Bateman Game for anything
Little House on the Silver Spoons, comedy’’, but it is not so easily pinned down. With its actualabduction-wrapped-in-fakemurder-mystery plot it feels like an old-fashioned caper film but there are poignant and personal moments dotted through the action. The result is simultaneously absurd and accessible.
‘‘I can really only speak to what I really respond to in things that I like [and that] is usually stuff that has got at least one foot on the ground, something that’s kind of relatable and tangible and plausible,’’ Bateman says.
‘‘What’s important is making sure that there’s a tonal sense of realism to it, that you might have some crazy moments and some crazy characters, but you need something or someone at the centre that is us, that is the audience.’’
Bateman, for the most part, plays himself. That is, the easygoing, slightly deadpan persona he seems to adopt for his characters, whether an an echo of the real man or simply a performed reality. His wife once said of him he was ‘‘the most sensitive, generous man, without being fragile’’ which seems to sum it up.
‘‘I’m trying to make these characters as close to who I amas possible for the goal of having the audience see no acting whatsoever,’’ Bateman explains. ‘‘I make sure that I hold some space there to go outside the lines a few times, both in the way in which that character is able to handle a comedic situation or a dramatic situation.
‘‘But I I don’t want to see acting. There’s about three people that can do that really convincingly, people like Daniel Day Lewis. I think the rest of us just basically can or should be playing somewhat heightened versions of ourselves.’’
The film plays heavily with traditional cinematic cues but uses them disruptively, typically to lull the audience into making assumptions about motive until, of course, the rug is yanked from under us.
‘‘I think that is John Daley and Jonathan Goldstein’s talent as writers and as directors,’’ Bateman says. ‘‘They respect the audience, they understand all the tropes and the boxes that one needs to check and ones that the audience is expecting you to check. The way they shape the experience is really their creative prerogative as writers and directors.
‘‘To me, that’s the big part of film-making, is being a member of the audience, sitting right in the centre of the theatre, and understanding where everybody is, what they’re thinking, what they should be thinking, what they could be thinking, and what do I wanna show them now?’’ - Sydney Morning Herald ● Game Night showing in New Zealand cinemas now.
‘ I’m trying to make these characters as close to who I am as possible.’ JASON BATEMAN