If you are planning on seeing Sebastián Silva‘s Rotting in the Sun (in theaters Sept 8, on streaming the week after), you probably shouldn’t read this interview. If you aren’t planning on seeing Rotting in the Sun, you should read this interview. You see, Rotting in the Sun isn’t exactly quite what you think it is. The trailers show a lot of sex and nudity and a plot that involves Silva, playing himself, sad that he doesn’t have an idea for a new project – at least until he meets influencer Jordan Firstman at a beach resort in Mexico. This is not what he movie is about. Well, it kind of is, until it very much isn’t.
And that’s the dilemma with Rotting in the Sun: keep the surprises a secret, and maybe lose some audience members who would otherwise be interested. Or be honest about what the movie is about, but lose the element of surprise. When I saw Rotting in the Sun, it was recommended to me by a publicist back at Sundance in January who thought I’d like it. For the first act I was amused by the premise, but didn’t quite understand why it got such a high recommendation. And then the scene happens that completely upends the movie.
Here’s where we will get into that scene a bit. Again, you should stop reading now if you want to be completely surprised like I was.
Let’s just say there’s a freak accident and Silva (again, playing himself) is no longer in the movie. And Catalina Saavedra’s Vero, who witnesses this event, is in the country (Mexico) illegally and doesn’t want to get in any trouble, so decides to cover this whole thing up. So the movie is actually about this event, the cover-up, and Silva’s friends and business associates wondering what happened to him. (At one point, Jordan Firstman thinks he’s being ghosted and decides to try to cancel Silva.)
Personally, I found this movie fascinating. I can’t think of another film where a director plays the lead in his own movie and less than halfway through kills himself off. And what is Silva trying to say by doing that to himself? We did into all of that ahead.
How are you today?
I’m good. I’m a little tired because yesterday we ended up at The Box, out of all places. Man.
Oh yeah?
The Box. Have you heard about it? It’s like this club downtown.
I have.
But yeah, it was a great night, man. I lived in New York for so long that it feels like my hometown, so it was really nice to show it to such a big audience. It was a lot of people last night. It was so fun.
I’m curious, how does the audience react to that scene? I assume you know the one I’m talking about.
A lot of people covering their mouth. And it is funny how some people don’t accept it. It’s like 20 minutes after the fact and they were texting me, “Wait, are you dead?” I’m like, “Yeah, bitch. I’m like, wrapped in plastic. I’m totally dead.” But some people can have a hard time believing that that’s what happens to Sebastián in the movie.
Do you want people to know that happens or not?
You know what? I think the experience of the movie, it’s better if you don’t know. It’s so fun, because it is really surprising. But, again, I feel that at some point it’s going to be very hard. People, they won’t read anything if they don’t want to learn. So it did become one of those movies that are maybe easily spoilable? But I don’t want to think that because I don’t respect those movies so much.
This is a tough one because I’ve talked to people who didn’t have much interest in seeing this. They think it’s about an influencer. Then I tell them what the actual plot is and then they want to see it. I know two people who saw it only after I spoiled the twist. But they wouldn’t have seen it without doing that.
I hear you, man. I hear you. And it has been a little bit of an issue, for me even, because Jordan Furzman is a part of the movie. But because he’s an influencer… I think that my distributor movie should make sure that the movie is not perceived just as a horny gay movie with an influencer in it, because it is damaging.
People think that’s the plot, and it’s not at all the plot of the movie. I mean, it is at first, but then it’s very much not.
Yeah, I agree. And I don’t think that people need to know exactly what happens, but I think that if we were just giving more attention to Catalina, people at least will be intrigued. Then it’s like, “Oh, it’s Catalina Saavedra,” this older amazing actress from Chile. It is a crime mystery movie, half of it at least. Of course, I knew that the explicit sex was going to become the headline, which is sad, but also very predictable.
But I didn’t want to stop myself from it because… I don’t know, man. I did want to make a movie that felt fresh, even in that sense, where it’s like, come on guys, can we stop really showing just ass cracks and sides of boobs in movies? We all watch porn, everyone does, or a lot of people. Or people have genitals, they can see them in the mirrors. Genitals should not be so surprising. But there you go. They really still are.
I think what I’m going to do, I’m just going to put a warning at the beginning of this. If you don’t want to know anything about the movie, don’t read this. But I think I’m going to leave all the stuff in you say about what happens in the movie. I think people who might not be interested might be curious, “Well, what is this actually about?”
And to me, it’s really sort of highlighting the participation of Catalina Saavedra, which I think that honestly, if the movie starts getting good bump, she’s going to be nominated for awards.
Out of the blue she becomes the main character.
Yeah. Yeah, I know.
You do such a good job of not foreshadowing what happens to you at all.
Well, in Psycho, I think Janet Leigh dies in the exact same minute. Coincidentally, you know?
