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You get out of the cinema and youre like, Well, what didMolly fromMollys Gamereally look like?
or the same question aboutTonya fromI, Tonya, the director ofAmerican Animalstells Vulture.
You actually are constantly reminded that its real, Layton says.
They are real people, there are real consequences.
They rent movies KubricksThe Killing, the originalOceans 11 and use nicknames fromReservoir Dogs.
The music cues are Scorsese-adjacent.
The theatricality of it all is knowingly overdone.
Its intentionally, in the words of director Bart Layton, slick as fuck.
With a background in documentary filmmaking, Layton plannedAmerican Animals fusion of narrative and nonfiction from the start.
There were other questions, too: Could they have ever imagined that they would get away with it?
And if they did get away with it, what were they thinking they would do with the money?
At that point they were serving lengthy prison sentences.
I just began to write to each of them in prison and ask for some more information.
We began this strange kind of pen-pal relationship from prison.
What were they saying in these letters?They wrote about their different motivations, thewhyof it.
I fell in love with the story, but I also kind of fell in love with them.
Spencer, the character played byBarry Keoghan, he talked about wanting to become an artist.
or What story am I ever gonna have to tell?
or How am I ever gonna find a voice?
It was so extraordinary and appealing.
I thought,God,this is a real story about our time.
Theres a pressure to be exceptional, to be remarkable.
Did you ever think about or pinpoint when that changed, culturally?
I really felt that those ideas should come through seamlessly within the story itself, if that makes sense.
By any other definition, they are really successful.
They have nice houses, nice car in the driveway, food on the table.
That was the American dream, wasnt it?
But for these young men that isnt a definition of success.
Now the worst thing you could be is a loser.
The American dream isnt just for a great job and kids and a family and a nice house.
It is becoming more about reaching some sort of celebrity.
And then at the very end you get a handful of photographs of the real people.
Youre sort of playing along.
The balance of fiction to nonfiction was really brought about by finding a rhythm to that.
Theres much less of the nonfiction interruptions.
The movie gets slicker and glossier.
The camera movement changes.
The color palette changes.
It was going to be slick as fuck!
One thing hands off to another, then you get this precise dynamic sequence.
Someone always screws something up.
You hit a beat a little late, or the camera doesnt quite keep up with the action.
I think it was the 16th take that we got it.
The whole crew erupted in this huge cheer.
The other sequence I really loved was theReservoir Dogsscene.
Pink was so smart.
It was really important that the audience knew this wasnt me taking a great leap and artistic license.
They did do that.
They did really give themselves code names based on other movies.
Of course they did argue about who was Mr.
Pink, and all the rest of it.
Again, thats a point where you want the audience to realize that they really did do this.
He really just wanted to call Chas Mr.
Pink because he knew itd irk him?
Thats hilarious.He knew that it would wind him up, and thats what Warrens like.
He just likes to press peoples buttons.
I love the bit where he says, I was Mr. Yellow because I was always my moms sunshine.
Can you tell me about that?We bring up this idea in the movie of unreliable narrators.
And then asked him if this was how he remembered it?
Of course he said, Well not really.
How can you witness something and just ten minutes later youre completely misremembering it?
I think there are lot of things like that.
And I was like, That didnt happen to you.
That happened to me and I told you about it.
He had completely absorbed the story and misremembered it and kind of remembered it as happening to him.
He was convinced, but I was like, You werent even there!
He was like, Oh yeah.
But in his mind he had a memory of it.
He had put himself into the story, and I think that can happen a lot.
Yeah, how random is that?Okay.
Im going to Google that.
I want to go back to something you said earlier.
Thats a really good question, and amazingly not one that Ive been asked in all of these interviews.
Ive had this conversation with my little brother who is my half-brother.
Hes the same age that Spencer was, and weve had very different childhoods.
I guess I had a more, lets say, tumultuous one than he did.
I was like, I really dont think that is true, but then who knows?
I think there is something truthful about the need for you to have meaningful life experiences to draw from.
Its a question for actors as well.
But I do not think that you have to do something self-destructive to make it find that voice.
Thats where inspiration can come from.
So Im not sure I agree with his idea, but I do think he has a point.
This interview has been edited for clarity and flow.
