#because i am genuinely tired of 'easier' books and i don't have that much money to buy different books

[unhonestlymirror]

You will be surprised by how many people don't like you for actually stupid reasons

[zoobus]

This is not me talking myself down but I can't really understand a lot of things you say because you have a bigger vocabulary and idk, you seems like write really well and I don't know if I don't understand some things properly bc English isn't my first language or... for some other reason, like a deficit or something... But what I understand though, I tend to agree with you and even when I don't agree I still like to think about it. Well, with all of this unnecessary and unasked information, I'll like to ask what you meant by your post about Nope (2022)? What was your interpretation? Tbh, to this day, I don't think it's a commentary about minorities. The only thing I think it could be seem like that is that thing with their father. Like, black people invented a lot of things and they were the first to do a lot of things, but they didn't get the recognition or the money they deserved most of the time so there's that. Often than that, I just think that the cast is black and there's the other dude who's not white... I don't remember much but I remember commenting with my brother that I thought it was cool that they were just, a diverse cast, with two black protagonists but they were just living their life and something fucked-up (presented itself as an opportunity) happened, that I thought it was cool that Jordan Peele didn't want to make the movie about racism. He does that greatly, but I believe black people want movies in which they are the ones acting/writing/producing/directing to be as diverse and full of possibilities as it always has been for white people, like, they want to have the opportunity to be in every possible story. True to be told, I'm not black... Or technically I am,,, second to some governmental organizations... Well, I'm pardo (kind of like mulatto), mother is black and father is white. I'm just saying this bc in Brazil, if you're pardo, chances are that you live like black people just with some more passability and has it easier than black people (pessoas retintas) but if you have any racial/class consciousness you understand some things that I'm afraid other mixed countries don't understand as well. But we're still racists as fuck so... I just rambled, idk. So what about Nope?

For me, part of the fun of movies and books is reading what other people took got from it. I love reading takes I would never imagine on my own, I love disagreeing with the consensus, and generally I think I’m able to consider, sympathize, and engage with opinions that differ from mine without losing confidence in my own interpretation.

So when I turned to Nope essays and the vast majority of them took it as a reflection of racial politics… I’m not exaggerating when I say I had a minor spiral. Was I stupid? Was I actually stupid? I didn't get any of that. I’m black. I’m privileged as hell, but I am African-American. I loved Get Out. Am I genuinely just a fucking moron who missed the obvious? Picking up media subtext is MY thing. That’s the one thing I’m good at. I had to rewatch Nope to prove I’m not an idiot. I must have been tired that day.

And maybe I am an idiot who missed all the subtext, but I’m more confident this time around saying I agree with you. I think a lot of people (including black people) are misconstruing unchangeable truths (the main characters are black) as social commentary. I think there is some amount of projection, that inclusion is inherently a political statement. Dare I say race is possibly clouding everyone’s perception. Take this popular essay excerpt:

Now look at this gif of OJ:

What about this suggests his character would have been at ease and unanxious if the crowd staring at him was black? What about him talking softly with his eyes glued to the floor suggests his discomfort stems from his marginalization as a black man? What did Peele add to his film that indicated OJ as racially-motivated-socially awkward rather than naturally awkward other than the fact that he’s black? It's plausible that racism could have made him like that but does the movie itself give us anything to make that assumption? I don’t think it does. I’ve seen some annoyed posts regarding autistic headcanons because they think these are just normal black man traits and um. No, shrinking violet who prefers animals to humans really aren't. I do know black dudes like OJ. I would not call them the Black Male Experience.

I find this viewpoint super frustrating – to plagiarize Margaret Atwood – White racism, white racism, is every fucking thing run by white racism? Pretending you have a personality of your own, that you can be an adorable, beloved Asian child star, Shy and awkward or boisterous and arrogant, it’s all motivated by white racism.

then the pa guy is confused as to where the “older one” is, clearly giving the message that he doesn’t trust oj to be a competent person. the pa sees him as an untrained boy,

reach. Ignoring the fact that people hate changes and learning your go-to expert died is a pretty significant change – oh yeah, the PA who was letting people walk directly behind a fucking horse just screamed “respectful of his subordinates/contractors if they’re white.”

