It makes sense that Joel Potrykus has remained a Michigan filmmaker his entire career. His rebellious, don’t-ask-permission attitude is right at home in a state without a formal film office, where the only things stopping you from making a film are getting a camera in your hand and stepping outside. That’s essentially what he’s done with his latest film, Vulcanizadora, a sly sequel to his 2014 breakout, Buzzard, which picks up Derek and Marty’s (played by Potrykus and long-time collaborator Joshua Burge, respectively) story 10 years later, as they set off on a camping trip in the woods on the shores of Lake Michigan.
Potrykus doesn’t give anything away about the purpose of Derek and Marty’s trip. All we know is what we see: a prickly, frustrated, but loving friendship; flashes of juvenile hijinks in sharp relief to conversations about fatherhood, mistakes, and anxiety; and the unbroken momentum to fulfil a grim promise. This is a film divided into two acts by one unshakably violent one. On either side, however, is the work of a director with one of the clearest points of view of any currently working, and Vulcanizadora is a sensitive, volatile, deeply felt drama about the people he knows best.
During the first weekend of the film’s theatrical release, via Oscilloscope Pictures, I had a brief chat with Joel about his freedom as a filmmaker, how critics interpret his characters, and the inescapable beauty of Lake Michigan.
Chris Cassingham: I want to start by asking a little bit about your career in general, because it does strike me as having a very specific, non-industry kind of creative freedom. And as a viewer, I see in you someone who’s unencumbered by, and not beholden to, outside influence. I wonder what that kind of freedom means to you as a filmmaker, and what you value most about it.
Joel Potrykus: Yeah, I have no aspirations of being a career director. These films don’t pay for my mortgage. The thing that keeps me going is that I can do exactly what I want, and no one will interfere with that. I’m really thankful for that, because I’m in Michigan, working with a very small crew, so I don’t need a lot of money. I think if you need a lot of money to make these, you have more people to answer to, and you have to get rid of things or add things in order to make money back. So the most important thing is that I don’t ever have to compromise. I like to work with people who trust me and don’t give me so much money that I’ll feel bad if they don’t recoup it, because it is an art project for me, it’s not anything that I ever intend to watch at the box office. I’m always just amazed that other people respond to it, or festivals program it, or theaters show it. It still blows my mind.
CC: Can you speak to your relationship with Oscilloscope, your distributor, and Dweck Productions, who are on the new film?
JP: Matt Grady at Factory25 put me in touch with [Dweck Productions] because I had an idea that didn’t need a lot of money, and he thought that they would be a really good fit. They were trying to do stuff that’s a little more artsy and not so driven by industry trends. And I was like, we have to shoot on 16 mm, and they understood that, and knew how important that was going to be for the look and feel of the film. So, they’re the best, man. I feel really grateful because, before this, we were just piecing these films together and reaching out to so many different people. So when one person, one company, is able to come in and give in and give you the entire budget, it’s very freeing.
CC: In previous interviews, you mentioned the fact that Vulcanizadora wasn’t originally meant to be a sequel or follow-up to your 2014 film Buzzard, and that you pitched the film to a name actor before deciding to reimagine the story with the characters from the previous film. Was that pitch a deliberate, commercially-minded decision?
JP: I don’t know. I reached out to Robert Pattinson because I knew he was a fan, and I knew that if he was interested I wouldn’t have to worry about money. But I was also more interested to see if he would be into this weird experiment; meaning, would this guy be into making a movie like I make movies? I don’t know him well enough to know how he feels about not having a talent trailer or only having a crew of 15, as opposed to however many were on The Batman. I really love his career because he can do The Batman, and then do Good Time — he takes chances. And at that early point, I thought it was going to be a brother movie, and Josh [Burge] and Robert Pattinson were going to be brothers. I could see that. It would have a different tone, it would be less comedic, but it was more interesting just to see what it would be like if he were on board. Now, the talks really never even got that far. He was dealing with a lot of different things, including The Batman and everything, but I got good notes from him. It was just good to get his thoughts about it because, again, I don’t expect anybody to respond to anything, so I go into these things very realistically.
CC: What struck me about these characters, both in this film and in Buzzard, was a lack of certainty of their social position. I’m reluctant to call them like marginalized people, but I wonder to what extent you recognize those characters as representations of your own position, whether it’s within the film industry or your own life.
JP: Yeah, I see that a lot. I actually would not call them marginalized in any way. I think there are people far more marginalized in society than those two guys. I don’t even feel like they’ve had a hard time. They’re just people that I know. Those two guys are every one of my friends, and they’re working the same jobs that all my friends worked at or do work at, and they behave that way. I’ve never considered me or my friends marginalized in any way. We have few things to complain about in life. It’s just that they don’t have drive, and they weren’t really raised within a structure that would give them career ambition.
