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 peter biskind 'down and dirty pictures' interview
 to access audio and video on collective you need real player.The Easy Riders, Raging Bulls author takes on indie cinema. In his seminal tome, Easy Riders, Raging Bulls, Peter Biskind charted American cinema’s late 60s and 70s creative rebirth through an array of larger-than-life filmmakers – Hopper, Coppola, Scorsese. When he came to assess US indie cinema in the 90s, however, Biskind found his attention drawn primarily to two polar opposites: enigmatic Robert Redford and cavalier Harvey Weinstein (along with brother Bob). Redford’s Sundance festival and the Weinsteins’ distributor, Miramax, set the agenda for much of that decade’s indie boom – and bust.“I’d already written a piece for Premiere [magazine] on Sundance’s 10th anniversary,” says Biskind, who worked early on for the organization’s advisory board. “I’d uncovered a lot of scandalous information. Redford’s hypersensitive to any kind of criticism and got really upset. When I caught up to cover the 90s, I discovered many of the same problems in a different form.”  Robert Redford & Peter Biskind Biskind’s new book, Down And Dirty Pictures, puts the Sundance Kid firmly in the firing line, depicting him as an indecisive, underhand, often absent boss whose festival succeeds almost in spite of his behaviour. But Redford pales into insignificance alongside Miramax founders, the legendary Weinstein Brothers. Progressing from New York underdogs to Disney-backed Hollywood players, scenes of Harvey Scissorhands’ movie re-cutting and epic tantrums, reducing people from Uma Thurman to Todd Haynes to tears, fill page after page. “There’s certainly plenty of negative stories about the Weinsteins,” admits Biskind. “On the other hand, Harvey behaves badly a lot of the time and that’s a big part of the story. But he and Bob, along with other companies, really made this movement and I think I made that pretty clear.’  Sophia Coppla's Lost In Translation & Adam Sandler in Punch-Drunk Love As Miramax shifts focus from edgy low-budgeters like Clerks and Sex, Lies And Videotape to prestige Oscar baiters like Shakespeare In Love and Chocolat, Biskind discusses how the whole notion of independent filmmaking changed dramatically: “Miramax became, as it were, the Trojan Horse through which studio values came to permeate much of the indie scene.” It’s not all bad news, though. “One of Miramax’s legacies has been these ‘Indiewood’ hybrids,” offers Biskind. “PT Anderson and Sofia Coppola films with big Hollywood stars - the Bill Murrays, the Adam Sandlers - that no Hollywood studio in their right mind would make,” Not that Biskind’s keen to line up with either Redford or Weinstein any time soon. “It’s kind of like ‘Which door is the tiger behind?’” he sighs. “I’d just as soon not have either of them.”
Leigh Singer
Down And Dirty Pictures by Peter Biskind is out now, published by Bloomsbury.
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