Boyhood: How to make a film in 12 years? Richard Linklater’s recipe

The film with Ethan Hawke, Patricia Arquette and Ellar Coltrane is rebroadcast this Thursday on Arte.

Shot between 2001 and 2013, Boyhood tells the life of a Texas kid who we see growing before our eyes, from the age of 6 to his majority. The project was a snack, the result is miraculous. On the occasion of the film’s release, in 2014, director Richard Linklater told us how he had come to the end of the most ambitious film in his career.

Have a good reason to do it

“”I wanted to make a film on childhood. But I wanted to approach the subject as a whole and I could not focus on a specific age, as Truffaut for example had done in the 400 shots. However, it’s complicated to tell a 7 year old child: ‘Well, next week, we’re going to shoot the scenes where you are 13 years old‘. (Laughs) It’s just impossible! Then one day, I had an enlightenment: ‘Why not turn a few days each year over a very long period of time? ‘ Several documentaries have already used this process, but I do not think it had already been tempted as part of a fiction.“”

Caster the right actor

“”I met lots of kids for the role of Mason. I chose Ellar Coltrane because he was intriguing, mysterious. He had original centers of interest for a boy his age. His parents also played a decisive role. They are both artists, they were very seduced by the project, and I needed to be sure that they would support me to the end, that they would not change any reviews along the way. Legally, we do not have the right to have such long contracts signed for children actors. When Ellar embarked on the adventure, he was six years old, it was going to take him twelve years of his life, double his age. It was totally abstract for him. As if I had embarked on a 80 -year -old shoot. (Laughs)“”

Draw up from the news

“I did not have a specific scenario, rather a global scheme in mind, with the major events that had to punctuate the film: school changes, the DMovement, the divorces of the mother. I also knew very early what would be the last plan. But the idea was above all to be influenced by what was going on in the world when we were running. The Iraq war, the election of Obama. These are decisive events when you grow up, even if you only understand them. The film tries to capture this moment when you stop thinking like your parents and when you assert yourself as an individual. And for that, the world had to be constantly in the background. Culture, politics, technological changes. Boyhood is a period film. But a film from time to present time.“”

Keep it for yourself

“”At the very beginning, I wanted the shooting to be confidential. In case we plant ourselves. But after a year or two, the secret was fanned and the title of the film ended up on IMDB, with a release date announced for 2014 or 2015. It made me a little paranoid, because I lived all this adventure as a scientist about to make a major discovery. I was really afraid that a colleague steal my idea and published the results before me! (Laughs) Today, that’s it, the film was shown to the public. I have a little trouble achieving. We have shot the latest scenes in October 2013, so it’s the first time in 12 years that I have been spending a whole year without working on Boyhood. I have the impression that I will take me a little while to turn the page.“”

Play it tight

“”When we exhibit the concept of Boyhoodeveryone finds it great. But from an economic point of view, a film like that has no reason to be. Go explain to a financier or a producer that he will only recover his money in 15 years. The budget was tight, it was really a small independent prod, and we had to juggle the time jobs of Patricia Arquette and Ethan Hawke every year so that they can be released during the 3 or 4 days of the shooting. But in a way, it also allowed me to turn in ideal conditions. Every year, I put something like 16 or 17 minutes of film in the box, I put them together, added them to what had already been shot, then I had another year in front of me to think about the direction that history could borrow, discuss with the actors, let their lives infuse the script. Cinema does not allow that, usually. It was an incredible luxury.“”

Agree

“”All directors are control-free. We all try to fold the world to our desires. There, I was obliged to admit that I was not going to be able to master everything, that unpredictable obstacles were going to stand on my way. Exactly like in life. You have to have an optimistic nature to get into such a project. And I must say that everything went miraculously well. The same technicians and the same actors followed me for twelve years with unshakable enthusiasm. There was just one time when my daughter Lorelei (who plays the hero of the film’s hero) told me that she would prefer that her character dies … (laughs) but it is mainly because she did not like the clothes that she had to wear that day. It was more a bickering between a father and his daughter than a conflict between a director and his actress.“”

Richard Linklater’s commented filmography