It’s not until the critics start to put things together and analyze the work that I go, “Okay, there’s something there.” But it’s definitely never my intention to make some statement on, especially, masculinity, or how men have a difficult time expressing their emotions. Give me a break with all of that stuff. That’s fine if people bring that out of their experience with it, but it is just me and my friends making a movie about our experiences. That’s it.
CC: You’ve described these characters in Vulcanizadora as 15-year-olds that happen to be played by adults. I’m curious to what extent you still feel like a 15-year old-yourself?
JP: Less so now that I have a kid. I had to embrace that at some point, because when I was first writing and making these, I didn’t, and still never, think I was going to write them as adolescent and immature. Again, that was the critics pointing out how stuck they were in a certain time period or age. But that’s also just kind of how I talk and behave. So a lot of times I was like, man, I’m embarrassed because people are saying those things about me, because those are my words and my ideas and my behaviors; and things that I thought were smart moments, other people called juvenile and ridiculous. But since having a kid, I just don’t have the luxury of spending all of my time with my friends, the same friends that I’ve had since high school. So, I’ve had to grow up, and it’s been great, but in a way, the next thing I write after Vulcanizadora may be moving on from a certain voice that I’ve been writing in organically for the last 10 years.
CC: Personally, I’m drawn to the immaturity that your characters may express because I feel them in myself; and I wish I could feel as free as they seem to be in expressing themselves, whether that’s read as immature or just merely how they are. Everyone wishes they could act like a child longer than is socially acceptable.
JP: Yeah [laughs]. And sometimes I realize I still behave in ways that aren’t socially acceptable.
CC: Along those lines, can you tell me about the primal pleasures of bashing a stick against a tree?
JP: [laughs] There wasn’t much of a script for a lot of Vulcanizadora — there was an outline — because I just knew what the characters needed to say, and most of it was Derek. That moment you mentioned wasn’t in the outline, but I just told Adam, the DP, to point the camera over there, and Josh to just grab a stick, and said, let’s just smash the hell out of this tree for a while. It just seemed like that’s what they would do, because that’s what I would do. And I was like, just keep going, and I’ll end it at some point, but this is going to feel great, because I just want to do this right now.
CC: I thought it was a really beautiful moment, accidentally beautiful, because these characters are in unspoken, unacknowledged, imminent conflict, and this is one of the few times when they come together in agreement about this fun thing to do.
JP: You’re right! For that reason it’s a weird scene in the movie, because there’s no conflict, like you said. And if you look carefully, Derek, who I play, goes, “Check this out. This is a good one.” And I point to the tree, and for the only time in the movie there’s a little hint of a smile from Josh, because he doesn’t know what we’re doing, and this isn’t scripted, and he really just found it funny that I was whapping away at this tree. So when I watch it, I’m always like, this is a weird scene, because they’re getting together. But at the same time, it makes sense. The audience needs to see that they’re friends and that they have some kind of connection. So, you know, you don’t overthink too many things, but it’s all there for a reason, I think.
CC: One thing I really need to ask about, and that I haven’t read much in other interviews you’ve done, is your relationship to Lake Michigan. I know you filmed in Manistee, which isn’t Northern Michigan, but I am wearing my Glen Lake Michigan shirt in honor of our conversation today. I’ve spent a lot of time in Northern Michigan. Basically every summer of my entire life I went to a summer camp up there near Sleeping Bear Dunes. So I have a very romantic relationship with that part of the world. One of the most fascinating things about Vulcanizadora was seeing the Lake, seeing this part of the world, in an extremely unromantic light. So I’m just curious to get some insight into your relationship with the woods, the lake, the dunes there.
JP: I was very conscious of not trying to make it look like a fucking calendar or something like that. The closest I got was that long scene where they’re just sitting on the beach, and Derek’s doing most of the talking about their plan. And I was like, I refuse to see the water in this. We are on a beautiful beach, but we’re going to shoot the tightest close-ups of our faces only. And I do not want to see the gorgeousity [sic] of the landscape and them becoming one with nature. So we could have made it more beautiful — I mean, the sunsets alone! — but there was a definite intention to get away from the beauty of nature. But it’s inherent. It’s still there.
CC: You’ve mentioned a fear that responses to the film’s violence would suggest it was in bad taste, or something along those lines, and were relieved that this didn’t end up being the case. After a year of screenings, do you have some kind of explanation or reflection on how audiences are responding to the gruesome nature of Vulcanizadora‘s premise?
JP: It’s restored my faith in humanity a bit! It’s been so great to see people understanding the emotional depth of the moment rather than just seeing it for shock. I don’t think too much about it being seen as exploitative anymore, which is a big relief. There’s been so many great conversations around Marty and Derek’s headspace that the actual big moment somehow doesn’t get much attention.
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