Friends come full circle with ‘Albany noir’ film
ALBANY — A Hollywood writer once dubbed filmmaker and Albany native Miles Jorispeyrafitte a “wunderkind.”
That was after his debut feature, “As You Are,” won a Special Jury Award at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival when he was just 23.
Then he toiled for seven years trying to get his next feature film green-lighted.
“Everything about trying to make a movie is difficult,” he said.
Financing deals fell through. The coronavirus pandemic halted production.
Despite each setback, Jorispeyrafitte remained hopeful.
The stars finally aligned last year after investors committed a couple of million dollars for the independent film and two-time Oscar winner Hilary Swank signed on. She plays a Times Union reporter investigating the murder of her estranged son Michael, who got caught up in the drug trade during the heroin epidemic. Her other son is an Albany cop. It is dark and edgy, set on the seamy side of town. It tells a gritty tale of a mother’s search for truth. The filmmaker dubbed its vibe “Albany noir.”
The filmmaker and his team, including boyhood pal and co-writer, Madison Harrison, were primed to start filming in Albany locations when Joris-peyrafitte had a call with the money guys.
“Is there any chance that we can shoot it in New Jersey?” one of them asked.
Joris-peyrafitte, soft-spoken and laid back, stifled a rising anger.
“I told them I’ve waited seven years and if you can’t make it happen in Albany, I don’t need to make this movie,” he said. There was a long silence.
“OK, let’s do it in Albany,” a producer said.
“The Good Mother,” a 90minute thriller that opens on multiple theater screens in Albany on Friday — with a special screening and audience Q&A with Joris-peyrafitte and Harrison at Albany’s Madison Theatre on Sept. 7 — is a narrative come full circle.
The two have been close friends since they were tykes attending The Free School, an alternative indie school in the city’s Mansion neighborhood, where their families lived. They started messing around at age 9 with a Hi8 camcorder Joris-peyrafitte’s mother let
them use. As young teens, Bhawin Suchak, a teacher at the Free School, taught them the rudiments of film editing on a computer.
For “The Good Mother” (its working title was changed from “Mother’s Milk”), they chose locations around the Empire State Plaza, downtown and the South End where they came of age.
“It was surreal shooting on blocks where we grew up, in the parks where we made movies as kids and seeing Hilary Swank walking into your next-door neighbor’s house,” Joris-peyrafitte said last week in a phone interview with Harrison. They live a couple of miles away from each other in Brooklyn. Both turn 31 the first week of September, five days apart.
They teamed up on a script that displays a tough love for Albany, an authentic place full of dysfunction, heartache and redemption in their version.
“I think it’s an honest portrait of a place that we love and sometimes hate on a deep level,” Harrison said. “It’s honest, but not cynical.”
“It’s really about the strength and resilience of people who live in Albany as they move through grief,” Jorispeyrafitte said. “It’s not a rosy picture. It’s a thriller and I hope the audience enjoys the ride and gets wrapped up in it.”
Suchak is co-founder and co-executive director of Youth FX, which provides opportunities for young filmmakers of color in Albany’s underserved neighborhoods. Joris-peyrafitte hired Youth FX members, local actors and production assistants among a crew of 60.
The pals started brainstorming their next project shortly after they wrapped filming “As You Are” in and around Albany in 2015. They knew people who had died of drug overdoses in the heroin and fentanyl epidemic. They wanted a female protagonist who was a mother.
“We didn’t want to treat her like the usual helpless, grieving mother narrative. We wanted to do it in a noir style
that would get into the dark places of her world,” Joris-peyrafitte said.
Swank’s character, Marissa Bennings, is a Times Union journalist who uses her investigative skills to search for her son’s killer. She is assisted by her dead son’s pregnant girlfriend, Paige, played by Olivia Cooke (“Sound of Metal”). Jack Reynor (“Midsommar”) plays her other son, Toby, an Albany cop.
The film is set in 2016 as Donald Trump was elected the 45th president of the United States. “Heroin and fentanyl were killing people we knew and the idea of truth was disappearing with Trump,” Jorispeyrafitte said.
The pair were influenced by the noir films “Klute” by director Adam Pakula and “The Third Man,” directed by Carol Reed.
“We like the noir style of visual storytelling and creating a feeling that there is a sort of oppressive, unknown force controlling things,” Joris-peyrafitte said.
Swank gave them a master class in preparation.
“She started going back and forth in great depth by email, breaking down the script and her character,” Joris-peyrafitte said. “It was an unbelievable privilege to get a glimpse into her process.”
“She is an incredible actor and her level of knowledge of filmmaking is extraordinary,” Harrison said
The cast and crew scrambled to wrap in 24 shooting days (they had hoped for 30), stayed in a budget hotel and cut out frills.
Swank’s assured acting kept them on a tight schedule. “She did all the intellectual work on the script beforehand and likes being in the moment,” Joris-peyrafitte said. “She likes to get it in the first couple takes because she feels that gets the best out of her. That’s a gift for a director.”
The release of “The Good Mother” coincides with a contentious strike by Hollywood writers and actors that has been going on for four months, curtailing promotional tours and pushing some movie launches into 2024.
Neither Joris-peyrafitte nor Harrison are union members, although both support the striking writers and actors. “We were fortunate we finished all the dialogue a day before the strike,” Joris-peyrafitte said. “We feel sheer gratitude that we finished the film and it’s getting a theatrical release in this difficult time.”
Joris-peyrafitte composed the score and cinematographer Charlotte Hornsby used anamorphic lenses, which enhance resolution and clarity.
“This movie looks like it cost more than $10 million to make because of our talented crew,” Joris-peyrafitte said. “It’s
going to be beautiful to see it on a wide screen.”
He hopes the audience leaves the theater with an emotion similar to out-of-town cast and crew members.
“People came from L.A. and New York and were not expecting to have a great time in Albany,” Joris-peyrafitte said. “They ended up loving the place. It’s a cool place to shoot a movie.”
And it’s not New Jersey.