The whites on the movie set were disrespectful, but imo I didn't see a compelling reason to read it as a commentary on how black men specifically are treated since the type of disrespect shown in that scene doesn’t come up for the rest of the film.

people talk about the horse, but they don’t know anything about the man riding it

None of those people knew anything about the horse. They don’t even mention the horse’s name. Like I get what you mean (jk no I don’t) but the people very much did not know or care about the horse. Here’s the script:

Emerald: Now did you know that the very first assembly of photographs in sequential order to create a motion picture was a two second clip of a Black man on a horse...? Yes it was, yes it was! Now some of y’all know Eadweard Muybridge, the grandfather of motion pictures who took the pictures that made that clip... but does anybody know the name of that Black jockey that rode the horse...? Holst: No Emerald: Nope. The first ever stunt man, animal wrangler and movie star rolled up in one and there’s almost no record of em… That man was a Bahamian jockey that went by the name of Alistair E. Haywood. My great great-grandfather.

I’m not even certain what to make of there being almost no record of him in the greater context of the movie’s themes about viewers feeling they’re entitled to consume/perceive another.

I find the assertion that the Peele made *any* parallels between the way animals are treated and the way poc are treated ungrounded. As I said in my original post, if your takeaway from Jupe’s generic sitcom and movie posters was that he’s EXACTLY as absurd as a chimp in a birthday hat, that the white family adopting an asian kid was commentary on token racism, you are literally just racist. There is nothing in this movie that suggests an insidious reason for his popularity.

The humans watch, the animals are watched until they do something drastic to make it stop. But none of the animals get characterization beyond that and none of the humans act in similar enough ways for me to derive anything from it. I don't recall anyone coercing OJ into unwanted eye contact. The glimpses we see of Jupe's childhood are of a cute kid on a corny sitcom set. The exploitation comes after the random monkey event, when SNL makes a parody skit and the world gradually forgets the gut-wrenching terror of being a little boy hearing your crush's flesh squished.

I am not saying race is irrelevant or that Peele had absolutely no intention of including subtext about black bodies or race exploitation in the film industry, but I am saying that I rewatched Nope specifically for that reading and I don’t find that reading compelling.

Unfortunately, I spent most of this complaining about what other people thought rather than my own. My interpretation was pretty surface-level. I think it was mostly about

respecting nature as it is and not what you imagine it is

somewhat about the nature of perception and how easily it’s distorted/how easy it is to believe you have a full understanding when you’ve only seen about an inch of it, and

something about feeling entitled to perceive things, idk I accept that I probably didn’t pick up on this theme as often as the director wanted me too. I’ll admit that.

[incorrect-ikevamp-quotes]

Hi! I love everything that you write and heh I am a fan! 😄 tbh this is my first time requesting something on Tumblr! If you don't mind and if I am not being a bother...can you write about how the guys would react If MC suddenly starts making meme references? I don't know how I got the idea but I am REALLY curious. And love you! :D

Hiya! Tyvm for the kind words, and apologies that this took a while! I hope you have the chance to enjoy it regardless ❤️❤️❤️ Love you too, sweet pea! I promise to get to the next request you’ve sent ASAP~

Aight but this would be hilarious because the range of the reactions is just ungodly. I will be putting this under a cut after Napoleon so I don’t clog up everyone’s dash, but all the suitors are included below otherwise! 

