Who will love the outsider artist at a time when even the hippest among us turn to Beyoncé for a birthday party dance mix? These days, polished, produced, mainstream music seems to have taken over. But the new film Frank, inspired by Jon Ronson's memoir about outsider musician FRANK SIDEBOTTOM, follows a motley crew of musicians, the Soronprfbs, as they retreat into the woods to make an experimental and aggressively unlikeable album. It’s a parody, but it's telling that the press conference for the movie this week included only a handful of reporters. “Thanks for the great turn out,” Maggie Gyllenhaal said jokingly as she entered the near-empty room.
In the film, the band eventually scores a spot at SXSW because of a social media-savvy but largely untalented keyboardist and recent addition to the group. He urges the group to write a catchy sell-out hit and, as a result, the band disintegrates. Michael Fassbender––under a papier-mache mask––plays the tortured artistic genius, Frank. The wide-eyed mask was a Frank Sidebottom signature, but Frank's character in the movie is a patchwork of different outsider artists from Captain Beefheart to Daniel Johnston.
Maggie Gyllenhaal plays Clara, a slightly psychotic theremin player with a penchant for drama and repulsion of anything mainstream. By the way, a theremin is an instrument that can be played without physical contact, by moving your hands like a spooky magician and altering sound wave frequencies. At one point in the movie Clara actually shrieks, “Stay away from my fucking theremin!"
OC asked Maggie about the story behind Clara's costumes, which range from starlet sunglasses to a Russian fur hat to a silk slip. “We thought at one point maybe she’d be an electronic music person with no style, you know, like a ponytail and sweatpants. And then we thought, no, let’s make her have style because why not! Clara thought she was in a French New Wave movie all the time, except she’s in a cabin in Wicklow. She’s like a very dirty character in a Goddard movie.”
There was once a time when the “very dirty” struggling, stay-away-from-my-fucking-theramin kind of artist held a certain romantic aura. For good or bad, it seems we now trust success as an artistic indicator, which makes Frank all the more interesting to watch. It's a strange, poignant comedy about alienation, not just of outsider musicians but of all people. “Normal faces are weird too,” Frank says from behind his big mask. “I mean what are eyes, they’re like science fiction movies.”
Frank opens in NYC theaters on August 15
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Maggie Gyllenhaal, Michael Fassbender, and Domhnall Gleeson. Photo courtesy of Magnolia Pictures.
In the film, the band eventually scores a spot at SXSW because of a social media-savvy but largely untalented keyboardist and recent addition to the group. He urges the group to write a catchy sell-out hit and, as a result, the band disintegrates. Michael Fassbender––under a papier-mache mask––plays the tortured artistic genius, Frank. The wide-eyed mask was a Frank Sidebottom signature, but Frank's character in the movie is a patchwork of different outsider artists from Captain Beefheart to Daniel Johnston.
Maggie Gyllenhaal plays Clara, a slightly psychotic theremin player with a penchant for drama and repulsion of anything mainstream. By the way, a theremin is an instrument that can be played without physical contact, by moving your hands like a spooky magician and altering sound wave frequencies. At one point in the movie Clara actually shrieks, “Stay away from my fucking theremin!"
OC asked Maggie about the story behind Clara's costumes, which range from starlet sunglasses to a Russian fur hat to a silk slip. “We thought at one point maybe she’d be an electronic music person with no style, you know, like a ponytail and sweatpants. And then we thought, no, let’s make her have style because why not! Clara thought she was in a French New Wave movie all the time, except she’s in a cabin in Wicklow. She’s like a very dirty character in a Goddard movie.”
There was once a time when the “very dirty” struggling, stay-away-from-my-fucking-theramin kind of artist held a certain romantic aura. For good or bad, it seems we now trust success as an artistic indicator, which makes Frank all the more interesting to watch. It's a strange, poignant comedy about alienation, not just of outsider musicians but of all people. “Normal faces are weird too,” Frank says from behind his big mask. “I mean what are eyes, they’re like science fiction movies.”
Frank opens in NYC theaters on August 15
Maggie Gyllenhaal, Michael Fassbender, and Domhnall Gleeson. Photo courtesy of Magnolia Pictures.