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Her art belongs to Daddy - July 16, 2005Growing up with a horror maestro has shaped Asia Argento's career, reports Phil Hoad. When Asia Argento moved to Los Angeles, she tried going native; dyeing her hair blonde, doing some networking. A role in xXx notwithstanding, it was never really going to work out. When it came to “demographics” and other exec-speak, she had to be frank. “It’s so ridiculous,” Argento says now. “I can’t believe people are serious when they say these things.” Talking with a dusky, guttural Italo-Atlantic accent, and sounding a little like a female Brando, the 29-year-old Italian actor and director is adamant that she would never make an American blockbuster, even if asked. “I don’t think I’d be capable . . . I wouldn’t know how to place 14 cameras to get one car blown up. I don’t have that fantasy.” In truth, Hollywood is unlikely to come knocking. As a director, Argento has concentrated on uncomfortable, intimate material with a dark, bruised look that recalls the full-blown horror of her father Dario Argento, who directed such cult horror classics as Suspiria, Creepers and Terror at the Opera. Her second feature film is an adaptation of J. T. Leroy’s autobiographical account of child abuse and prostitution, The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things (see review). Argento says that the project “found” her. “Kinda like love does.” Yet love is a rare commodity in both the book and film, which tells the story of a boy labouring through a terrible upbringing by his mother, Sarah (Argento), a white-trash girl who inflicts her emotional problems on her son. It is remarkable that Leroy survived to write so coherently about his experiences. “I think,” says Argento, “that his four years with the loving foster-family made him realise that there is a kind of a love that doesn’t involve pain.” But was it difficult for Argento as a parent (she has a four-year-old daughter) to step into the role of the abusive mother? “I related a lot more to Jeremiah than to Sarah, but I didn’t condemn her, I didn’t want to make her a monster. I wanted to make her into a human being who didn’t have choices.” Reflecting these messy realities, her version of The Heart is Deceitful is true to its source, using an uneven mixture of acting and directing styles (including Claymation interludes) that are about as far from mainstream film-making as you can get. Beguiling and beautiful in person, Argento is equally difficult to get a handle on, unless you hit on shared enthusiasms (clubbing and the pace of London life, in our case). She refuses to discuss her childhood, though the length at which she talks about protect- ing the child actors in her film is telling. Growing up with Dario must have been interest- ing, given how often he would later torment his teenage daughter-cum-lead actress (and women in general) in movies such as the serial killer thriller Trauma (1993). When she was 14 years old, Argento left her family to go on a clubbing pilgrimage to London, a city to which she was drawn by the techno scene (her DJing still pays the bills). After living in London for several years, surrounding herself with artistic folk, she settled in Paris, Rome and then LA. So what is London’s appeal? The answer is as unexpected as it is instantaneous. “People smile here — I like smiling people. I like people to be nice.” Judging by her films, she rarely finds life so simple. The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things is now on selected release
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