Comte is the one that recognizes a few, but didn’t really stay in modern times long enough to be as well-versed as a Gen Z kid might. Regardless he finds the wittiness and absolute chaotic fuckery to be delightful, and will 100% support the harmless nonsense. It never fails to get a laugh out of him

Mozart that first day be like: “Buzz off MC I hate you” MC, because she likes swinging bats at wasps’ nests: “Well that’s not very cash money of you” Mozart: ?????????? Comte, giggling in the bg like the secret fae he is This one’s just because I’m petty, but after the events of Comte rt I just imagine them encountering Vlad again and MC’s just “I lived bitch.” while Comte is flipping him off behind her lkjahgkjhdsg

Comte @ Leo when he finds the latter under his desk: Had it not been for the laws of this land, I would have slaughtered you.  MC: wheezing from the hallway as she’s about to give him his letters

MC: So how was your day, honey? Comte: Good, good--briefly had to go beastmode upon the punk that pilfered my lint roller MC, biting her lip to keep from laughing: So does Leo still have his kneecaps? Comte: for now.

Comte, @ literally anyone upsetting the MC: I won’t hesitate, bitch

Comte: Be careful with my emotional baggage, it’s designer

MC: What if I was evil and ran towards you at very fast speeds Comte: My arms are strong, I would catch and hug you

Leo and Dazai are the ones that don’t have a single reference point but are filled with so much dumbass chaos energy that they just. Understand immediately???? Nobody knows how or why, but they just catch on so fast--adapt the language in a matter of weeks. Never underestimate the power of combined boredom, depression, and humor

I swear to god I just see MC taking them their Blanc/Rouge and being like “here you go sir, one enslaved moisture” and they just go fucking hog wild from day one. MC starts impersonating Theo when he leaves the room around Dazai, like fake deep voice “you all only hate me because you do not like me and I am mean to you. grow up.” Or like the MC meets a baby on her travels with Leo around town and she holds them and says v seriously and sagely “So you are Baby? I have heard tales of your exploits.” and Leo about loses his shit right there. They both think MC is the funniest person alive--they’ve never been more eager to throw a ring at someone in their entire life.

Also a bonus for my beloved Dazai:  MC, facing even the slightest inconvenience (like dropping her fork) in the most dramtic voice possible: Life is not daijoubu. Dazai: wheezing

MC, after watching Theo turn down a woman at the bar in the meanest way possible: bro quit letting the darkness consume you u r scaring the hoes Dazai, literally rolling around on the ground, half-drunk and dying:

MC, walking alongside Dazai and stopping to stare at her reflection in the River Seine. Dazai’s expecting some sad or twisted shit, since people often feel comfortable talking about those things around him, but instead she just: “Oh, it’s you. The source of all my problems.” And he about falls into the river from shock HAHAHA

At this point don’t be surprised if his next book is about an absolute madlad woman similar to MC

Napoleon finds it to be a delightful quirk more than anything? He doesn’t really understand it, but he finds it funny when they change their voice for effect or speak in exaggerated tones. If it’s just comprehensible enough for an outsider to understand--or Sebas gives him context--chances are it’ll send him into a laughing fit

For this one I just imagine MC singing that Ratatouille meme song obnoxiously bad while cooking, and Napoleon and Comte are just so wildly amused by it bc it makes zero sense and it’s only vaguely French at this point

MC @ Napoleon while they’re cooking brunch: Can I offer you a nice egg in these trying times?

MC, conflicted because she’s tired and wanted to sleep in but also got to see Napo’s cute sleeping face for a few hours: For my next stunt, I’ll wake up at 5AM on the day I can sleep in. Sebas: Early to bed and early to rise makes a person healthy, wealthy, and wise MC: early to bed and early to rise makes me a massive bitch Napoleon: laughing in agreement

Isaac is the type to be bewildered and concerned at first (especially when he hears the more nihilistic ones hoOOOoooOO BOY) but eventually begins to understand it’s some bizarre attempt at humor (that hurts Zack baby). While some part of him laments that it reminds him of Dazai and he’s secretly jealous of how she and Dazai bond over it, he will sometimes join in the chaos when the mood strikes him and he’s feeling mischievous

