At the ArcLight Sherman Oaks tonight I caught a sneak preview of Fugitive Pieces, which officially comes out the first Friday in May. This was part of the AFI Directors series, an ongoing deal at both ArcLights where they show new movies a few days or weeks before they officially come out and have in-person guests to chat with the audience afterward. AFI Directors is a bit of a misnomer because, while sometimes the guests do include the director, oftentimes it'll be a bunch of other people involved in the film, perhaps because the director's busy promoting it elsewhere. Tonight would be a perfect example. While the writer-director was indisposed, we did get to meet two of the cast members as well as the producer. In fact, the producer and one of the cast members almost didn't make it. They literally came straight to the ArcLight from another promotional screening on the other side of town.
Fugitive Pieces is adapted from a 1996 novel by Canadian poet Anne Michaels. The thing about the novel is, it's one of those novels you couldn't imagine ever being translated for the silver screen. Being a poet by trade, Anne wrote it in a sort of poetic, lyrical, stream of consciousness style. With hardly any dialogue, the prose can get a bit dense at times. It reminds me of The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje. Ever read that? It's a great book, but it's not exactly a page turner. It's the furthest thing from one of those books that make you think, "Wow, so cinematic! This would make a grade-A movie experience!" Nah, it's nothing like that. Which then tells you what a yeoman job Anthony Minghella (God rest 'im) did in distilling it into a two-hour narrative. Same here. Writer-director Jeremy Podeswa should get a medal for this pup.
'Kay so let me give you a snapshot of the plot. It starts in 1942 Poland, in this town called Biskupin. A seven-year-old Jewish lad named Jakob Beer watches helplessly as a bunch of Nazi fucks murder his folks and kidnap his fifteen-year-old sister Bella. While hiding out, he's discovered by a Greek geologist named Athos Roussos. Athos is in town with a bunch of guys working on an archaeological dig. Suddenly, though, he feels kind of responsible for this little fella, so he takes him aboard his boat and they sail on back to Athos's home on the Greek island of Hydra. As we learn later, not only does this single act of kindness save Jakob's neck, it saves Athos as well. Soon after he leaves, the Nazis show up at the dig site and mow down most of his colleagues.
And so this is where Jakob lives for the next four years or so. Athos is a childless widower who lives the simple life on this tiny island with the gorgeous views of lush green landscape and the 
impossibly blue water. There's some drama here for sure, as the Nazis make their Teutonic presence felt in this unassuming landscape with their loud-ass boots. Not being Jewish will by no means guarantee your safety either. Since the local ghetto has been deserted, the Nazis think that the rest of the locals have given their Jewish neighbors safe refuge. Which, of course, they have. Not only is Athos being Dad to Jakob, a Polish Jew, but he's also taken in the daughter and son-in-law of one of his neighbors (the son-in-law is Jewish). Jakob is absolutely terrified of leaving the little house. Even coming out on the terrace to take in the sunset seems kind of risky. You never know when those gray-helmeted assholes might show up and start shooting. For a while I was afraid this poor chap would develop agoraphobia or something, but nah, Athos eventually coaxes him out. Meanwhile, Jakob learns Greek and really takes to the old man. Most of the people in the neighborhood survive, but it's not to be Athos and Jakob's neighborhood much longer. Within a year of the war's end, Athos lands a professorship at the University of Toronto.
impossibly blue water. There's some drama here for sure, as the Nazis make their Teutonic presence felt in this unassuming landscape with their loud-ass boots. Not being Jewish will by no means guarantee your safety either. Since the local ghetto has been deserted, the Nazis think that the rest of the locals have given their Jewish neighbors safe refuge. Which, of course, they have. Not only is Athos being Dad to Jakob, a Polish Jew, but he's also taken in the daughter and son-in-law of one of his neighbors (the son-in-law is Jewish). Jakob is absolutely terrified of leaving the little house. Even coming out on the terrace to take in the sunset seems kind of risky. You never know when those gray-helmeted assholes might show up and start shooting. For a while I was afraid this poor chap would develop agoraphobia or something, but nah, Athos eventually coaxes him out. Meanwhile, Jakob learns Greek and really takes to the old man. Most of the people in the neighborhood survive, but it's not to be Athos and Jakob's neighborhood much longer. Within a year of the war's end, Athos lands a professorship at the University of Toronto.Toronto is where Jakob's new life begins. He picks up English in a jiffy and becomes neighbors with the Polish Jewish couple down the hall, Jozef and Sarah. That they can speak Yiddish to each other sort of creates an immediate bond. Eventually, and with Athos's encouragement, Jakob takes up writing. Ever since Athos took him under his wing, Jakob's become an avid reader. Soon Jozef and Sarah have a son named Ben, to whom Jakob eventually becomes a surrogate big brother, especially seeing as how Jozef becomes a bit of a tyrannical father.
