scenes. "To me the sex scenes in this movie, they’re not sex scenes. They’re sexy. But sex scenes to me are ’Well, we have our two lead actors, and we want to see them naked. So we bring in the soft lighting and the slow motion and the music, and we’ll have a sex scene.’ That has nothing to do with anything. Whereas these scenes that have a strong sexuality are the story. That’s where the story gets told. They’re based in emotion. They further the plot. It could be dialogue, but it’s physicality and sexuality instead. I didn’t have any qualms about that at all. It’s just a really interesting and exciting way to tell a story."

As Wendy, Trachtenberg plays the anchor to Neil’s character, the one person in the world he fully trusts. Trachtenberg discusses this relationship: "Neil and Wendy are very, very close. She’s the only one that knows all of his secrets. She is really just his cornerstone, his rock. She’s everything to him and that is very special to me. It was sort of just miraculous kismet that Joe and I just got along so famously. Actually everyone, I mean, the first group of interviews this morning when we first saw each other, it’s like genuine, ’Hey, how are you?’ We’re all running over to leap and hug and everything. It’s really hard to find that on a set where every single person just likes seeing the other every day."

When you work on a film like this, it’s not for the money. Corbet says that he hopes the film will affect people. "We just hope they’d be moved... I think in any fashion or any way that a human being can be moved: enraged, upset, glowing, inspired, whatever it is. I think that’s the reason we make film. I think that’s the reason all people make film."

For those who may have watched Gordon-Levitt on 3rd Rock From the Sun, Skin will certainly come as a shock. "The movie’s out in New York, so people have come up to me on the street already having seen it. It is such a different thing. They’ll look me in the eye and tell me what they think and feel about the movie. People don’t look me in the eye and tell me what they think and feel about 3rd Rock from the Sun. Not that there’s anything wrong with a casual and fun television show. I’m really proud of 3rd Rock from the Sun." But I don’t think it’s really dearly important to anybody that watches it the same way that Mysterious Skin is. I know how dear and important so many movies are to me. So I’m really proud to be part of something that can stay with something like that."
 Tartan Films

Gordon-Levitt (left) and Corbet in Skin

Trachtenberg has had her share of kid-friendly roles herself, but she just laughs at those responses. "In Sundance we were doing a Q & A and someone asked, ’Well, you know this is a departure from 3rd Rock and Harriet the Spy, huh?’ It was just like, ’Well yeah.’ For me Harriet the Spy was ten years ago, for Joe I think 3rd Rock was probably around the same time, maybe a little less, by like a year or something. I think because we’ve all been acting for so long, we each have a respect of the material and the project and there’s a professionalism there so we all knew we had 20 days or, like, I don’t know, 21 or something days to shoot the movie and we all had to be on our game constantly every second because you never know what could happen. We didn’t have the luxury of having, you know, a bunch of takes because we couldn’t afford the film, so I think just the fact that all four of us had so much experience beforehand really helped the movie."

"The only thing I want to do is stuff with people who care about what they’re doing," says Gordon-Levitt. "A lot of people, most people who are working, they do it for money. And I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with that. It so happens that I made a lot of money already, so I don’t have to worry that much about it. I wouldn’t fault anybody for doing it for the money, but it doesn’t interest me right now."

"I think it is one of the most compassionate films that I have seen in a really long time," Corbet adds. "I think that there’s something so special about both sides of an equation being represented: yin and yang, sweet and sour, good or evil or whatever. You can’t have one without the other. Everything co-exists. They need each other. Brian and Neil, they need each other. They’re the key to each other’s salvation. For this to be one of the films in some time to explore that is something that I think is probably the most unique thing about the film. It’s not something that I’d seen recently or maybe ever. At least not like this. It’s special stuff."