How do you meet a legendary director like Brian De Palma and become his pal? As Noah Baumbach explains, you go to this birthday party. “I got loaded and hit on Brian, talking about his movies. I remember Brian at one point saying to me [incredulously] ‘Get To Know Your Rabbit‘?!’ — I mean, I was really overdoing it, trying to get my bonafides out there,” he told us last fall. “I woke up the next day after the party thinking like, well that was fun to have met Brian De Palma. But then Brian called me that day and he was like, ‘Let’s get together.’ He was so open.”
From there a friendship sparked, and now a documentary, with Baumbach teaming with his buddy Jake Paltrow to make a movie about De Palma, and a pretty damn good one at that. Here’s the official synopsis:
One of the most talented, influential, and iconoclastic filmmakers of all time, Brian De Palma’s career started in the 60s and has included such acclaimed and diverse films as Carrie, Dressed to Kill, Blow Out, Scarface, The Untouchables, Carlito’s Way, and Mission: Impossible. In this lively, illuminating and unexpectedly moving documentary, directors Noah Baumbach and Jake Paltrow engage in a personal and candid discussion with De Palma, exploring not only his life and work but also his singular approach to the craft of filmmaking and his remarkable experiences navigating the film business, from his early days as the bad boy of New Hollywood to his more recent years as a respected veteran of the field. In the end, what emerges is a funny, honest, and incisive portrait of a truly one-of-a-kind artist, and an exhilarating behind-the-scenes look at the last 50 years of the film industry through the eyes of someone who has truly seen it all.
“De Palma” opens on June 10th.