Isaac: How are you feeling? MC: Oh, I’m not Isaac: seconds from dialing 911 Isaac: Are you okay? MC: Oh yeah dw I just suffer from that syndrome where your neutral expression makes you look like you’re an angry serial killer Isaac: say sike rn

Isaac, tutoring MC and correcting something:  MC, muttering while redoing it: The risk I took was calculated, but man am I bad at math. Isaac: unable to help a laugh

One time MC was avoiding Isaac for fear of hurting his feelings and he just confronts her like: Isaac: back by unpopular demand, me! What’s wrong, MC pls MC was so hecking proud of him

Isaac, telling MC about a recent discovery he learned at uni from another professor: bones typically heal stronger after they’ve been broken--so long as they’re set properly, of course MC, looking him dead in the eyes: So what you’re saying is that I should break every bone in my body until I become superhumanly powerful? Isaac: please do not, no

Mozart and Jeanne are just. Totally lost. Why are you talking like that??? Why are you making “crab hands”???? They don’t understand. Maybe never will. They reach a point where they just kind of laugh and shake their heads, endeared by the oddity after they’re used to it and have determined it isn’t a threat/insult. 

MC: It’s a cold and it’s a brooooken, Waluigi. Waaaaluigiiiii...waaaahluigi..... Mozart: surprised, then starts snickering and playing along on the piano

Arthur, asking MC very personal questions out loud because he is an idiot sometimes: Soooo MC, are you a top or a bottom? MC: I’m a threat. (If he asks a second time, the response will be “Wouldn’t you like to know, weatherboy.”) Jeanne, fighting a smile:

MC, about to punch an asshole: Your free trial of being alive has ended Jeanne, seconds from laughing for the first time in 100 years:

Also, because I genuinely can’t help myself. You know that knight meme like “Parry this you fucking casual.” I cannot stress enough that it is literally the personification of Jeanne’s entire character. I’m not even joking.

Arthur and Shakespeare are utterly fascinated by the rapid evolution of wordplay and the sheer hilarity. They will ask all about these so-called “memes” and ask for examples of them if MC can show them (either somehow accessing her phone or drawing them). MC draws Arthur the knife cat meme and he about a s c e n d s at the hilarity of it all, points and yells THEO IS HOLDING THE KNIFE. He is correct. They will be delighted and follow along eagerly, and--god forbid--will make their own based on late 19th century struggles.

Is this where Shakespeare got the idea for “What, you egg? stabs him” and “You are a saucy boy.”? I’m too scared to ask. Don’t even get me started on “The Fool jingled miserably across the floor.” That one is just too on the nose...

I can’t even imagine what would happen to Shakespeare if MC like translated vines and memes into Ye Olde English around him. Imagine she’s at one of those noble balls and hears rumors of these two guys living together and they’re so obviously gay and he says “And those gents w’re roommates.” And in the most false surprised tone ever MC just replies “oh mine own god, those gents w’re roommates.” Imagine having a wife that’s just as hilarious as you are and hits you with all the force of a bag of wet mice every time you speak in retaliation, he’s going into palpitations.

Every time Arthur does smth stupid MC just: “I Pretend I Do Not See It.”

Vincent is tickled pink by MC’s penchant for finding joy and/or amusement in nearly everything they do, and he smiles gently when he sees them muttering and laughing to themselves. He wants to be able to join them in what they love, but he has a harder time following along and understanding the darker humor sometimes. Mostly gets confused??? Please give him the easier ones to mimic and laugh when he tries--or just include him in your jokes MC. He’s babie your honor...

But he also. Will not. Stand any kind of self-deprecation or borderline verbal self-harm. He’s usually very easygoing and calm, but for whatever reason that stuff makes him go deathly quiet and upset.

MC, after something goes horribly wrong, hugging Vincent: Oh Vince, we really in it now Vincent: giggling a little despite his worries, relaxing

MC: Theo stop simping for Vincent that’s my job

MC, when Theo leaves the room and she gets Vincent all to herself: The evil is defeated.

