ALFONSO: I was an annoying kid, I guess. While the others would be
playing soldiers, I’d be playing a soldiers film — already I had a
narrative. They’d say, “Let’s do this or that,” and I’d say, “No, I’m
shooting here and killing people there!” All children have a movie in their
heads, and I wanted to impose mine on everyone else. But the only one in my
family that I could fully include in my make-believe world was my little
brother, Carlos. I love all three of my siblings, but my relationship with
him was special from the start.
Carlos was a quiet kid, very sweet. Now he’s a jerk! He was very serious, and
smart in a quiet way. As the elder brother, I was leading. But he was a
leader, too, in an understated way. And he was way more sociable than me. He
had lots of friends — I never had any. I wanted to, but I never felt I
belonged to any of the circles. Maybe that made my bond with Carlos even
stronger.
We’ve always had a healthy relationship. We teased each other and we had big
fights — sometimes fist fights. Something really stupid would start it, and
you add hormones and being teenagers. We’d be trying to get the attention of
Mum, the normal stuff. We came from a middle-class household. My father was
a doctor of nuclear medicine. My mum was a biochemist, but then she did a
master’s in philosophy, and now she is a witch, like a healer. I love
her witch friends.
Carlos always had the right balance: though he loved cinema and music and art,
he also loved sports. From the age of seven or eight he was playing in these
tournaments and he became a child American-football star. We shared a
passion for planes, and we could be ages at the airport, just looking at
planes, knowing everything about them. We still love them. But then I
introduced Carlos to film. From childhood I had been going to the movies,
once, twice, sometimes three times a day. I always went alone. I must have
known it was odd, because I’d tell my mum I was going to study or play
football, then I’d sneak off to the cinema. By my teens I was into foreign
films and art-house cinema, and I started bringing Carlos along.
Ever since I remember I’ve wanted to make films. After film school I began
working my way up in the industry, working as assistant director on foreign
films shot in Mexico. Meanwhile, Carlos went off travelling for a year when
he was 18 and he wrote me these great letters. I was laughing so much at
what he wrote and I was enthralled by the images he created. It was clear he
was going to be a writer. He was emulating Robert Smith from the Cure, but
he looked more like Boy George — punky, with a big hat and black lipstick —
shocking people when he came home to Mexico City.
Carlos and me, we’ve taken so many trips together. Once, in his twenties, he
said he wanted to go to the desert. So we went to a place in Mexico, a day’s
drive away, in this crappy car of ours. Then he said:
“I want to see dunes, they’re not far away.” So we went to the US border. Then
it was: “The Grand Canyon is not far away.” Then: “LA is not so far away.”
And then: “Oh, look, San Francisco is not far!” On those trips we could talk
for hours and hours, or we could be in complete silence.
I had a kid young in life — my son, Jonas — so I had a family to support and I
got a gig writing screenplays for these stupid Mexican TV shows I was also
directing. I invited Carlos to give writing a try. He did a great job, and
we learnt we could work together. We laughed a lot, and there was no need to
explain stuff to him — given an image, he instinctively understands not just
its visual aspect but the emotion it conveys. We did these horror episodes,
Twilight Zones — Toilet Zones we called them because of the low budget. We’d
write, direct and edit them; it was great fun. It was New Year 1990 when I
said: “Okay, now let’s write a full-length film.” That night we started. I
did one last job, to raise money, and Carlos carried on writing. In six
weeks we had the screenplay for our first film, Solo Con Tu Pareja [released
here as Love in the Time of Hysteria]. It was a turning point and it opened
a lot of doors.
After that I was getting offers from Hollywood, so I went to Los Angeles, and
Carlos came too. We lived together for a year, and it was a sad, lonely
time. We had a crappy rented place and no money, and I’d go home every
weekend to Mexico to see Jonas. It was frustrating too: we’d go to these
Hollywood parties and feel we didn’t belong. I lost four years developing
projects that never happened, and Carlos wrote four screenplays for studios
that didn’t get made. He was losing his essence, like I was. I realised then
that in 18 years I had never fitted in. I’d tried to mould myself to
different groups, yet I only got rejection. That’s when I said: “This
is who I am. Whoever likes it, great; whoever doesn’t like it, great too.” I
became 100% who I was, rather than shape-shifting. And a very healthy
relationship with Hollywood began.
After that I developed two full screenplays with Carlos and did my first
studio film, A Little Princess — the only film I’ve made that I fully like,
even over Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Then we said: “Let’s
forget the studios and do a film that we want to do. A film in Spanish.”
