Valeria Golino began her career in the movies almost by chance after her uncle received a call from Lina Wertmüller saying she needed to cast a young woman in “A Joke of Destiny”. The young Valeria got the part and quit her modeling career to work in the movies. Her gamble paid off and a mere three years later she won the Best Actress award at the Venice Film Festival for her performance in “A Love Story”. With her vibrant personality, haunting beauty and her ability to convey earthy characters, she became one of the most beloved faces in Italian cinema. In 2010, she directed a short film called “Armandino e il Madre” for which she won the prestigious Silver Ribbon award for Best Debut Short Film.
In 2013 she released her first feature length as director, the evocatively titled “Honey”, which tells the story of the title young woman (played by a sensational Jasmine Trinca) who dedicates her life to helping people achieve peace through assisted suicide. We see her travel to Mexico to obtain drugs and then guide her clients through the tough process. Honey doesn’t allow herself to become attached to these people, until she meets Carlo (Carlo Cecchi) an older gentleman who challenges her worldview. The film premiered during last year’s Cannes Film Festival, where it won the Prize of the Ecumenical Jury.
On the eve of its American release, we sat down with director Golino and leading lady Trinca, to discuss the film’s themes, why this movie needed to be made and how actors are very much like cats...
SB: Why direct this movie now? What about the story said “I have to direct this”?
Valeria: When I decided to do this story, I had just finished my first film as a director which was a short and I was editing it. I wasn’t really planning to direct right away, but I read the book, and I thought the idea of this book was so poignant, so cinematic that I started imagining it. My first instinct was “this is a great role for a woman, maybe I can play it”. And then the more I thought about it, the more I thought “I wanna do this movie, I don’t want to be part of this movie” and at that point I decided not to cast myself and I started looking for my muse…
I thought two reasons: first of all that theme. There is an urgency in Europe and in Italy - being a Catholic country and the way we’ve been these past twenty years living under a very conservative mood - that to talk about these things, talk about death even...I thought the theme and the way I could treat it...I thought “this movie has to be done”. I knew it would be hard, I knew nobody wanted to produce it - that’s why my boyfriend and my best friend produced it - because in Italy unless you have a comedy in your hands you won’t get financed…
SB: So were you advised not to do it at some point?
Valeria: No…
SB: What about you Jasmine?
Jasmine: (laughs) No…
SB: Cause the truth is I kept thinking, this movie must’ve been so hard to make in Italy. They’ll want to burn these poor women…
Valeria: But no, let me tell you something. Unfortunately it’s not even that, I wish it was that, twenty years ago when Bernardo Bertolucci did “Last Tango in Paris” people were screaming and saying “go to hell!”. But this is not about morality any more, it’s about market.
SB: Wow!
Valeria: I wish somebody had said something about this, at least then it would’ve started a real conversation about who’s right and who’s wrong. But it’s all about the market, who’s going to see this movie and who’s not. Ideology has gone to sleep, nobody cares.
SB: That’s even sadder than I thought…
Valeria: Yes, sadder and dangerous…
SB: Jasmine, watching you in the film I kept asking myself how you had approached this character too. Did you justify her actions in your mind, did you create a backstory for her?
Jasmine: I was very, very lucky cause I met Valeria - and I’m not saying this just because she’s here (laughs) - but it’s not usual in Italy to find a female role like this and I was lucky because it was a wonderful part. Very well written, it had something to say and also Valeria knows exactly what to say, how to direct me, because she’s an actress. But the most important thing is that we were in a real connection during the movie. I think it’s because she knows something about me. I used to do very useless roles…
Valeria: Not useless, you’ve worked with very big directors…
Jasmine: Yes, but my roles were there to explain men.
Valeria: As it often happens with female roles…
Jasmine: But Valeria understood something, when we met. I think she understood something behind my “angel face” (laughs)
Valeria: Jasmine went through many changes in her private life and in a way I feel like I happened to her while all of this was happening. It’s strange what happens, in the movies once in a while you have these encounters…
Jasmine: ...that change something.
