There are a lot of Mexican characters who I assume are played by non-actors in the film. I love this blend where you’ve got Chris Cooper, who’s one of the best actors, and some of the other big hitters, but then you have them interspersed with people who I suspect are members of the public or people that they found. So the acting styles are totally different but it makes a really nice effect. It makes me think a little bit of Ken Loach’s Sorry, I Missed You. In that film, people are at different levels of technical ability with their acting but it’s just a lovely effect when you realise what you’re watching is a documentary of the making of the film. Lone Star has that quality too.
I also like the confidence to use the same technique throughout the film to go from the past to present. And also just to have a film as genuinely subversive and surprising about the nature of love and family ties. Throughout the run time, it surprises you in a big way, four or five times, but not in a twisty way, it’s not cheap or anything, but every turn of the story has an emotional punch in there. And there’s no easy answer, which I suppose is something that you could say about any family. Maybe it ties in a little bit with Onibaba too, the kind of shadow of the parent and how we’re all pulled in two different directions: one to fill our parents’ shoes but then other to run as far away as possible from those shoes.