That was Y Tu Mama Tambien, which we made in 2001. Writing it, we were
laughing like crazy and getting very excited. We learnt that the only way to
make things happen is to take control of your material from the get-go. And
it all happened from there.
I live in London now, and Carlos is still in Mexico, but nothing’s changed
really. We still talk a lot, about everything — film, politics, family, art,
philosophy… Growing up, my friendship with Carlos was one of my strongest.
And he’s still one of my best friends. Definitely.
CARLOS: Ever since we were very young we’ve loved movies. One day
my grandmother asked, very worriedly: “Where’s Alfonso?” and the rest of us
said: “Try the movie theatre, Grandma.” He would go two or three times day.
It’s in the family, that love for cinema. We’d do these marathon
film-watching sessions, jumping from one cinema to another. Alfonso says
that he was looking for naked women when he was younger, and it was probably
the same with me. We were very lucky, growing up in the 1970s, when
Hollywood had the best directors: Cassavetes, Coppola, Scorsese… We also got
Kurosawa, Vidor, Bergman, all the masters. I was starving to see movies. We
were watching Planet of the Apes, Blacula, the Pink Panther films, Poseidon
Adventure, The Aristocats. My favourite when I was very young was Melody,
with Tracy Hyde, which is a love story between two 10-year-olds. I fell in
love with Tracy Hyde and I was six.
When he was 12, Alfonso got a super-8 camera and decided to be a film
director. My sister and I became his actors, his extras, his props. It was a
torture — so humiliating. Of course, Alfonso is my big brother, and he would
bully me. The matter would be settled with a single punch. “Do it!” he would
say, and I would do it. Our mum saw what he shot, but she didn’t know his
methods.
I had a lot of friends, but Alfonso was a loner most of the time. He and I
always had a strong connection, and that got stronger when we started to
work together creatively. When he was in film school making his short films,
he’d take me to the shoot to carry cables or move lamps. At 14 I decided I
wanted to be a writer, and one day Alfonso said: “You say you want to write.
Well, help me write my scripts.” So I wrote some. I enjoyed that — and
working with him — a lot. I went to live in Copenhagen after high
school, and when I came back I would only wear black. I was a punker.
Alfonso says I looked like Boy George, but that only shows his ignorance. He
probably fell in love with him. I’m not saying he’s gay, I’m just saying
he’s probably gay. Anyway, eventually I went to be with Alfonso in Los
Angeles for a year. Well, we love each other, but we learnt then that we can
live in separate houses and be happier. LA is a lonely city, and to exist
there you need a car and a credit card. I didn’t have the latter and I
had this shitty 1974 Toyota Celica. There was a lot of friction between us.
You will not kill your roommate but you can almost kill your brother. After
a year there I said: “Okay, it’s time to move back to Mexico.” As a writer
you can be based anywhere — and that’s a huge advantage.
Then Alfonso called me and said: “What if we do Y Tu Mama Tambien?” It was one
of our first ideas, one we’d dreamt up 10 years before. I was on a
flight to New York the next day, and we started work. Writing that script
was magical, one of the best experiences of my life. And with the actors
Gael Garcia Bernal and Diego Luna, and our producer, Alejandro Inarritu, we
got to create this film family we have now. There’s a lot of love and
support and truth between us, and we went on to make our latest film, Rudo y
Cursi, a sibling of Y Tu Mama.
Today Alfonso is a director who writes, and I’m a writer who directs. That
rivalry we had as kids is probably still there, but now it’s productive. And
I believe Alfonso is one of the most complete directors. He reads so much
and knows so much about culture. He’s a teacher to me. And a confidant. And
a shrink. And a barman. He’s incredibly imaginative. He’s very funny and he
loves to tease people. We share that. He’s quick and can be cunning and
ironic. When we were younger, we were both very successful with women; we
had no problem with that. Now I’m happily married and he’s happily divorced.
But, you know, we’re both idiots. The talented one in this family is his son,
Jonas, who wrote and directed this beautiful film, The Year of the Nail.
Jonas, who’s 28, has no fear. I’m so jealous. I have to recover the
freshness he still has.
Alfonso and me, we talk and laugh a lot and have a great time together. Mostly
we’re working out our ideas, polishing them, discussing plots or characters
or politics or painting. Since he moved to London we don’t see each other as
often, but we’re always in touch. I don’t know whether he’s my best friend,
but he’s one of them. I haven’t had many bad moments with him, and I’ve had
a zillion good ones s
The Cuarons’ film Rudo y Cursi is released on DVD tomorrow
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