Sometime in the 1950s or early 1960s, when Jakob's approaching thirty, Athos passes away. Not long after, Jakob meets a hot blonde at the music store named Alex (Rosamund Pike), and soon enough the two get married, which you could already see was going to be a mistake. He just doesn't fit in with Alex's crowd. Plus, she wants him to change way too fast. Not only does Jakob not change, but he finds himself thinking more and more about his childhood. You see, throughout all the experiences he's already had, one thing that's been a constant is the memory of his sister. Once in a while he can't help wonder if she's alive. Not everyone hauled off to the camps met their maker there. Maybe she was one of the lucky ones. Bella was also quite the piano prodigy, which explains why Jakob likes going to the music store so much. By scooping up as many classical records as he can, he feels like he's helping keep the memory of her alive. Laced throughout the entire movie are little scenes where Jakob has a dream of Bella playing a tune.
Eventually, after he and Alex divorce, Jakob faces up the nerve to go back to Hydra to see Athos's old cottage, which has fallen into disrepair. The trip turns out to be just the thing to help him finish his book, Ground Work. By now he's an English lit professor at Toronto. His routine becomes teaching there half the year while spending the other half on Hydra, where he restores the old cottage. Ben, meanwhile, becomes a handsome young man and hooks up with this cute redhead named Naomi. It's thanks to them that Jakob reaches the last, and most meaningful, stage of his life. They introduce him to this hot young museum curator named Michaela. Like a lot of people in this film, she's the child of immigrants (and in her case her parents are from two different countries). Despite Jakob being old enough to be her dad, they hit it off right away and in no time develop a pretty deep relationship.
Oh yeah, speaking of getting old and time passing, that's one of the very unique things about this flick's plot structure. It sort of jumps around in time, and you've really gotta be on the ball about paying attention to how old people look. This isn't one of those movies that feeds you captions after a jump in time (e.g. "Five years later" or "Many years later, after Jakob's first return trip to Hydra" or whatever). By the end of the film, when he meets Michaela, Jakob looks to be fiftyish, which would make it the 1980s (my favorite decade!). The movie doesn't cover those 40 or so years in a straight line. It's jumping forth and back all the time. At one point it was like, "Oh look. There's that little kid Ben from down the hall whom Jakob was always looking after....Wow, look at Ben now. He looks to be in his twenties, what with that beard and a cute redhead on his arm....Whoops. Now we're back in Poland as little Jake's having breakfast with his parents and Bella." And so on.
That kind of time hopping sort of ties into the story's theme. It's all about memory, our version 
of things versus other peoples' versions of things. It's about keeping the memory of loved ones alive and how, if we're not careful, we may never feel as connected to anyone living as we are to someone who's long gone, and how, ya know, that can sort of stymie our enjoyment of life. Yeah, I know, it's pretty deep stuff. This film definitely wears its heart on its sleeve (sometimes it brandishes it a bit too much for my taste), but it knows what it wants to say and sets out to do just that. One thing I really liked were the voiceovers, especially Michaela's. Normally I'm not a big fan of that device. In writing workshops they're practically anathema. But the voiceovers here were taken straight from Anne Michaels' beautiful prose. At times I was like, "Gee, that sounds great, Michaela. Please don't stop talking on my account."
of things versus other peoples' versions of things. It's about keeping the memory of loved ones alive and how, if we're not careful, we may never feel as connected to anyone living as we are to someone who's long gone, and how, ya know, that can sort of stymie our enjoyment of life. Yeah, I know, it's pretty deep stuff. This film definitely wears its heart on its sleeve (sometimes it brandishes it a bit too much for my taste), but it knows what it wants to say and sets out to do just that. One thing I really liked were the voiceovers, especially Michaela's. Normally I'm not a big fan of that device. In writing workshops they're practically anathema. But the voiceovers here were taken straight from Anne Michaels' beautiful prose. At times I was like, "Gee, that sounds great, Michaela. Please don't stop talking on my account."There's one other thing I couldn't help taking away from the film. I know this is not what it's ostensibly about, but man, what an incredibly ethnically diverse city Toronto is. Seriously. It even gives New York and L.A. a run for their international money. When I saw David Cronenberg in person for that Eastern Promises screening back in January, he mentioned one of the draws for him to make that film was that it showed an ethnic side of London you don't see much in films, and it reminded him of the diversity of his hometown, Toronto. If you've been to Toronto, then no doubt you already know what he's talking about, but I've never been. Seeing Fugitive Pieces, though, has really nailed Dave's point home for me.
