“A whole other level”: The only movie Michael Shannon watched “three times a week”
There are few actors with the emotional gravitas to completely steal a scene despite only appearing in it for a few seconds, a rare quality in a performer that is only embodied by the true greats.
It could be Emma Stone’s brief appearance in Eddington, which somehow adds a new dimension of weirdness to Ari Aster’s world, or the larger-than-life presence of Philip Seymour Hoffman in Almost Famous, but there are many films in which a supporting character has completely altered the tone.
While many spring to mind, perhaps Michael Shannon is the reigning king of cinematic subtlety, with a body of work that boasts nuanced and precise performances with the likes of William Friedkin, Jeff Nichols and Sidney Lumet. From his portrayal of a manic man convinced that he is being attacked by bugs to a corrupt real-estate broker, there is no story too complex or demanding for Shannon, with a deep love for cinema that has influenced his unconventional choices.
However, while he has predominantly worked in the medium of fictional storytelling, the actor described the one documentary that changed everything for him, perhaps leading him to his eventual collaboration with the greatest documentarian of all time.
The divide between documentary and narrative filmmaking has always been strong, with some artists remaining firmly in one camp and insisting that their chosen medium is the best. But while Shannon is known for his work in films like Knives Out and Revolutionary Road, the actor found himself smitten by one documentary that altered his perception of the medium.
Crumb, directed by Terry Zwigoff, follows the life and career of the infamous cartoon artist Robert Crumb, journeying through his personal life and the depths of his mind through interviews with those who knew him. It is a huge feat, with an enormous amount of material and detail to explain the eccentricities of a man who was clearly very complicated, growing more and more twisted as we learn more about his inner world.
When describing the film, Shannon said, “It’s a documentary, but I remember liking Crumb a whole lot. When Crumb came out, I would go and see it like three times a week; I would be bringing different people to see it. I’d seen a couple of documentaries before, from Errol Morris or whatever, but that, I mean that one took it to a whole other level as far as I was concerned. I just thought it was the most interesting family I’d ever seen in a movie, really.”
It’s the type of film that is not for the faint of heart, with an often brutal and hard-to-watch insight into this man’s life that will make you wonder how people like this even exist. But regardless, it is a fascinating watch, and one that reveals a lot about the hidden depths that some artists carry and infuse into their work.
Perhaps his experience watching Crumb sparked a wider fascination with the medium. Shannon later worked with the great Werner Herzog on one of his few fictional films, Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call – New Orleans.
