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Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu Roundtable
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 You really wanted an all-American icon in that part of the story, because you want see some guy, a real American hero, with the problems in the Muslim world. And I think it works really nice. But it won't hurt your movie either to have him written in.Alejandro González Iñárritu: No, I think, you know, I thought that there was a possible risk, you know, but that's why it excites me. Because it was a challenge to blend him in this unknown actors' world. And I felt that I was able and he was able to blend himself in this canvas. And people during the journey forgot about seeing Brad Pitt-not as the actor, but the human being. Then not only him, but that would see.
Because part of the bottom line of the film is about that. It's about framing this, you know. And I thought that that was a good way to go beyond the expectations of the people what kind of role the guy should play. You know, and I like the idea of normally he's playing an American hero; this time he's just a weak human being as the audience. And I like that idea. I like that idea. So, you know, I thought that was a good reason to try that.
It works out very good. This takes action. When you get from a dusty village, but it doesn't go anywhere, so that's a nice ending to the story. And then the face with the wrinkles, that was always in the script, that you had to…?
Alejandro González Iñárritu: No, no. No, no, I want him to be a little older, a little more ravaged.
How did you decide on the different cultures that the film should talk about? I mean, you could have gone to Black Africa, you could have gone to Europe. Why exactly these three or four countries?
Alejandro González Iñárritu: Well, you know, to make the story sense, and a country that American people normally go touristically, it's more Morocco - originally …. seeing it, than Tunisia. But then I changed it to Morocco because I went to Morocco when I was nineteen years old, the first time without any money at all. But I spent like 50 million lira and I was really shocked by it. And I thought Morocco was a more accurate place than an American …. And then Mexico by obvious reasons, and Japan I always wanted some occasion to shoot that incredible country. And I found it a very beautiful story to shoot that, you know. So.
Yeah? And Morocco because of the Islamic point?
Alejandro González Iñárritu: Yeah, because I would need to make that happen at about, you know, the kind of misunderstanding thing and the pressures of the American Government or a Muslim country, it has to be a Muslim … country.
Next time you could get Rashid Banal behind the wheel of a car, he gets into trouble!
Alejandro González Iñárritu: Never again! I will take out his licence. Whatever. No more cars!
But seriously, the scene at the border. I mean, that's a very tough scene, because, well, he has a point, but the border control guy has a point as well. I mean, so it's all…
Alejandro González Iñárritu: I like that, because it's not bland. It's not like `poor Mexicans and bad Ameicans'. It's complex. It's a way that immigrations and the borders are very complex, what is happening. Very, very complex. So. Yeah, but I agree, no more cars! It was difficult taking the shot. Cars … in chases, it's difficult.
Each culture has a different way to express itself. How did you direct all the different cultural, different actors?
Alejandro González Iñárritu: How… the story, or how - what's…?
 Unless ….the fact because you had to express something different in Japan, in Morocco or America.Alejandro González Iñárritu: Yeah, you know, it was for us, for me too, to observe and absorb and try to tell the stories from the point of view of the characters, you know, try to be in their shoes and not be telling the stories from the point of view as tourists, you know, or as a documentary, National [Geographic]. To do the things that attract me. Personally, I didn't shoot it, because that was my point of view and I didn't care.. I wanted what a Japanese girl will be really attracted to or what is important for these communities in Morocco, you know what I mean? I didn't want to shoot something fascinating, romanticised or `cool'. So in the same way I did to try to serve the cultures from that perspective and not like in curiosity or torrid way, you know. So I tried to do that.
How do you like working in Japan, for example, how did you research that part of the story? Because Japan is a very difficult culture to understand!
Alejandro González Iñárritu: Yeah. I think, you know, the bottom line is that I have been only three or four times before I shot the film, and the bottom line is it's a story about two different kinds of loneliness, and the sign language thing, and having to research a little bit that world. But the bottom line of the story is very a simple one about parents and children, and in this case it's about the parent, the daughter and the loneliness … in a human city. Which, you know, I try not to do many research, too much analysis, then it's paralysis?. And I'm scared of that. I want just to find out what really makes sense, you know what I mean?
Another thing: we might find something that is not the right …., then I go and research and look for what is really accurate. But it's very simple, everything. I didn't make up a film about the Japanese culture. It's about the human being. My form is the same as the Moroccans or whatever, so in a sense at the bottom line we are very similar.
Yeah, but you say that you want to show the culture from inside, which means that you have to be inside, or…
Alejandro González Iñárritu: Yeah, in a way. Because I mean, yeah, but it's not like, you know-I'm talking about that sometimes many films and directors get trapped…where you shoot the scene and that distracts you from what really the film is about. And I didn't want to do that, you know what I mean? So I mean, what I would say is that I was really rigorous to shoot only what was extremely necessarily dramatically for the story and I was not distracting all everywhere: “Look at the cow! Look at how funny they are! Look at that!” Yeah! Because then I end up in lost information. … which is accurate because that is from the point of view of tourism. It is the way we see things like that. But in this case it was exactly the same, so I didn't distract myself. I just concentrated on not going that way, all the time.
