Lindsay Lohan and James Dean in The Canyons. a clumsy game of seduction and manipulation. The results are rated as ridiculously horrendous, with one early review saying that there is «ugliness and deadness» to the story. The birth of a cult classic.
The script will remind anyone affected by Idol, pop star The Weeknd's unsophisticated vanity project in which he drives his co-star Lily-Rose Depp crazy and who just tripped over the finish line on Sky Atlantic. . But the criticism of «ugliness and deadness» was made ten years ago. That was when the South by Southwest Film Festival rejected Paul Schrader's 2013 film The Canyons, a tale of lust, mind games and group sex that prefigured Idol in both its setting and its mesmerizing horror. As with The Weeknd's spectacular spectacle, Canyons audiences leaned forward in bewilderment: how could something so horrific be done?
Schroeder — famed Hollywood writer of the new wave of Raging Bull and Taxi Driver — may have wondered the same thing when he found himself naked in the middle of filming in front of a screaming Lindsay Lohan. Lohan, the A-list actress-turned-z-lister he somehow chose along with porn star James Dean, was erratic on set. But now she had an all-too-human case of cold feet when she was scheduled to film a «four-way» sex scene with Dean and two other porn actors.
She retreated into a closet and refused to come out. Schrader quickly undressed, hoping that the demonstration of vulnerability would calm her down. “Lince, I want you to be comfortable. Come on, let's do it, he pleaded. Lohan encountered a naked 66-year-old man, yelped, smiled and agreed to film this scene.
Her courage did not fully pay off. Reviews of the Canyons ranged from horrifying to vicious. «A depressing, unpleasant job,» wrote the New York Times. «The canyons are out of place and discouraging, and Lindsay Lohan is enough to make you cry,» the New Republic said. />
How do movies like «The Canyons» and «The Idol» get on the screen? In the case of Idol, the answer lies in the fact that The Weeknd and co-creator Sam Levinson, the creator of Euphoria, showed their star power and convinced HBO to green-light an erotic thriller that was both non-erotic and devoid of thrill.
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However, in the case of The Canyons, the script was more complex and rooted in an aborted shark film called Bait, on which Schrader worked with producer Braxton Pope and Bret Easton Ellis, a Generation X writer who devoted his career to diagnosing the sluggish void. modern America. Funding for Lure ended less than a month before filming began, and the trio decided to try something completely different: a super-low-budget thriller with explicit sex and tons of psychological manipulation. A film made «on the cheap that doesn't look cheap,» as Schroeder put it.
But even «a cheap thing that doesn't look cheap» is expensive in everyday money. Especially involving Lohan, whose party lifestyle made her uninsured, meaning no Hollywood studio would want to get involved.
Schroeder, Ellis, and Pope decided to take a walk, each putting in $30,000 of a $250,000 budget. The rest was collected through the Kickstarter crowdfunding platform, with backers promised perks such as cameos and the ability to read the script ahead of time.
Lindsay Lohan in The Canyons. Photo: Alamy
“It was a modern reaction to a broken old system,” Ellis said. “Paul Schrader and I had a film in the studio a month before filming began with a full cast, and the foreign money fell apart. Paul told me, “I'm ready to make a film. I'm ready to film right now. Just write the script — we can't have special effects or car chases… Set the drama in LA and we'll see what happens.» himself in the life of pop star Jocelyn (Depp), the Canyons don't have much history. Dean and Lohan are Christian and Tara, a jaded Hollywood couple (he makes low-budget horror films) in an open relationship.
But that relationship takes a turn for the worse after they become romantically involved with Christian's assistant Gina (Amanda Brooks) and her boyfriend Ryan (Glee's Nolan Funk). Old jealousies flare up, secrets are revealed — and Christian reveals a dark side that Tara has never seen before (a turn that foreshadowed the real scandals in Dean's life, as we will discover later).
Dean was the first all-star line-up to be defended by Ellis. “I was reading Fifty Shades of Gray at the time and was trying to get a job doing it,” said Ellis, who has grown tired of writing novels and moved to Los Angeles in hopes of pursuing a film career. “Parts of this book started to influence the script and I was thinking about actors with expiration dates. And I was thinking about James Dean… I became obsessed with him even before I started writing the script, and I realized that I was writing a character for him.”