MC: And this is where I would put my will to live...if I h a d one! Vincent: ;-; MC: oh shit, oh fuck, I was only kidding Vincent wait (MC was subsequently lectured and loved on for many hours)

Theo is conflicted because on the one hand, he loves to see you smiling and having fun. On the other, you’re clowning as hard as Dazai and Arthur and he can only handle so many monkeys in his circus. Most of the time he will roll his eyes and be the straight man of this comedy, but you might find him cracking a smile--or accidentally letting a chuckle slip past his lips now and again.

MC, after meeting Theo: I’m a nice person, but I’m about to start throwing rocks at people.

Theo, those first days: Oh? You’re approaching me? Instead of running away, you’re coming right to me? MC: I can’t beat the shit out of you without getting closer.

Theo: Every time I ask MC to explain “vibe check” to me she hits me with some kind of improvised weapon

MC, after the “incident” (you know the one): This year, I lost my dear lover Theo Theo, in the distance: QUIT TELLING EVERYONE I’M DEAD! MC: ;-; sometimes I can still hear his voice...

Sebastian is last because oh boy. OH BOYYYYY I LOVE HIM. Okay so the way I see this happening with Sebastian is just. So wild. Because at first he’s t r y i n g so hard to be the proper butler man. He does not meme. But then he starts to drift closer to what Niles from The Nanny was, where he’ll quip and joke in private or when the situation is just beyond the amount of absurdity he can handle without making a snarky comment. Everyone in the house can’t fathom how Sebas and MC got so close so fast, but there are points where they’re just “Are they even speaking English anymore???” It’s 11 times funnier than normal because Sebas almost never smiles or laughs when memeing, the deadpan quality of his playing along sends MC every time

Has ABSOLUTELY said “HEY. PANINI HEAD. ARE YOU EVEN LISTENING TO ME???” jokingly when MC made a mistake in the kitchen. They laugh about it for y e a r s

MC: I can’t date someone who keeps a lamb as a pet, that’s so weird Sebas, brushing Lotte in front of MC: MC: MC: Okay, I will make an exception because she looks very polite

MC and Sebas, fully aware of the fame some of the men will reach in modern times: We will watch your career with great interest.  (I s2g that’s like half of Sebas’ rt right there I’m crying)

Sebas rt with Lotte be like that 500 dollar Mareep meme: “sometimes a family can be just a boy, his gf, and their 500 dollar two foot tall Lotte”

[uomo-accattivante]

One of the things you can’t help noticing when you talk to Oscar Isaac is just how incredible he is at playing the part of Oscar Isaac. It’s not that he’s putting on a performance. But when you talk to Oscar Isaac, the public idea of Oscar Isaac begins to make a tremendous amount of sense.

We talk a couple of days before the release of Netflix’s new Triple Frontier, an action-adventure heist/American military allegory flick (it’s a lot) that Isaac stars in, and Isaac manages to, within the span of a few minutes, quote Shakespeare and express guilt about shoplifting in his college days. In other words: He’s sensitive with a risky streak. It’s no wonder the Internet has declared him its boyfriend (and more recently, its husband).

This quality, of course, is part of what makes Isaac so compelling to watch when he’s playing an actual role. He seamlessly shades his characters with duality; by turns he can play dour and charming, cerebral and clueless. Take Triple Frontier. Isaac portrays a character, Santiago ‘Pope’ Garcia, who is essentially a stand-in for Donald Rumsfeld. He’s tasked with rallying an all-star gang of ex-Special Forces agents (played by Ben Affleck, Charlie Hunnam, Pedro Pascal, and Garrett Hedlund) to execute a covert heist of a South American drug lord. It’s an ill-fated, and perhaps misguided, operation, but Isaac makes you believe that nothing can go wrong—and, moreover, that what they’re doing is inherently right, all while emitting a sense of manifest failure.