Valeria: I was lucky to find a woman who was in a completely transformative moment in her life. I feel we were both lucky, because I gave her the right role and she gave me what I needed. I saw many other actresses, and I hate doing screen tests, but at the same time I did so many to so many actresses that I didn’t want to do any more. I saw all the important actresses of her generation but Jasmine was always my first choice, my first dream...yet I did everything I could not to get her...and then I ended up back with her. This also happened with my leading actor Carlo Cecchi…I thought of a thousand reasons not to get him. This is why I always say the following, which might sound precious but it’s true: that sometimes actors are like cats and they choose you, they come to you. You don’t choose them, they come to your house, they sit there and Jasmine and Carlo did the same thing, they entered my mind and just sat there.
SB: Now that you mention Carlo, in a way the movie is a love story…
Valeria: it is definitely!
SB: I wonder how you both achieved to create that chemistry...because I found it to be adorable.
Jasmine: Valeria told me, this is not at all the relationship between a father and a daughter and this was clear during the movie. In a way I fell in love with Carlo, there were moments when I was in love but Carlo can be very tough.
Valeria: What you see in the movie was easy, he’s very smart but he can also be very reluctant, his first reaction to everything is “no”. So I had to break that thing to have him do the movie, which he was very happy to do.
Jasmine: He was tough…
Valeria: But Jasmine was patient…
Jasmine: I think in the story through this relationship between the girl and the misanthrope, Honey becomes human. Because she has lots of shallow relationships, but it’s only with him that she becomes human.
SB: Right, and the movie also reminded me of a spy film...we see Honey getting missions and then lie to people.
Valeria: I’m glad you see that because I wanted to mix genres instead of making it a monolithic thing…”this is about euthanasia”, so I wanted to set up the mystery first and then turn it into something of a romantic comedy. These structural changes make the movie interesting.
SB: Was it difficult to achieve this tone?
Valeria: Let me tell you how much sleep I lost making this movie…(laughs) besides having all the pressure about this being my first movie, to me it wasn’t about directing Honey, it was about becoming her. Working with the actors and deciding where to put the lights and everything was a pleasure...but the tone of the movie took my sleep away. I changed character during this movie, I was so worried about making this too sentimental or moralistic or taking death as a spectacle...everything was a trap on the tone of the movie. Finally I am glad with what I did, but for like a year I was going insane…(laughs) I didn’t want to teach anyone anything, what you see, you see without judgment, showing empathy. It’s essential to focus on the conversations between the characters because you realize that neither of them are right or wrong.
SB: Something else that caught my attention was it doesn’t look like the film of a first time director. From the opening scene, in which we see Honey go into the ocean and then you have this brilliant sound mix, every choice is so spot on that you feel like “there’s no way this is her first time doing this”...
Valeria: The thing is, imagine how long I have been doing this job...since I was 17. I’ve been doing this for 30 years and I’ve been learning and unlearning. I’ve done 80 movies. Also, I love movies, I’m a cinephile and by now I have a definite aesthetic taste. You can also see how much I was in love with her during the movie…
(Jasmine blushes and giggles)
SB: right, she’s in every scene of the film.
Valeria: the way I film her is the way I would want someone to film me…
SB: Before I go, has anyone told you how similar you look now?
Valeria: Yes, some people have said it...
SB: After I watched the movie I felt it was some sort of Ingmar Bergman situation…
Valeria: Where we become the same!
SB: Jasmine after watching Valeria, would you like to direct a film as well?
Jasmine: I would love to but I don’t have the same glance as Valeria. When she takes a picture you know it’s her.
Valeria: and you have yours…
Jasmine: not yet…
Valeria: ...you’ll see, at 30 you don’t have the same world view but I think you should do it sooner...because I waited until 45 and now I’m thinking “what did I do all this time?”. Now, I’m like “how much time do I have?”.
Jasmine: I’d love to give something back to you though…
Valeria: You can direct me!
"Honey" opens in theaters in New York City on March 7, 2014.