But the Japanese part of the story, I almost felt like I was watching a Japanese movie by a Japanese director. So it really was the inside view. Then again, the other three stories are more in … and that ….is a little more detailed from the central story. But it works in itself, because the girl is very good and you can just feel there's something to the naturalness etc. Do you feel in the same way that that story is a little more detached from the other stories?
Alejandro González Iñárritu: Completely. That was deliberate, yeah. The other three other ones are, not physically, but this is the first film that I do. There's four stories, not three. The four stories that are not physically common, you know. The other three…. perhaps there were physical connection of the characters. These ones, they are not connected, they never see each other. Which was difficult and it's an emotional connection, but practically. I mean, the Japanese, it's … extreme, and I wanted that because the other ones are related in some way, more closed and more obvious.
But this one is not obvious up to the point that it began to be obvious, but is like a real story, a perfume that exploding there. You know. It's an oriental perfume that goes through the film, which is very physical, and this one is very more metaphysical, I would say. It's not plot-driven at all; it's just character-driven and closed. And at the end you discover that it's the beginning of the story. The father was one…It's how he triggers. It was deliberated off-balance. Be not so obvious. This was what it was like. Add a little bit of mystery, you know, of Japan.
Like the mystery of the… Japanese film…! The word `trilogy' has been used with 21 Grams, and now this one. How deliberate is that? Is it a trilogy? Is that something that happens afterwards?
Alejandro González Iñárritu: No, no, no, I think that, you know, when I was starting 21 Grams I thought that - I had this idea when I was starting shooting 21 Grams. And I thought that would be a good way to explore parents' and children's stories in a lot of point of view and perspective in a foreign country as the United States, 21 Grams, and then in a global …. and see how that worked. So that was my idea. And that's why I called it…. Thematically they are basically the same, without carrying a lot of the scale or the size of the film with the stars work.
So it's a trilogy of parents and children, because it's been called `the trilogy of death', which was kind of difficult to understand! Because this isn't about death, this film.
Alejandro González Iñárritu: Who called them that? I don't know! I didn't do it! Many journalist today treat it as a … Somebody called it `the trilogy of death'. Where did that article appear, who wrote that?
I have it in here. I could ring you afterwards, yeah.
Alejandro González Iñárritu: Really? Who - which…?
I got it on the internet. I have no idea where it came from. That's interesting to know. But this is about life, it's not about death.
Alejandro González Iñárritu: That is what I said! This is a trilogy about death - about life rather than death! What a horrible name-`the trilogy of death'! I would not want to see those films.
So what is a trilogy of death…? So it's a trilogy of parents and children on a greater scale every time?
Alejandro González Iñárritu: Yeah, in different scales and different perspectives.
What could be the next…?
Alejandro González Iñárritu: Global, you know… Mars! No, no, it's over, I think. It's the end. This is the end.
But you do have plans for the next movie? And will it be more on a small scale or on a larger scale…?
Alejandro González Iñárritu: Yeah, I don't care what the scale is. For me, you know, really it doesn't matter what the scale is. No, my big plan now is to have time to do nothing. That's my big challenge that I have in front of me. I want to really rest a little bit. And I'm working on some project that will take me a lot. It was very complicated.
And maybe see a different culture again to inspire you?
Alejandro González Iñárritu: Umm, there are some thematics, some themes that are part of me. From another period.
Are you still with Guillermo Arriaga?
Alejandro González Iñárritu: No, this one I have been working two years with another friend of mine.
Just came from the film … Are they more personal from you or from him?
Alejandro González Iñárritu: I will say that it's, you know, doing a film like this is - you know, the film is done in stages. And the first stage is the script, which, you know. I invite him to make this film with me because I heard him say yes, he liked it. Yeah, he started writing and it happened. After he started writing, it's an interminable interchange of ideas, which at the same time I think we put together a lot and he write it. But then after that, you know, once the script is there, which is the first stage, you go to production, and then you're hunting, you plan whatever you want. In a film like that a lot of things change. And so I have to be writing and adjusting…
But I will say that, you know, thematically it's personal. At the end, every film is still personal. Not that I would not do - you know. It's an extension of yourself, at the end, want it or not. Because it ends up transforming yourself and you end up transforming the film, in a way. And all these themes that I explore here, they all of them are really close to me. Those themes which you really like, and especially the one of the immigration: you know, the Amelia thing of living in LA, having to go through all these stories which are terrible. A really good example. That was some kind of ….
Was there again 36 versions of the script and what is better for the… Did it fall into place?
Alejandro González Iñárritu: No, I think that was, I think, maybe twenty! I don't know how he ever survived me! It's a thing. But I think, yeah, but it wasn't as much as ….
Did the[newspaper change during the shooting, or…?
Alejandro González Iñárritu: A little bit, yes. Yes.
The shooting was over a year! I mean, that's big…!
Alejandro González Iñárritu: Yeah, yeah. And you have to be adapting, you know, in the limitations of the vernaculars and the cultures and the dialogues and things. We changed a lot of dialogue and a lot of things. And then in the editing. Normally it's done like this always, it's a kind of formative process. Which is great. I mean, a lot of things happen by accident sometimes.
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Destination London 
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