Two-time Oscar winner Alexander Payne (“The Holdovers”) teased the upcoming sequel to his beloved black comedy “Election” on Sunday in Sarajevo while expressing his desire to delve into the genre, sharing more details about an upcoming Western while also expressing his hopes of “making a good car chase movie.”
Payne, who will appear at the Sarajevo Film Festival to receive a lifetime achievement award, gave an update on the expected sequel to his adaptation of Tom Perrotta's 1999 novel, starring Reese Witherspoon as Tracy Flick, a tough-as-nails ambitious woman.
Paramount is reportedly developing a sequel for the Paramount+ streaming service, titled Tracy Flick Can't Win, based on Perrotta's next novel, which was published in 2022, with Witherspoon reprising her iconic role and Pine set to direct.
“There’s talk going on right now. Jim Taylor and I are thinking about it right now,” Payne said Sunday, describing conversations with his old colleague, who also attended. “If there were to be a sequel to ‘Election,’ what would it look like?”
The Oscar winner also opened up about an upcoming Western he's working on with “The Holdovers” writer David Hemmingson, citing Anthony Mann (“Winchester '73”) as an influence while keeping plot details under wraps.
“It would be great to take a realistic/naturalistic approach to Westerns, while also using landscape, as much as the sense of place is important in the films I make,” he said. “Having a more dramatic and stylized interaction between character and landscape is really interesting.”
Speaking to a packed crowd at the Bosnian Cultural Center in Sarajevo, the Nebraska native also expressed his desire to “make a good car chase movie, like Bullitt,” the iconic 1968 action thriller directed by Peter Yates and starring Steve McQueen.
“I just watched a great French film shot in Athens in 1971, starring Jean-Paul Belmondo and Omar Sharif, directed by Henri Verneuil. ‘The Thieves’.”The box“Awesome car chase. And Vanishing Point, a masterpiece. I want to do a car chase. I also want to do a detective movie.”
Payne's eight films have been nominated for 24 Academy Awards, including four for Best Picture and three for Best Director. He has won Best Adapted Screenplay twice, and “The Holdovers” won Best Supporting Actress this year. His other films include “Citizen Ruth” (1996), “Election” (1999), “About Schmidt” (2002), “The Descendants” (2011), “Nebraska” (2013), and “Downsizing” (2017).
On Saturday evening, Payne received the Heart of Sarajevo Honorary Award and hosted a special screening of his 2004 Oscar-winning film “Sideways,” returning 20 years after the film premiered at the Bosnian festival.
Asked about his relationship with that film's star, Paul Giamatti, who reteamed with Pine in a critically acclaimed performance in “The Holdovers,” the director cited famous screen partnerships, such as Bergman von Sydow and Fellini Mastroianni, as examples of relationships he tries to pursue as a director.
“They had such good chemistry, they understood, instinctively, together, what kind of film they were making,” he said. “I wanted to have that kind of relationship with an actor or actress, but I didn’t. Because every script I did was completely different, one from the other. I was jealous of these directors who had long-term relationships with one actor.
“I liked Giamatti quite a bit,” he continued, drawing laughter from the audience. “I liked him a lot,” he admitted. “And after working with him twenty years ago on Sideways, which was screened here in Sarajevo in 2005, we wanted to work together again. And because I don’t make films as much as I would like, I haven’t had much opportunity to give him something.”
Payne gave a special screening of “Sideways” in Sarajevo.
Everett Group
One missed opportunity was “Downsizing,” the director’s 2017 sci-fi comedy about humans being miniaturized to save the planet, which was originally conceived with Giamatti in the lead role. “It was hard to get financing with him in the lead role, because it was such an expensive movie,” Pine said. The role eventually went to Matt Damon, though the film still flopped at the box office.
The director insisted that deliberately keeping his films' budgets low was a way to avoid interference from his financiers.
“I want low budgets. Freedom lies in low budgets,” he said. “The more expensive a film is anywhere in the world, the more nervous the people who control the money will be and will try to influence you. And even if you are strong and able to resist their influence, they will still sneak up on you.
“You don’t want anyone talking to you while you’re making a movie—especially people who are only thinking about money. And the way you do that is by deliberately keeping your costs low,” he continued. “I want low budgets. I don’t want anyone thinking about what I’m doing. Stanley Kubrick, same thing. He kept his budgets low so people would leave him alone.”
When asked about the secret to his long-standing career, Payne described his creative process as “all feelings and instincts – feeling your way in the dark, moment by moment.”
“I put my ass on the floor and started writing. You just have to keep writing,” he said. “I just finished The Holdovers and I’m on a trip now, and people say, ‘Oh, do you have a new project?’ A new project? I didn’t put my ass on the floor to write a screenplay. You have to put in five or ten thousand hours writing. Without a chair, there’s no movie.”
The Sarajevo Film Festival takes place from August 16 to 23.
