As the car flipped in mid air, rolling from front end over the back end, actress Elizabeth Reaser screamed. In the midst of the chaos, there literally seemed to be a suspended moment when the artist heard a stabilizing voice come from the other passenger in the car, her best friend. The surreal voice that seemed to surprise even her friend said to Reaser, "you're okay, you're okay, you're okay."
The voice was right! Reaser and her best friend were physically fine, and no one else was injured, but the experience awakened the actress.
"I thought I was going to die," said the Julliard trained Reaser. "Ever since then, I am now taking the world in, in a different way. I just feel so grateful."
The car accident, which happened three days prior to our interview at the Scottsdale Valley Ho hotel, left, the beautiful, kind and eloquent Reaser, who you might remember from her role in the film "The Family Stone," in a contemplative place as we dished about her current film project "Sweet Land."
"... At the end of the day when you make a movie like this, you can feel like this is the real thing, this is something to be proud of. It is good to know that you did something special and meaningful," reflects Reaser, who learned German and wore period skirts ("I never wear skirts!" she confided) for her role.
Billed as the celebration of land, love and the American immigrant experience, "Sweet Land" focuses on Inge (Reaser), a mail order bride who arrives in Minnesota in 1920 to marry a young Norwegian farmer named Olaf (Tim Guinee, The Shovel). Inge is German, which ultimately causes problems for their intended nuptials because the Reverend refuses to marry the couple.
Inge is sent to live with Olaf's friend and neighbor Frandsen (Alan Cummings, Spy Kids) and his family. There she learns English and American Ways, and slowly comes to know and love Olaf.
Ultimately, the story is about love. Not the 'sex first, and get to know you later love,' that characterizes so many film and true-life relationships. But actually getting to know an individual, appreciate the good and flawed aspects of that person, and enter into the process of truly falling in love. Speaking of adoration, making this film had been a rare and wonderful experience for all of the actors.
"This has ruined me, it's so great," Reaser gushed about her experience with "Sweet Land." "I knew the script was beautiful, the location is amazing and he [director Ali Selim] was very gentle with the actors, but I didn't realize he is like a genius," explained the actress. "It took him ten years [Selim says 15] to get this movie made and he is such a sweet, good man."
Because of her admiration for the director, Reaser bent over backwards to learn to speak German in nine days. "It's amazing what fear will do," she offers as a reason for how she was able to sound so convincing.
"Learning a foreign language, and memorizing that language can be so challenging. I was going crazy."
Actor Tim Guinee who was also visiting Arizona on this press tour to promote the movie, sells this film like it was his personal property.
"I watched this movie, which I've seen 8 trillion times, at the premiere in Minneapolis and found myself crying. There are a couple of moments that just hit me," said the actor. " I think that everyone has a longing." Guinee, who after making the film Ladder 49 became a volunteer fireman, believes that longing is inside of every person living in this country because most everyone in America is an immigrant.
"With the exception of two or three percent of the folks who are left from the great nations who were wiped out here, willing or unwilling, everyone else is an immigrant in America. Because of that we all have a hole in our chest, some sort of empty place in our hearts that longs for knowledge of who we are, of where we came from, that yearns for connection to the land, that keens for finding a way to have gratitude for the sacrifices our ancestors made that let us live, that desires and longs for connection to community and a sense of vitality within community, that longs for proximity to beauty, that longs for love, that longs for home, that wants to know that we are vital in our relationships to our beloved, our families, our community, our world and our God. That is our birth right as immigrants is that yearning," Guinee waxes philosophical.
"What pulls at me about this movie is the echo of that stuff in the heart. And I think this is a great love story," he concludes.
Reaser and co-star Guinee are members of the mutual admiration club.
"Working with her was grand...she is such a workhorse," insists Guinee, who lives in the Catskill Mountains and tends to 2,800,000 bees when he is not acting.
"I think he is the hardest working actor I've ever met," countered Reaser. "I was like that (a workhorse) because of him... we would work on set all day long and then work at night. And he is so passionate, so considerate. I mean between he and Ali I think they might be two of the nicest people that I have ever met, to the point that I couldn't deal with how nice they were. It is almost overwhelming that kind of generosity of spirit, I've worked a lot and you don't encounter that very often."
The characters were silent for large portions of the film. Reaser loved acting without having to say any dialogue because it played such an important part of her role.
"I loved it! Personally I'm all about economy of language. I just feel like there is so much talk and noise, and it just drives me crazy. I'd much rather listen," she says. And while the voice of assurance from the car accident is gone, Reaser has a desire to take everything in, working in the Minnesota wilderness provided a perfect backdrop and scenic wonder.
The "Sweet Land" cinematography is brilliant and full of colorful sweeping landscapes, and endless blue skies. One challenge with the film is that the pace is beyond that of the tortoise, patience is required, but the talent and story compensate for the lack of speed. And a beautiful, slow, peaceful film about acceptance, love and standing for what you believe in makes the Land look Sweet indeed.
Reach the reporter at: jamise.liddell@asu.edu.
