“I didn’t start off thinking I was going to be a director and writing really wasn’t my thing,” said Mike Mills. “I went to Art School, got into design, and kept looking for more ways to get into the public world.”
He continued, “This sounds like a joke, but I lived near Jim Jarmusch (Paterson, Broken Flowers) and kept seeing him around, somehow, like hanging out in the same coffee line felt like maybe I could do that world.”
At age 25, Mills had no official training, but found a path to filmmaking through music videos. “Writing [music] videos is like a contest of ideas. I knew Spike Jonze (Her, Being John Malkovich) a little bit and [I realized] I had to get good enough at ideas to compete.”
“I was a punk rock kid who went to art school. It took years and years of sticking to it and trying, then I wrote a short film that went to Sundance called Architecture of Reassurance, which I don’t think is very good,” he joked, “but it got me to the next step.”
For Mills, the next steps were working with Moby and The Beastie Boys, followed by an adaptation of Walter Kirn’s novel Thumbsucker (Lou Taylor Pucci, Keanu Reeves) and then Beginners (Ewan McGregor, Christopher Plummer). “I feel like I didn’t find myself until Beginners, which was brought on by my dad and my dad’s bravery.”
Observations on Writing
As a screenwriter, Mills appreciates “moments,” going so far as to call himself “plot disabled,” but piecing moments together inspires him because these screenplays and adaptations are based on things “observed and not written.”
“Observed screenplays have the most nutrients. Walter is really good at that in the book and that sort of taught me how to smell those moments and see them. That story isn’t my story, but I could relate to a lot of it.” The author encouraged Mills’ changes to his story and where he wanted to takeThumbsucker. “His book is much better than my movie,” joked the writer/director. “He was very generous.”
Mike Mills. Photo by Julieta Cervantes
Through this type of writing, following paths of Jonze and Jarmusch, Mills has essentially avoided the studio circuit all together only making films every 5-8 years or so. “I’ve never really interacted with studios. Being a writer/director, you’re already like a start-up employee.”
Continuing his observations, Mills had a child and this new relationship as father-child inspired his latest film, C’mon C’mon. The plot follows Viv (Gaby Hoffman) a woman who asks her radio journalist brother to help look after her child Jesse (Woody Norman).
“Follow what you want to do, not what you should do. It’s brave to be yourself, make yourself interested, or make yourself crack up, and not follow any industrial guidelines.”
Writing C’mon C’mon
The origin of C’mon C’mon comes from time spent with Mills’ child. “It’s my kid, my childhood, rethinking it, and the world my kid showed me with his friends. Rethinking your connection to the world at large as a parent.”
In some ways, this describes the mood or tone of the film rather than the plot, which follows an uncle and nephew as they embark on a cross-country trip to view life beyond Los Angeles. “It’s about all those ideas and feelings that come up in that very intimate space.”
The same idea was true for Beginners, which was based on Mills’ father coming out at age 75. “That’s my dad’s story of being born in 1924, knowing you’re gay, and also how it affected my life. So much of that – Harvey Milk, The Velveteen Rabbit – that’s straight from his world.”
“Very personal stuff can be the most commercial,” he said. “The most communicative. The most connective to other people. The love and the closeness to what you witness keeps you going when it gets rough. You have this source that is vibrant and under your skin.”
While working on Beginners and 20th Century Women (Annette Bening, Elle Fanning), he said both felt like they would never get made. But, because they were based on family members and little moments, he was able to be relentless about the journey. “You’re going against reason the whole time, but having this connection and love helped me feel it all.”
The Long Journey
“My films tend to take 5-6 years to get made. A year or two of that is shooting and editing and prepping. It takes a year to three to write any of my scripts. I do one project at a time. In that way, I’m not entrepreneurial at all. It’s so hard for me to believe in just one.”
“It takes me years. I’m not lazy. I’m working on it constantly. I think people think I chill by the pool or go to Switzerland because of the duration of my films, but I’m always working. And I get paid union minima, so let’s be honest, it’s $220 grand for five years of work so you can imagine I need to make other money. I direct ads once or twice a year to be a parent with a house.”
Another reason to delay the process was the writer/director thinking about his child’s consent. Essentially, his real child is too young to give over rights, and he didn’t want to do anything to alter his child’s life too much. “In those years, I found enough ways to distance it that I could include parts of it, where other parts I would never share.”
As for the choice of making these personal stories fiction movies rather than documentaries, Mills said he likes to “take from real life but then shape it.” This way, he can play with the material, hold it up to the light, and put his own spin on. “Plus I’m really into cinematography,” he said. “I want to make a movie.”
A Different Trip
“Once you start writing, you’re on your own trip and you’re listening to the Writing Gods or you’re hoping the Writing Gods are going to start talking. I’ve got notebooks of ideas that I saw, but once I start writing, I’m on a different trip.”
Mills only writes for himself and prefers to leave the screenplays minimal in nature. Essentially, he sees them as something to be built upon. “Hopefully, you don’t know how that camera is going to move. Hopefully that location is going to tell you something. Hopefully that actor is going to show you something. Hopefully your instincts are going to grow from the time you’re shooting it.”
Viv (Gaby Hoffmann) Photo courtesy of A24
“I’m a slightly funny screenwriter because I think writing is centrally important and the hardest thing I do, but I’m not beholden to my scripts. They’re essentially to get me to the cosmos I need to shoot but I’m not going to be beholden to something I wrote a year or two earlier in the vacuum of this room. Hopefully, there are some surprises waiting for me. I’m always hunting for that which I didn’t know before.”
In this same light, Mills always tells his actors, “You’re the author now. You’re the author of that person we see on screen.” For his latest film, that meant having dozens of long conversations with Joaquin Phoenix about the character Johnny. “I really need to do that because the person is known, so I need it to get under their skin and intermingle with their heart, life, and history.”
“Films take up a lot of space: your life, the culture. I’m into moments. Situations and moments. There’s something real being communicated about that person’s soul. So it’s trial and error. I try this and that. Have a lot of readers. You see what’s sticky and what’s indulgent. That’s what takes me forever but I love chasing unreal camaraderie. I’m also not following a normal plot. What you see in the movie, there’s so much weird shit I cut. What’s left is what I think communicates with the stranger in the dark room.”
This interview has been condensed. Listen to the full audio version here.
