Based on murdered Dutch filmmaker Theo Van Gogh’s original movie of the same name, Interview stars Steve Buscemi — jauntily sporting a multi-hyphenate’s hat as adapter-director — as a hard-bitten journalist forced to go head-to-head with a pretty starlet played by Sienna Miller.



Before Van Gogh’s death in 2004, he had planned to remake three of his films in English, and re-set them in New York City. In the wake of his murder by an Islamic extremist, his longtime producing partners, Gijs van de Westelaken and Bruce Weiss, decided to honor Van Gogh’s memory by enlisting American directors to collaborate on the films with members of Van Gogh’s original film crew. Buscemi was the first to commit to the idea, and he chose to remake Interview, while also appearing on camera.

The noted indie actor stars as pessimistic, world-weary journalist Pierre Peders. Having made his name as a war reporter, traveling all over the world and seeing some of the most horrifying sights imaginable, Pierre is understandably irked at the occupational demotion that he feels he’s received with his current assignment — a puff-piece profile on up-and-coming TV and movie actress Katya (Miller, above). The odd-couple pair meet in a chic restaurant (she’s over an hour late, naturally) and it’s an instant and decidedly spiteful collision of worlds — Pierre’s serious political focus and Katya’s superficial world of celebrity. But perhaps all is not as it appears. When Pierre is slightly injured in a car accident inadvertently caused by Katya (she’s the proverbial girl who stops traffic), they end up back at Katya’s spacious loft for a long night of talking, drinking, sparring and strange, embattled intimacy. Their contentious bickering and verbal chess game — spiked with wit, intrigue and sexual tension — eventually evolves into a surprising confessional.

Notable films of reference here include Oleanna, for its battle-of-the-sexes sparks, and also the recent Sleuth, costarring Miller’s famous ex, Jude Law. Interview has brevity on its side (it clocks in at 83 minutes), and it’s true that sparks fly in effective fashion, making the film quite watchable in an in-the-moment fashion, but the mix of drinks and philosophy wears a bit thin, and the ego-clash dance becomes a little too literal at one point. Still, Miller is mightily effective in something like this, playing off her off-screen tabloid reputation by toying with and twisting her hair in precious, entitled fashion when she's late, and just generally vamping it up a bit. You find yourself mostly caught up in Katya's game, even if the movie's final twist — without getting into specifics — doesn't ring wholly true for the manner in which it assumes Katya wouldn't take full credit for her ruse.

Interview comes housed in a regular Amray plastic case, and presented in 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen, with an English language 5.1 Dolby digital soundtrack and optional English and Spanish subtitles. Supplemental features on the DVD include six minutes of behind-the-scenes material comprised chiefly of EPK-produced interviews, as well as a 13-minute featurette that examines the work of originating Dutch filmmaker Van Gogh; the latter reveals that the American adaptation includes a plot twist born of a real-life taxi accident head bump from one of the movie’s Dutch producers. There’s also a full-length director’s commentary track from Buscemi, and it’s a pretty good chat, if also littered with a few spoilers. He talks about the spontaneity of production (they blocked sections, but not specific marks) and his preference for a sparse score from Evan Lurie. Make sure you’ve already seen the film before you indulge his remarks, though. B- (Movie) B (Disc)