On Sunday James Franco presented his film Francophrenia in New York City. One of our contributors, Denise, was at the event and sent us a brief review and photos from the event which you can check out below:
I attended the North American premiere of Francophrenia (or, Don’t Kill Me, I Know Where the Baby is) at SVA Theater in NYC as part of Tribeca Film Festival. Going in, all I knew was that Franco was filmed behind the scenes while shooting his part on General Hospital over the last few years. On the soap he plays an artist/serial killer obsessed with one of the main characters on the show and also depicts murder in his art. Franco (his character) stages a huge exhibit at MOCA in L.A. and some scenes were filmed at MOCA. Francophrenia takes place during this time while filming at MOCA in 2010.
Before the film began, James and Ian Olds (director) spoke for a bit about what to expect. James said some will like it and some won’t. It takes some engagement. (He was right)
Here is a synopsis of the film:
It starts out showing James on his way to film at MOCA and getting his hair and make-up done. Then he goes out and meets the fans who have been waiting on the set and signs for everyone and takes pictures. As he gets closer to filming his scenes, the film shows actual scenes from GH not at MOCA, but these scenes are in a black & while inky sort of view. These various scenes are inter-cut during the entire film.
Once James films a scene where he falls off a balcony, you can see him start to have some sort of breakdown and a voice in his head starts speaking (not James’ voice, it was Ian’s voice) and takes over and suddenly he doesn’t know where he is or what he’s doing. He spends the rest of the film trying to figure things out and getting confused with his character. The weirdest part was when the symbols on the restroom started to talk and make comments about James and his state of mind.
After the film James, Ian Olds and Paul Felton (writer) came up on stage for a Q&A. They talked about the voice in James’ head being the “third level of Franconess” and how this interior monologue highlights the strangeness of the documentary. They wanted to repurpose and fictionalize the material and play off of James’ celebrity through the artificial narrative. Ian said ultimately it was a “deranged portrait of all of the labor behind a celebrity.” There were many scenes of James staring into space and he said this was done to cut out normal interaction. James said he sees raw material from a film like clay to make sculptures and he likes making the process of filming into the basis for another film.
All in all I thought it was pretty good. It was nice and weird, although maybe slightly self-indulgent.
