At home in both Warsaw and NYC, Paradox Lake's director takes a peek inside the human mind - Discovery: Przemyslaw Shemie Reut - Brief Article

Film Comment, March-April, 2002 by Chris Chang

A few months ago I had the unnerving experience of sitting in a neurologist's office for a consultation. To put me at ease, Dr. Glenn Luciano made friendly chitchat, and asked what I did for a living. When I said I worked at a film magazine, his face lit up, and he told me about his role, playing a neurologist, for a Polish director whose name he couldn't spell. The film, he explained, was a quasi-documentary set at a camp for autistic children, also playing themselves. The doctor wrote the title down like a prescription and handed it to me. Weeks later the note was still tucked away in my wallet when a colleague called from Sundance to announce, "I have finally found a film with a pulse." He started to summarize: Polish director, documentary style, autism, etc., and a sequence of bells went off in my head.

Paradox Lake is Przemyslaw Shemie Reut's second feature. The story involves Matt Wolff, a young man disenchanted with his comfortable material life in New York City. He opts for a radical lifestyle change by volunteering to work with autistic kids at a special camp upstate. There he meets Jessica, a highly imaginative 12-year-old, who apparently occupies a playful fantasy universe. She continually restages scenarios from her favorite stories with small plastic toys. She fascinates Matt. He's under the impression that although she can't speak, she's attempting to communicate by alternate means. As things progress there are hints suggesting Matt himself may not have a clean bill of mental health, and the film climaxes in a hallucinatory maelstrom combining hardcore medical imagery with animated psychedelia.

"I was doing research for a different story and I came across the word autism," says Reut. "I knew it was a disability but I had no idea of what kind. The definition was something like, `Enchantment in fantasy as escape from reality.' That's something that applies to many people, including me. I mean, isn't it a perfect definition for filmmaking?"

Reut studied journalism at Warsaw University, and went on to get a degree in film from the School of Visual Arts in New York City. His first feature, Close Up--made at SVA--premiered at the London Film Festival in 1996. He then interned at Good Machine, where he learned the survival tactics of an urban independent: "It runs like a good machine! Tight budgets, freedom to directors, smart casting, great sales arm. The producer Anthony Bregman was very helpful. He taught me equity funding, foreign presales, and how to read and write contracts. With private funding and a presale in Poland I had the freedom I needed to make Paradox Lake. New York City is the best town to make indies."

The Warsaw/NYC axis is a crucial component for the way Reut gets things done. "The final stages of post-production took place in Poland. The average monthly wage there is about $200. It's much cheaper to do a lot of things like soundtrack work, animation, etc." The multiple formats that went into the film include MRIs, endoscopy, CG, graphics, mini DV, Super 8, Super 16 (about 75 percent of the film), and 35 mm. "Using different formats was dictated by necessity. It would take thousands of feet of film to get what we wanted. We could shoot Jessica for hours before she did anything. In a situation like that, video is the right tool. It's also less obtrusive than a big film camera with its noise and long lenses. With video I could be right there and the kids could be with me, comfortable and natural."

All but four of the people in Reut's film are playing themselves. Actor Matt Wolf is, in fact, Matt Wolff. He and costar Phe Caplan underwent the standard training procedure prescribed by the camp. (Reut took the same course one year earlier.) "It was a one-day training session," says Wolff. "We watched a video of the camp, discussed what our days would be like, and they explained some of the problems we would face, and the potential for violence. We then went into a room with gym mats and we learned a few self-defense moves. Handholds and wrist holds and things like that. I think Reut was bitten by a camper his first year." While they went about their actual counselor duties, scenes were improvised to conform to the plot of the movie. Before filming began, an understandably tricky permission process took place. "I sent letters to the parents of the kids," says Reut, "explaining the idea to show autism as it really is. Ninety percent gave their permission. The fact that I previously worked at the camp helped a great deal. I wasn't seen as an `outsider.' I never filmed anything that would be embarrassing." Once the campers saw the crew was not threatening, they opened up and started to have fun with the whole process. Some of the counselors and staff were suspicious at first, but as their interest grew, trepidation dwindled.

The variety of behavioral states labeled "autistic" has been likened to the colors of a rainbow. And it's easy to see the variety of formats Reut uses as mirroring the shades of different mentalities. I suggested to him a continuum in which mental clarity existed at one end, and madness at the other. "I wouldn't call it madness. I'd call it ambiguity. Ambiguity in the sense that at one end we understand, and at the other, we don't, and we don't know what causes or what cures it. The brain, not the heart, is the most important part of us. It is our biggest mystery." And the mystery of ambiguity cuts to the core of Paradox Lake. As Wolff's brain is subjected to the physical torment dictated by the plot, the film brilliantly displays a visual analog of mental calamity: as he "loses it," viewers become unsure of what they are watching. When you ask people who've seen it, there's much confusion as to what actually happens in the end. Is Jessica alive? Is Matt alive? In fact, during filming, Wolff himself wasn't sure exactly where the director was taking him. But when he was asked if he wanted to sit in on the brain surgery session, things started to fall into place. "When I was in the operating room I had a pretty strong impression my character was headed for some rough times," says Wolff. (The surgery sequences were filmed at the NYU Medical Center under the supervision of Dr. Luciano.)