From Left: 'Brother and Sister,' 1973, Teenage Lust; 'Untitled,' 1963, Tulsa. Photos by Larry Clark.
How would you respond to someone who would say that it’s too much?
I mean, what can I say? Get a life!
When you started, was it hard to translate your photographic aesthetic to film?
It wasn’t difficult at all. The first time I walked on a movie set I said, ‘Ahhh, I’m home.’ I’ve always wanted to make film. Tulsa was a book, but it was really a film to me. I had wanted it to be a film, but I couldn’t make it on my own. So, when I finally got myself together to make a film, it was just natural—I had been doing it all along.
Your films tend to deviate from the traditional, linear method of storytelling. How would you describe your method, if you can articulate it?
Gee, I don’t know if I can. I just look at my work, and it’s what I do. My last few films, Marfa Girl 1 and 2, we have the same characters. In Marfa Girl, there were just so many questions about what happened to the people and about their lives. So, in the sequel, I try to answer what happened to them, but I also ask a lot of questions, so there might be a Marfa Girl 3.
So, the sequel was an attempt to resolve the first?
Marfa Girl 2 was meant to show what happened to the people, but then it got more and more complicated as it went along. During Marfa Girl 1, I had a diary—I didn’t have a screenplay, but you need a screenplay to sketch out how much time you’re going to spend in a certain place. So, I sketched out a very very short screenplay—it couldn’t have been even 25 pages. With Marfa Girl 2, I made it up as I went along, which was interesting to do.
Spoiler alert, but why did Adam have to die?
We don’t know he’s dead yet. He was shot in the chest, so we don’t know for sure if he’s dead or not, which is why if I make a third, we don’t know if he’s going to be around or not. [That] might be a good reason to make another film. A third one is complicated because so many things happen and the characters have to figure out how to get out of it all. Everybody is in some deep shit. It would really be something.