On the heels of turning 40, Isaac hasn’t given much thought to where he wants to take his talents for portraying complex characters next, only that he wants to scale back. “Doing the circus thing can get tiring after a while,” he says. Though, it won’t be long before he talks about what a thrill it was to train for a daunting high elevation chase scene. The change of tune comes off genuinely; he digs a good adventure, but also wants to settle down. It’s both. And it’s Oscar Isaac, so you believe him.

Happy birthday!

Thank you.

Did you do anything exciting?

We had a little bit of a house party. We just moved to a new place. So we thought, “Why not trash it? Have a party.”

It was a pretty big birthday [40]. As you move into middle age, are there new kinds of roles you're interested in playing?

No, not necessarily. But it's just kind of fun to start a new decade.

Do you have a philosophy in terms of how you choose roles generally?

Oh no, if only. Things would be so much easier. Choosing roles is really more like falling in love. I don't have a specific type that I'm looking for. It's just kind of if I read the thing or speak to the director or see some art that's connected with it and it incites something where I can't stop thinking about it, then I keep moving towards it.

Tell me about how you fell in love, then, with the character of Pope in Triple Frontier.

I worked with J.C. [Chandor] on A Most Violent Year. That had gone well. And I knew he was somebody I could trust in the editing room. You could try lots of different things and he won't make you look like an idiot. And then he talked to me about the kind of guy this is, the parables behind the whole movie, it being an allegory to the way the United States has operated throughout the world, and how in some ways my character is the Donald Rumsfeld of the story. [Pope] says, “Look, we can do this. We can take out a really bad guy. We'll be rich. We'll be in and out. No problem.” And so there's a bit of hubris there about their skills—even though these characters are incredibly skilled. But he underestimates the team's greed.

Once I became involved, we started having conversations. We thought an interesting complication—and one thing that would make it not feel so cliché—would be making the character of Pope actually from the area that he's been working in. There's a familial connection to it, so there's something more at stake. He wants to take out this guy not just as a trophy but because he actually thinks it'll make a difference.

In Annihilation you also played someone in the military. And I read that you at one point had considered joining the Marines. Is there something about diving into that military world that attracted you?

Yeah. That's definitely something I had been into when I was younger, and I had imagined that that was an avenue I could've gone down for my life. And I was very near going to boot camp and starting that whole process, and then other things happened that took me away from that. So I think there's always something inside of me that wonders about the What if? of it.

I can be quite a good student when it comes to certain things. So learning the mechanics of working with the weapons, learning about situational awareness and clearing the room, the team-building exercises—all those things, I got very excited by. And also, there was a lot of high altitude training.

What was that like?

What was cool was that all of us had a different physical task. Garrett [Hedlund] was the MMA fighter and there was a whole MMA fight that ended up getting cut down quite a bit. So he ended up spending a lot of time training that way, training with jiu-jitsu. Pedro [Pascal] spent a lot of time with the cockpit and flying. And then Charlie [Hunnam] and Ben [Affleck] both found things that were specific to their characters. And for me, I knew that I was having to do this extended chase sequence in Colombia, which was between 10,000 and 13,000 feet, depending on exactly where we were shooting. So I knew that was something I needed to train for just so I'd be able to do more than one take without throwing up. And I found a place here in New York that's a hyperbaric chamber that's able to replicate what it's like to run in different altitudes. They have a treadmill in there. And an oxygen mask, and even a tent you could sleep in at night to get your blood saturated with oxygen.

When you were preparing, what kinds of things did you learn about the military that surprised you, or that you didn't know when you were considering joining the Marines way back when?

I was a kid back then, so I didn't know much. I was like, “I'll get fit. I'll get money for college. I'll go in there because some of my friends are planning on going in there as well.” There were some people I admired who had been. This was like 1998. But the reality of it is the amount of sacrifice—not just physically, but emotionally. Being separated from your family for long, long periods of time. And especially special forces guys, who are just the elite, top of the top. There's this sense of [it being] these tough guys, these killers, chest-pounding guys. The truth is the people we spoke with [have] humility and soft-spokenness and ethical codes they go by, [there’s] lack of rejoicing in violence, the desire for connection, and the way deadly force is viewed—all those things I found to not be clichéd adolescent ideas of what being a military guy is.

