Director Crowe looks at success, failure in new film

By Bob Tourtellotte

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – For “Jerry Maguire” director
“Cameron Crowe,” whose new movie “Elizabethtown” debuts on
Friday, his Hollywood career is all about time.

“Time,” Crowe said, “puts things in proper perspective.”

The saying is as appropriate for Crowe as it is for the
main character in romantic comedy “Elizabethtown,” a young
dreamer named Drew who falls into a funk after an athletic shoe
he designs turns into a financial fiasco for its manufacturer.

Crowe told Reuters he suffered a similar fate after his
most recent films, 2001′s “Vanilla Sky” and 2000′s “Almost
Famous.” Surreal drama “Sky” proved a hit at box offices, but
was panned by critics. “Famous,” a personal story about a boy’s
first love, was a critical success but a box office flop.

From Hollywood’s perspective, Crowe needs a hit from the
new movie he wrote, directed and produced to retain his status
as one of his generation’s top talents. But the director
doesn’t see it quite that way. Over time, he said “Sky” and
“Famous” have earned loyal fans, and both have done just fine
financially when box office, video and DVD sales are combined.

“Almost Famous” “felt like a public embarrassment, and it
kind of mirrors what happens in this new movie,” Crowe said.
“But now, however many years later, nobody remembers it was a
dud in theaters. They only remember they dug that movie.”

“Elizabethtown” is a personal story, although not as close
to Crowe’s own life as “Famous,” in which the main character
covers a rock tour for a music magazine much as Crowe wrote
about music for Rolling Stone magazine.

In “Elizabethtown,” Drew’s depression following the shoe
debacle is interrupted by his father’s sudden death while on a
trip home to Kentucky. So Drew goes there to arrange for the
body to be returned to Oregon where Drew and his family live.

Things don’t work out exactly as Drew planned, but he is
embraced by his country cousins, aunts and uncles. Their warmth
and a budding romance with a flight attendant (Kirsten Dunst)
he meets on his trip give Drew a new outlook on life.

LOST IN KENTUCKY

“The powering thing behind the movie was to capture the
feeling of being alone and going back to Kentucky and getting
walloped by a sense of family I hadn’t realized was so much in
place,” Crowe said.

“That root system can really surprise you, particularly if
you’re caught up in your own little success and failure world,
and all the sudden you realize there are bigger issues: family,
life and death,” he added.

The idea for making “Elizabethtown” came to Crowe in summer
2002 following the release of “Vanilla Sky” while he was on
tour with his wife, Nancy Wilson, who plays with the rock group
Heart.

The tour bus was driving through Kentucky where Crowe
hadn’t been since his father’s death. He was struck by the
countryside’s beauty. So, he got off the bus, rented a car and
“got lost” on the state’s back roads and highways.

In another parallel to Crowe’s life, Drew goes on a road
trip visiting landmarks such as the memorial to bombing victims
in Oklahoma City and the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee
where Martin Luther King Jr. was murdered.

So far, “Elizabethtown” has received mixed early reviews
mainly from its screening at September’s Toronto Film Festival.
Since then, Crowe has said he trimmed 18 minutes from the
film’s length. He likens the festival screenings to tests.

“It was a work in progress. It was educational to just sit
in the theater and look at it. It is, at its heart, a comedy,
and I’ve always felt you tune a comedy by watching it with
people,” he said.

Whether “Elizabethtown” is eventually deemed a “Maguire”
like hit, a “Famous” style flop, or something in between like
“Vanilla Sky,” Crowe said he is not so concerned anymore.

From the new movie, he said he is most struck by some words
he wrote that are spoken by Drew’s girlfriend, Claire, who
tells her moribund beau, “Fail big and stick around and make
them wonder why you’re still smiling.”

“It’s hard to do,” Crowe said. “But it’s good advice.” And
then he grinned.

Reuters/VNU