The Q&A afterward was moderated by a sweet gal named Jenelle Riley, film and TV editor for 
Back Stage West. The three guests were producer Robert Lantos and actors Rade Serbedzija (Athos) and Ayelet Zurer (Michaela). Continuing with the whole international thing, none of these guests were American. Robert's from Hungary but already has a solid career with English-language stuff. Check it out. His CV includes quality work like The Sweet Hereafter, Ararat, David Cronenberg gems like eXistenZ and Eastern Promises, as well as Sunshine and Being Julia (both by Hungarian filmmaker István Szabó). Rade Serbedzija is a Croatian actor in his early sixties with a good many credits to his name, including season six of 24. Ayelet Zurer, meanwhile, is an Israeli actress who stacked up a lot of credits in her homeland but only just started acting in English with Spielberg's Munich a couple years ago. This year she was also in Vantage Point.
Back Stage West. The three guests were producer Robert Lantos and actors Rade Serbedzija (Athos) and Ayelet Zurer (Michaela). Continuing with the whole international thing, none of these guests were American. Robert's from Hungary but already has a solid career with English-language stuff. Check it out. His CV includes quality work like The Sweet Hereafter, Ararat, David Cronenberg gems like eXistenZ and Eastern Promises, as well as Sunshine and Being Julia (both by Hungarian filmmaker István Szabó). Rade Serbedzija is a Croatian actor in his early sixties with a good many credits to his name, including season six of 24. Ayelet Zurer, meanwhile, is an Israeli actress who stacked up a lot of credits in her homeland but only just started acting in English with Spielberg's Munich a couple years ago. This year she was also in Vantage Point.So no, the film's leading man, Stephen Dillane, wasn't there. That's too bad, as his performance shouldered this film and then some. A London native, Steve can also be seen playing none other than Thomas Jefferson in HBO's monster miniseries John Adams with Paul Giamatti and Laura Linney. And it's also kinda sucky that writer-director Jeremy Podeswa didn't make it. He hasn't done much in the way of features, but he's got a ton of TV directing credits with shows I admire, among them Dexter, The Tudors, Six Feet Under, Rome, The Riches, Nip/Tuck, and The L Word. Like David Cronenberg, Jeremy is a Toronto native.
One of the things Robert Lantos talked about was how it took them next to forever to find the kid who played Jakob Beer as a youngster. They hired casting agents and auditioned kids from
all over the Western world, Canada, the U.S., U.K., you name it. Well, they finally had to look East to find their boy. Actually, it was more like the boy's agent found them. Robert said they were less than a month away from shooting when an audition tape from Prague landed on his desk. It was Robbie Kay, whose sole credit at that point was a small role in Hannibal Rising. Robert took one look at the tape and told his casting agents to cease and desist their search because they had finally found their young Jakob. Looks like the kid hasn't missed a beat either since wrapping Fugitive Pieces. He landed a supporting gig on Masterpiece Theatre's new adaptation of the play My Boy Jack. And he'll also be in a TV movie version of Pinocchio (guess who he plays?).
all over the Western world, Canada, the U.S., U.K., you name it. Well, they finally had to look East to find their boy. Actually, it was more like the boy's agent found them. Robert said they were less than a month away from shooting when an audition tape from Prague landed on his desk. It was Robbie Kay, whose sole credit at that point was a small role in Hannibal Rising. Robert took one look at the tape and told his casting agents to cease and desist their search because they had finally found their young Jakob. Looks like the kid hasn't missed a beat either since wrapping Fugitive Pieces. He landed a supporting gig on Masterpiece Theatre's new adaptation of the play My Boy Jack. And he'll also be in a TV movie version of Pinocchio (guess who he plays?).Robert's most favorite part of the production by far was finding places to shoot in Greece. In the story, the Greek part of the plot never leaves Hydra, but shooting all the Greek scenes there simply wasn't possible. It's impossible to drive there, as it's a tiny island with tiny winding roads. One interesting thing about the island's landscape is that it rises up pretty steep. With all those white houses, it looks like a giant vanilla ice cream cone. Rob had a bum foot when the helicopter landed at the island's base, so instead of walking, he had to mount a donkey for the entire trip to the island's summit. They also did some shooting in Athens as well as another one of the islands. While riding that ass up Hydra was a bit of a bummer, Rob said he loved flying over all that postcard scenery in a helicopter. If he could spend the rest of his career scouting locations, that'd be swell with him, he said. By the way, they never did shoot in Poland. A patch of woods somewhere between Toronto and Hamilton took care of that.