The movie is very much an allegory about the American military and the country's greed. But how did you internalize the individual sense of greed that you're portraying in the film?

There's something that's epic about it. It's a very primal tale. Macbeth is the same thing. Macbeth is a heroic soldier. The entire first part of Macbeth is everyone saying what an incredible soldier Macbeth was, what he did, how he was fearless, courageous, how he saved his men. He is the hero. And then that little thing gets in there like an infection, this thought, What more could I have? "What do I deserve for everything that I've done?" And that’s mixed with the violence the person is seeing. So that for me was very interesting. Noble people who have a tragic flaw that brings them down. For my character, it was less the money. It was more revenge, taking out this one guy he's been hunting since he's been down there. He actually believes that if he cuts down this head, the rest of the thing will fall.

Did you return to moments in your life or career where you caught yourself letting greed get the best of you?

I think when I was in college I definitely did some damage at the Tower Records across the street. And the Barnes & Noble... And a couple liquor stores. There was a sense of, “I am a college student. I can barely make ends meet over here. This is a big company; they're not going to mind if I take this book of poetry.” So I could justify snagging a few items here and there. But of course Tower Records closes down, and I can't help but feel at fault.

It’s not your fault.

It was a flawed system. They had the bargain DVDs right next to the place where you walk out. So you could just put [your bag] right there next to it, go through the metal detectors, and then reach back and grab your bag.

Do you think you could graduate from Barnes & Noble theft and pull off an actual heist?

No. I wouldn't know where to begin or what to do. Anything I know about it is from movies.

Are you a fan of the heist genre?

I like the heist genre thrown on its head. My favorite movie is Dog Day Afternoon. And that is another thing where it's like, Let's do this thing. We're going to rob a bank. In and out of there. And everything that happens after that is, to me, the most exciting part. It's people in extreme situations. I worked in a hospital when I was younger, and that's something I learned a lot from, seeing people in extreme situations. You see the entire spectrum of humanity in those moments.

As a musician and a big music fan, how do you use music to get yourself in the mindset of a role?

I've done that for ages. Often for me, it's less specific about, This makes me think about this thing. It's more about what gets me to a place of readiness, openness. What makes me feel connected to the earth a bit more. Sometimes I'll put together music that I find inspiring thematically, or tonally. But I think if it's something that needs any real depth of emotion, there's this one guy named Ernst Reijseger, an incredible cellist who did the soundtrack to Werner Herzog's Cave of Forgotten Dreams. I listen to that and it puts me in a primal state. It opens me up so I'm able to receive anything that's floating around inside without judging it too much.

Were you listening to that for this role?

For this one, there were a couple moments when I did. But I think I listened to a lot of Sepultura, a Brazilian hardcore metal band. It gave a sense of the chaos and the violence, and it has some Brazilian kind of tribal elements to it. So it felt like a bit of a mix of everything they're getting involved in down there.

What's the best piece of direction you've gotten in your career?

The first one that comes to my mind was just like the sweetest way of saying "Tone it down." A great writer, Hossein Amini, he came over and in the sweetest way said, "The camera is just not able to capture what you're doing right now. We don't have the technology yet to get what you're doing. So you just have to bring it down a bit so we can capture it on the camera."

My editor insisted I find out about the footage you filmed for the Disney Parks upcoming Star Wars-themed lands. Is there anything you can tell me?

I'm afraid I can't, because actually I don't really remember [laughs]. I think some of it happened in the middle of filming the actual movie. So they were like, "Hey, today you're coming in and you'll be in the cockpit." So it's those kinds of situations. I'm sure I'm in the cockpit and I'm screaming about something important.