Lindsay Lohan in the movie Canyons. Photo: Alamy
The actress has long since vanished into obscurity. But 10 years ago, he was that rare porn star whose fame went mainstream. He didn't look much like the stereotypical adult film actor: he was more lean than muscular, and exuded a thoughtful wistfulness.
«Dean is polite, self-deprecating and non-pornographic,» Pope wrote in Vanity Fair. “He does not use drugs or abuse alcohol and seems comfortable in his own skin. His background — parents with two scientists, one of whom worked in a jet propulsion lab — does not quite match our ideas about the origin of a porn star. , with whom Christian is having an affair (Ellis was against her choice, but, insisting on Dean, felt that he was not in a position to object). ). Schroeder and Pope sat down with her at the Chateau Marmont in Los Angeles. The meeting was memorialized more or less immediately after a New York Times reporter arranged to join.
Director Paul Schroeder and Lindsay Lohan on the set of Canyons. Photo: Alami
“We arrived first and ordered a drink. She arrived late, as we were promised … Lindsey announced that she wanted to star in the film, but there was a catch, ”recalled Pope. “She refused to play yoga instructor. She would only participate if she was in charge.”
Schroeder and Pope agreed to her request. Throughout his career, the director has worked with troubled stars. He felt he could handle Lohan. «We don't need to rescue her,» Schroeder said. «We just need her to survive three weeks in July.»
The fundraising campaign was a success. One supporter even lent his home in the Malibu hills for filming (anticipating The Idol, for which The Weeknd opened his Bel Air mansion as a backdrop).
Initially, Dean, not Lohan, behaved like a Hollywood pro. He was always on time and his lines were cold. Lohan was less reliable, especially after Lady Gaga temporarily moved into the Chateau Marmont and they began to spend all night together.
“If you planned things in the afternoon, there were no problems, but it would be more difficult if you called early in the morning. Lindsey is a very gifted and very talented performer, but there are certain aspects of her background that make life in general a challenge,” Pope told Little White Lies last year.
«Every time we filmed, the paparazzi chased her. I have an alley at home, and then the wall and the paparazzi jump over the wall. It was crazy. TMZ will contact the production people and try to get information about her.»
However, they got confused — until the «four-way» sex shoot, in which Lohan understandably went pale until Schroeder undressed. Lohan survived thanks to Schrader and the booze he thought she'd been snorting all day. After that, she jumped into her Porsche and drove home; Schroeder was worried that she might have an accident. (Lohan, who entered rehab shortly after filming The Canyons, later denied drinking alcohol during filming.)
Idol received scathing reviews, and The Canyons received a similar response. It was rejected by the Sundance and South By South West film festivals, the latter stating that it had «quality issues». Ellis expressed bewilderment. “I think the hate for the film is disproportionate to the film itself. And I don't know if Lindsay brings something to that. I don't know if casting James did anything or if I'm such a controversial figure.»
Bret Easton Ellis, James Dean, Paul Schroeder and Tenille Houston walk the red carpet for The Canyons at the 2013 Venice Film Festival. Photo: Alamy
The Canyons were a stunning flop, earning a measly $30,000 on their opening weekend in the US. But it turned out to be an important milestone for everyone involved. This was the beginning of a turning point in Schrader's life, who just four years later received the first Oscar nomination of his career for The First Reformers, in which Ethan Hawke played a morally unstable pastor. Lohan, too, has bounced back and launched a new career as a Netflix rom-com star (she recently wrapped filming at Irish Wish in Dublin).
But there's also Dean, whose next boy is Ellis' door softness caught a glimpse of malice. In late 2015, several women came forward with allegations of sexual harassment against him, including the rape of his ex-girlfriend. He denied the claim, but his career as an actor—porn or otherwise—is over.
The Canyons have a small cult following, but are largely forgotten. However, you can see his DNA in Idol, another half-hearted tale of sexual manipulation in the Hollywood hills. The key difference is that The Canyons was the work of an underground film industry of desperate people on the fringes of the film industry.
Idol, on the other hand, is created by people at the peak of their careers, who are supported by the most noisy broadcaster in the United States. Given the circumstances, the Canyons may have been destined to be terrible. Idol, on the other hand, was terrible by choice — and therefore lacks the underdog mischief that was the one thing The Canyons were aiming for.
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