It was also Rob who snagged Rade for the part of Athos. Again, if you look up Rade on IMDb, you'll see he's a fairly busy fella, but he agreed to meet Rob at a cafe in Brentwood to talk about
the piece. When Rob got there, he was walking along the sidewalk toward the cafe entrance when, through the window, he spotted Rade sitting at a table with his son, who was doing homework. The only thing was, Rade was out cold with his head down on the table. So Rob walked in, woke his Balkan ass up, and offered him the part. For his part, Rade said he had no time to read the Anne Michaels novel. By far and away the most time-consuming aspect of preparing for the role of Athos was learning Greek backward and forward. He had to convince you (and he does) that he's native Greek and has been living most of his long life there so that he could talk as naturally as he does Croatian in real life. He couldn't stop raving about little Robbie Kay. Rade described him as one of those old souls in a child's body, what with the level of maturity that seemed light years ahead of his age. It's too bad Robbie couldn't show up to talk about his experiences, especially all the language training he had to go through. Dude had to pretend Yiddish was his native language, and then he had to pick up some Greek and, hardest of all I'm sure, English.
the piece. When Rob got there, he was walking along the sidewalk toward the cafe entrance when, through the window, he spotted Rade sitting at a table with his son, who was doing homework. The only thing was, Rade was out cold with his head down on the table. So Rob walked in, woke his Balkan ass up, and offered him the part. For his part, Rade said he had no time to read the Anne Michaels novel. By far and away the most time-consuming aspect of preparing for the role of Athos was learning Greek backward and forward. He had to convince you (and he does) that he's native Greek and has been living most of his long life there so that he could talk as naturally as he does Croatian in real life. He couldn't stop raving about little Robbie Kay. Rade described him as one of those old souls in a child's body, what with the level of maturity that seemed light years ahead of his age. It's too bad Robbie couldn't show up to talk about his experiences, especially all the language training he had to go through. Dude had to pretend Yiddish was his native language, and then he had to pick up some Greek and, hardest of all I'm sure, English.Language training was a recurring theme. Being from England meant Stephen Dillane had to learn how to sound like he was, ya know, not from England. Being from Israel meant similar for Ayelet. I have to say I was a bit caught off-guard by her thick accent and her occasional stumble
with English during the Q&A. Definite props must be given to her dialect coach 'cause in the flick her English sounded natural. Ayelet said the toughest thing for her about playing Michaela was the fact that she wasn't a very well developed character in the novel. In contrast to Rade, she read the novel several times before cameras rolled. To her, Michaela in the novel was more like a spirit flitting through the story than an actual person. Indeed, it wasn't until Anne Michaels showed up on set to feed people that Ayelet got a better grip on her role. She spoke to Anne at length and picked her brain and came away using a lot of Anne's personality in the role. Ayelet said she had a feeling Anne had imbued what little we know of Michaela in the novel with elements of herself. As for how she snagged the role, that was thanks to Jeremy Podeswa. Ayelet said she was putzing around her kitchen one day when Jeremy phoned from Greece, where he was already in pre-production on the film. Ayelet said she was sitting on her kitchen floor for an hour or so while she and Jeremy chatted about the role. The only thing he'd seen her in was Munich.
with English during the Q&A. Definite props must be given to her dialect coach 'cause in the flick her English sounded natural. Ayelet said the toughest thing for her about playing Michaela was the fact that she wasn't a very well developed character in the novel. In contrast to Rade, she read the novel several times before cameras rolled. To her, Michaela in the novel was more like a spirit flitting through the story than an actual person. Indeed, it wasn't until Anne Michaels showed up on set to feed people that Ayelet got a better grip on her role. She spoke to Anne at length and picked her brain and came away using a lot of Anne's personality in the role. Ayelet said she had a feeling Anne had imbued what little we know of Michaela in the novel with elements of herself. As for how she snagged the role, that was thanks to Jeremy Podeswa. Ayelet said she was putzing around her kitchen one day when Jeremy phoned from Greece, where he was already in pre-production on the film. Ayelet said she was sitting on her kitchen floor for an hour or so while she and Jeremy chatted about the role. The only thing he'd seen her in was Munich.
