But even by her standards,Dick Johnson Is Deadis a radical approach to non-fiction filmmaking.
But now, it’s upon us the beginning of his disappearance.
And we’re not accepting it."
Credit: Barbara Nitke/Netflix
moment that was key," Johnson says with a laugh.
I was just like, ‘Oh, I’m gonna make a film about my dad.
Kill him over and over until he really dies for real.’
Dick Johnson in ‘Dick Johnson is Dead’.Netflix
And that’s the first time I’ve ever had a succinct pitch in my life."
Dick Johnson Is Deadarrives on Netflix Friday.
KIRSTEN JOHNSON:He laughed.
He laughed, he laughed, and he asked, “Why me?”
Both on the level of like, do you want to kill me?
But also on the level of his modesty as a human.
He’s like, “I’m not worthy of being the subject of a film.”
And I was like, “That’s not what matters.
And then how did you start going down the path of actually making it?
Well, we did some crazy things.
You could fall down the stairs.”
Just seeing him do it, I was sort of horrified.
I was like, “I can’t do this.
I can’t ask this of him.”
Those kinds of absurdist, transgressive conversations were happening between us.
So did you come up with the different death sequences in an improvisatory sort of way?
Once we had the budget, my dad’s dementia had further advanced.
I was desperate to go to Hong Kong and haveJackie Chanhelp us throw Dad out of a building.
Like, I went up to Jackie Chan’s people at an event and talked to them about it.
Have Dad meet Bud Cort."
The mind just went to all of these extraordinary places.
So it felt like this multi-perspective approach speaks to the way dementia functions.
I must let other people film me.
So it was always about this multiplicity of angles on the questions of the film.
How did you get the idea for the heaven sequences?
Those are so strange and fun.
Heaven grew out of, “How can I do a fantasy sequence differently in terms of process?”
We knew my father’s capacities were shifting.
It meant everything can shift, there are backup plans for everything.
We would add something when we knew we could add it.
Well, we were putting it all together all along; [editing] was constantly happening.
So I was trying to put him back together.
Can we make a blood-curdling sound behind it?
Can we make that head hit on the sidewalk in a way that makes you ill?"
And then like, “Oh, ooh, don’t want that.
Ooh, that really made me laugh.”
So the putting together and falling apart was always happening, kind of like the dementia itself.
[Laughs]
But I think the film taught us how to make it.
Like, him playing the clarinet or him dancing.
He’d never danced.
He hadn’t played the clarinet in years, and suddenly he could do it again.
So he brought us these unimaginable joys.
As much as we can imagine the horror of dementia, the film brought us this unimaginable pleasure.