Even if you haven’t seen Psycho you kind of sense something is going to happen. She had just committed a crime.
You’re right. You’re right. But it has been done. It definitely has been done before.
Hitchcock also had it set up where you couldn’t come in late and posted warnings about it.
I didn’t know he was giving warnings before that. That’s amazing.
So she stole money. She’s on the run. There are these warnings. In your movie, you’re just trying to figure out your next movie and then you trip and fall off a building.
It’s such a good moment. I always enjoy that moment when you’re with an audience. That’s why it’s tricky. It’s like, do we want to spoil it? Should it be this important? It just makes the experience more fun. I don’t think that you’re disappointed with the movie if you know, but it just makes that part way more thrilling. That’s really it.
It is a weird balance of you kind of want to tell people, “Hey, something crazy happens. You might want to watch this.” But it’s more fun when you don’t think anything crazy is going to happen.
But I feel that if enough people watch the movie, they’ll go. Same as you did. It is like, fucking go watch it and you’ll see. I hope so.
I love the pitch meeting scene. Is that based on any actual experiences?
It’s very close, actually.
I’m assuming your ideas were heightened for the movie. One was about aliens who come to earth to rape men, with “a Twin Peaks vibe.”
Oh my God. You know what?
What’s that?
I have to be honest, that is actually real. Because there is this guy called David Huggins. I don’t remember who he was, but I think he has a little documentary called Love and Saucers and a little book called Love in the Alien Purgatory. And I had been fascinated with this weirdo from Jersey who says that he was abducted by aliens, and his stories were very sexual. So I don’t know if I ever pitched that really to a network or a producer like that, but it is something that I was interested in – aliens and abductions. But yeah, that’s kind of a real meeting that I’ve had. But those are the meetings, man.
What about the one about the virus that kills men?
Oh my God, that is real. That was told to me in the midst of the pandemic, which made it so much worse. They were developing that, and in the midst of COVID. So many people were dying and it was so somber and so scary. So they were sort of mixing feminism and a pandemic. It was so rotten. It was really rotten. So yeah, I had to put it in. Any rotten experience was going to go into this film, and that’s definitely one. To try to make a show about men dying, it’s terrible.
You’re told that would need to be directed by a woman.
It’s so explicitly passive-aggressive.
But they love the idea of you hanging out with an influencer.
That part, I feel for me, is the broadest comedy of the film, how they react to Jordan. It’s so ridiculous. They know his videos line by line, and they’re absolutely thrilled. It makes no sense.
After you’re not in the movie anymore, Jordan thinks he’s being ghosted and tries to cancel you. So your character is dead and now also being canceled.
Yeah. I love that. Jordan feels like he got ghosted. My character is sad about nothing. Just being completely fulfilled with everything and just being bored. I really have nothing to be sad about, really. And then Vero is the only one with a real problem. She has a corpse in the rooftop, hiding.
Before people get to the twist, were you worried people would think you’re being indulgent by casting yourself as yourself trying to come up with a movie idea?
And it is still. Well, not so much anymore. I moved on. I’m doing new things. But yeah, that was a concern, even writing it. I was like, “Should I put in myself?” I think I try to be clear that I’m making fun of myself in the beginning when I’m Googling myself.
Well, the pitch meeting’s very clear, too.
Yeah, exactly. You would expect that if somebody shows themselves Googling themselves, they’re making fun of themselves. So I guess that gives you a clue that it’s not a completely self-absorbed decision, but it is in a way. But it’s been my career in a way where it’s like, I just look around my life and pick stories from experiences that I’ve had. I did it in Nasty Baby. And now I did it again, and in the most explicit way. And back to your question, of course, I am. I’m a vain guy, and I don’t want anyone to think that I’m a self-absorbed mother fucker who has nothing else to think about but himself. But yeah, the fact that I kill myself in the movie, I guess sort of redeems that quality.
I truly can’t think of another example of a director casting himself in a movie as himself, and then killing himself off. Maybe it exists, but I can’t think of one.
I mean, it’s so specific.
What does that mean? Why’d you do that? What are you trying to say about yourself?
Yeah, exactly. Maybe I was saying, “You know what? This is the last movie. This is the last movie.” But it’s not.
Yeah, I don’t think it is.
I don’t think it is the last movie. But yeah, there is definitely a before and after. And I think also the fact that I’m killing that Sebastián. Because of course, I have some of those traits: self-deprecating or death wishy. Or, I don’t know, judgmental, withdrawn, a self-mortifying guy. I do have the qualities that the character in the movie has, but it was very satisfying to also kill that part of me and sort of become fully aware of the downsides of that personality. Or of those personality traits: the whining, self-deprecating Sebastián. And take all of that to its maximum sort of expression, and then destroy it. So there was something therapeutic about it, for sure. I can’t say I feel way better about myself and life after the movie, but a little better.
Well, that’s good. That’s something.
Step by step, right?
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