David Fincher: "Platforms have whetted an appetite for different stories"

Ego, megalomania, mastery.

Three words that define the legend of Orson Welles,

Hollywood's

eternal

even when he died at 70 in 1985. At that time, David Fincher had only taken the camera to make music videos with Madonna, Michael Jackson ... or advertisements.

He hated publicity, but it opened the doors of Hollywood for him.

His career is also defined by those three words, given his attention to detail and the thirst for control of a 58-year-old Denver-born director who, like Welles, has garnered dozens of Oscar nominations for his films and no statuettes. for him.

He compares himself by saying that his

"was

from John Hughes' teen relationship movies."

Now he wants to clarify a small detail:

his new film, which premieres on Netflix, is not a feature film about Welles or the authorship of

.

"That was what my father [screenwriter of the film] proposed to me, but I was not interested in that posthumous arbitration," he makes clear as soon as the conversation begins.

“

does not speak of a dispute.

He talks about a man, a professional and the change his life took when he met a young genius ”, he explains.

• Who wrote 'Citizen Kane'?

• A Netflix movie, directed by Amazon and written by HBO

That man is Herman Mankiewicz, a journalist, theater critic and one of the New York intellectuals who made up the Algonquin group.

Mankiewicz discovered a career and fortune in Hollywood, although alcohol early drowned out his brilliant voice.

"As Billy Wilder said, in Hollywood they give you a pool and in return they take your soul," recalls Gary Oldman who plays Mankiewicz.

“There is something true in all this, but

does not intend to answer any questions.

I do not think that the cinema should give answers.

Unlike.

The cinema must ask the right questions and leave the audience thinking about the answer, ”sums up Fincher.

It is the only thing that this perfectionist, author of

or

leaves open.

In fact,

is the fruit of an obsession that began three decades ago, in rerun theaters where his father, the writer Jack Fincher, took him, and where he saw films such as

and, of course,

"There are no more of those, old cinemas to watch old movies," he recalls nostalgically.

That's why he went from the first script that his father presented to him, and from the second and third versions, while he was polishing it.

Then it was Hollywood that happened, because it is not easy to shoot a period film in black and white no matter how Fincher you are.

"It was as difficult as changing course to the

recalls.

Black and white story

In the end, the maneuver came out round of a carom.

It was closing — of its own accord — the door to

, a critically beloved series that never found its audience, and opening the perfect niche for

"I was tired," he apologizes for the television problems that led Netflix to ask him what he wanted to do next.

“I have a black and white story that is not even stereo, I told them.

And they answered me: 'Have you seen

?

Beyond

visual, narrative and interpretive achievements

what makes Fincher most proud of his latest work is that it is part of a revolution taking place on screens.

“We are in the middle of an interesting renaissance of the medium.

I have nothing against studios, but the war of digital platforms has whetted the appetite for telling many different kinds of stories.

It is a great moment to tell stories and I don't care if they are seen on a mobile phone ”, it is dispatched.

"Television is like the novel you read before bed.

You decide when to turn off the light.

A movie is a distilled experience, where even the dullest moments have been polished.

They are different disciplines, and as much as I am interested in Mankiewicz and his many Hollywood stories,

has a concise narrative, of two hours and eight minutes, and everything is concentrated there.

That is his universe ”.

Robert Downey Jr. described working with Fincher as as tough an experience as living in a gulag.

Fincher denies that fame.

“All the time I was telling them, less, less, less.

Give me something simpler.

Gene Hackman was a genius at playing people.

No more.

I was looking for the minimalism of Humphrey Bogart, Gary Cooper, the pre-Brando interpretation ”, he details.

Gary Oldman Naked

So minimal was his work with the actors that Gary Oldman was left naked, without makeup to resemble Mankiewicz.

Fincher is aware that his artistic requests can sound pretentious: the black and white (shot with digital cameras, although adding some dirt and stripes to the image to resemble old celluloid), the mono sound or a detailed Trish period costume Summerville, part of the director's regular team.

“I did not want to make a movie of now telling a story from then.

I wanted to make a film from that period, and we remember that time in black and white ”, he points out.

Past times with many connections to the new millennium, especially when he talks about the power of media conglomerates.

"When my father included that in the script I was not interested, but then the last elections came and it was very clear how the new social platforms can tip the balance."