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The feature-length How’s Your News?
I received the news of the expansion of Arthur Bradford’s button-pushing short How’s Your News? to feature length with luke-warm feelings. Frankly, I hadn’t thought that much of the original. For those of you who missed it, it involved various scenes of severely disabled people sticking microphones into the faces of passersby, people who were often freaked out by the How’s Your Newsteam’s appearance. I suppose it was kind of an intriguing gag, forcing us to face the fact that we have a lot of deeply held attitudes towards disabled people, but I didn’t find it all that funny or cool, despite the fact that the film had been coproduced by the creative team behind South Park. But a funny thing happened on the way to becoming feature length. How’s Your News? got a heart. Really. Now the film is far less centred on how average Joes and Janes are shocked by the appearances of the How’s Your News? crew, and is more focused on the gang themselves. The film has transformed from what seemed a crude joke into a poignant and full portrait of these folks. They emerge as resilient, funny, sharp and decidedly human-less a cheap gag than dimensional people. “I totally agree,” says director Arthur Bradford. “The first short version and the new feature version are entirely different films. Basically, we learned from our mistakes. We wanted to get away from the sense that this was simply a practical joke-which was what some people thought.”
After
playing at Comedia two weekends ago-the original short version debuted
at Fantasia two years ago-How’s Your News? will now begin a two-week
run at the Parc this Friday. And this is an unprecedented run for a
film that’s been restricted to festival audiences (and a couple
of U.S. cable-TV airings) so far. Bradford says he feels the Montreal
repertory run is fitting, considering how the city’s audiences
have embraced the film. “A lot of film fests rejected this film.
A lot were afraid of showing it. I really appreciated the fests here
for showing it. A lot of fests don’t want to offend anyone. And
that’s an attitude I have a problem with: I’m always eager
to talk to anyone who’s deeply offended by this movie. There’s
a certain subtext to people saying these people shouldn’t be on
film.” Interestingly enough, song played a big part in the initial inspiration for the original film. Bradford, who’s been working with the disabled for years, has spent his last 10 summers working at Camp Jabberwocky, a retreat for people with disabilities. “Every summer we put on a musical show at the camp. And every summer I would direct it. It was extremely good training for making this movie.”
As well, when Bradford started work at the camp he was an aspiring videographer. He’d bring his camera to camp and get the attendees to interview one another, something he found they loved doing. After making a promotional doc about the camp, the film somehow found its way into the hands of a pre-South Park Matt Stone and Trey Parker. They phoned Bradford up immediately and offered some seed money, which allowed the director to buy a van for their cross-country travel and some new video equipment. The How’s Your Newsteam was on the road. Bradford says a big part of the challenge of making How’s Your News? was simply keeping things fun. “It’s always hard to make a documentary. My brain was in overdrive most of the time. It wouldn’t have been a fun movie if it hadn’t been a fun trip.” The crew certainly look like they’re having fun, as they interview people on the street, actually engage in a celebrity interview with Vince van Patten (once famous as the Bionic Boy, he actually takes the possibility of gaining some publicity very, very seriously) and even attempt to interview animals at the zoo. Odd,
it is, but because it involves a road trip across America, Bradford
says European festival audiences have found the film even more exotic
and fascinating. “I was really surprised in Amsterdam. It’s
been much better received over there than in America. They find more
depth in the movie-they see it as commenting on America and Americans
as a whole.” : How’s Your News? opens Friday, July 26 at the Cinéma du Parc >> Movie Listings |
by
MATTHEW HAYS