At work: Director Todd Field
intensely studies a camera's viewfinder, but displays a sense of humor for an
interview with members of the press.
(Photo: Robert Zuckerman/New Line)
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By Omar P.L. Moore/The Popcorn
Reel -- October 2006
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Todd Field's new film "Little Children", the director
says, is not about suburbia at all. "This story could have taken place
anywhere. It could have been in Pakistan around a well with women in
burkhas gossiping or guys playing extreme soccer in a minefield for that
matter." Field has been promoting the film, which opened on October 6 in
New York City and Los Angeles. Opening in subsequent weeks in other North
American cities, "Little Children" -- about several members of a quiet
Massachusetts community whose pasts and presents collide in surprising and
dangerous ways -- will make its presence felt in a big way. Its cast
features Kate Winslet as a suburban stay-at-home mother who follows her heart
with an adulterous relationship with a stay-at-home father played by Patrick
Wilson, who is domestic dad while his onscreen wife Jennifer Connelly edits
documentary feature films. Veteran actors like Raymond J. Barry and
Phyllis Somerville round out the cast. Todd Field himself looks very
satisfied with the film, which was adapted from Tom Perrotta's novel of the same
name. Perrotta and Field co-wrote the film's screenplay.
"For me . . . the absolutely essential element of my initial attraction to Tom's
novel to continue to exist . . . is his voice. That's the first thing
which struck me . . . he got me in the beginning and he grabbed me and he had me
laughing and he had me in a very particular manner, and as I got deeper into the
book I wasn't laughing anymore," Field said. The film version of "Little
Children", despite its humorous moments is no laughing matter either. The
more the viewer journeys through the minefield of human relationships and
contradictions, the more entangled the dilemmas and ironies are. In an
often claustrophobic look at adults trying to break from convention and
absolving themselves of guilt and responsibility by pointing their collective
fearful finger at a neighborhood sex offender who has been released back into a
quiet, close-knit Northeastern community outside Cambridge, Massachusetts, there
are lots of judgments being made, by people who probably should not be throwing
the first stones in the proverbial biblical sense.
Indeed, Field says, "the central idea is
this idea of fear and judgment which is embodied in many different fashions in
all these characters in his book but centrally around Ronald James McGorvey."
McGorvey, as jarringly portrayed by actor Jackie Earle Haley, is a sex offender
who has been released into the local community after serving time for indecent
exposure to minors. The community's fear of him allows for an outlet of
release, self-righteousness and moral indignation, while its own flaws and
contradictions remain unaddressed.
Working with Perrotta on the adaptation of his novel for the big screen was very
satisfying. Their dialogues were "very dynamic and exciting", Field
commented. "I can think of a lot worse people to spend time locked in a
room with," the director joked. Field's story is a mystery of sorts as
gaps of knowledge are deliberately left unfilled about the circumstances of
certain characters, especially the sex offender. More than any mystery,
the director feels that the book is a comment on today's times in the U.S.
"The thing that I got about Tom's book which is so abundantly clear reading [it]
in '03 was that here is this sort of fairy tale allegory for the state of our
country. You know, looking for evil in a corner based on evidence or dodgy
evidence. Sending people off to prison with no human rights whatsoever and
looking over our shoulder all the time and wondering, are we good citizens of
the world, and moreover are we good Americans? That's what interested me
about the material. The idea of exploring some sexual deviancy or impulse
-- that's another movie."
Kate Winslet as Sarah and
Patrick Wilson as Brad, in Todd Field's new film "Little Children", which is
adapted from Tom Perrotta's novel of the same title.
(Photo: New Line Cinema)
That other movie could have been "Eyes Wide Shut" (1999), in which Field
appeared as medical school dropout-turned-pianist Nick Nightingale, hired to
play at secret society mansion parties where all manner of orgies and sexual
couplings occur. In the photo at the bottom of this page he tries to persuade Tom Cruise's
character to avoid attending the party which is off-limits to non-high society
figures. For a few minutes Field talks lovingly about Stanley Kubrick and
several other matters surrounding the late Kubrick and a certain actor's
criticisms of the late director that Field did not want to spend much time
commenting on. As far as the new film is concerned, Field has plenty to
say about it. His reflection on what his film conveys and what its meaning
is, is a study of a director's thorough knowledge of the complex string gives
detailed answers about the film he has spent the better part of just over two
years working on. "You're dealing with parental anxiety as a platform to
explore fear and judgment and a lot of other things, so what scarier monster to
have than an alleged, you know, whatever euphemism you want to attach to that
character [the sex offender] . . . but that's really up for grabs for the
audience."
Field is part of that audience. In some ways it appears that he views his
film "Little Children" through the eyes of his own children. The
42-year-old married father of three admitted that when he became a father for
the first time at age 24 he was clueless. At a key moment in the new film,
when Kate Winslet's "Sarah" character sinks into the arms of her child, the
director knows where she is coming from. "That's something I certainly
relate to. I have an 18-year old daughter, and a 13-year-old son, and a
10-year-old daughter and those three children have all been raised in a
fundamentally different way based on where my wife and I were ourselves. I
mean, my daughter basically raised us. She is so much more mature
than we are and she knows every single flaw that exists for us. And she's
right. And it's scary. I mean, she has a level of maturity
that is uncanny for an 18-year-old, probably based on pure survival, because we
were babies when we had her and we had no idea what we were doing."
Despite his intensity as both an actor and a director, Field displays a
tremendous sense of humor throughout the interview with members of a roundtable
press that included The Popcorn Reel. "I identify with that character [Winslet's
Sarah] a great deal. I understand what she's going through." He
pauses for a second or two. "Even though I'm not having affairs with
Patrick Wilson [the actor who plays Brad]."
Throughout the interview, Field engages in some introspection. He
mentioned being abducted as a youngster. He also commented on his own
childhood, contrasting it with that of his children. "We're shoved fear
down our throats that there's all these terrible things out there . . . we're
shoved all these definitions about what it takes to be a good parent, because of
course it makes us terrific consumers. Fear drives the market, you know?
First thing that they said after 9-11, [does a mock accent]: 'don't worry,
America will be back in business tomorrow.' Well, you know, that's a
thread that runs through our entire society right now. And my childhood
was very, very different from my children's childhood, and I wish that weren't
so. But I too have been affected by that fear. I too am not as
confident as my parents were. And I wish I were, because that's part of
the greatest gift that anyone ever gave me."
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Todd Field at the 44th New York
Film Festival in September for a screening of "Little Children."
(Photo: Jeff Vespa/WireImage.com)
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The director (seated) is surrounded by his
principal cast members from "Little Children" backstage at the Toronto Film
Festival in September 2006: from left, Patrick Wilson, Kate Winslet and Noah Emmerich.
(Jennifer Connelly also stars, in a small but key role.)
(Photo: Jeff Vespa/WireImage.com)
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The director as Nick Nightingale in Stanley Kubrick's final film "Eyes Wide
Shut". (Photo: Warner Brothers)
Related story: Jackie Earle Haley
talks about the
character Ronnie and the long journey through his own personal life, in
Hollywood and outside it.