I was hoping I could get through my interview with Julian Schnabel without him asking what I thought of his movie. Schnabel's film-making career has been on a steady upward trajectory since he made Basquiat in 1996, and his last feature, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, received near-universal acclaim, including a best director Oscar nomination. Not bad for a painter who treats film-making as a mere sideline.
His latest film, Miral, chronicles the lives of several generations of Palestinian women, in particular an orphan who is drawn towards violent activism as she comes of age during the first intifada in the late 1980s. Played by Slumdog Millionaire star Freida Pinto, Miral is based on writer Rula Jebreal; the movie is adapted from her book of the same name. Pinto is one of several elements in the movie that don't quite work. Others include the overwhelmingly English-language dialogue, an incongruous soundtrack featuring Tom Waits, and a generally earnest, reverential tone that never quite rings true. And yet, who but Schnabel would have had the guts to take on a film like this? Miral takes an unambiguously pro-Palestinian viewpoint; Schnabel is unambiguously Jewish. His mother was even the president of Hadassah, the American Zionist women's organisation.
After the film was shown at the Venice film festival this September, critical reactions ranged from lukewarm to scalding. Miral emerges as "a bland totem of hope rather than a compelling movie subject", said Variety. Our own critic Peter Bradshaw wrote: "What a disaster." In yet another vote of no confidence, its US distributor, Miramax, has pushed back its release date from this December to next year, a clear indication that it no longer considers the film an Oscar contender.
Schnabel doesn't seem too upset about any of this when we meet. Even casually dressed, there's a Mephistophelean air to him, with his goatee and tinted glasses. As well as presenting Miral at the London film festival, he's also in the UK for an exhibition of his giant-sized Polaroids, which record his enviable life – a studio-home in Long Island, celebrity friends including Mickey Rourke. They are selling for €30,000 (£26,600) each.
He starts talking about the differences between being an artist and a film-maker, then springs it on me out of the blue: "Did you like the movie?"
"Yes," I say, automatically, then add, "I had reservations."
"OK. We'll talk about that," he says, before picking up where he left off.
Schnabel and Jebreal, it should be pointed out, are in a relationship. They met at one of his exhibition openings in Rome. She came from Israel to Italy on a scholarship in 1993 (which is roughly where the Miral story ends), and became host of a political TV talk show. Schnabel agreed to read the script of a film adaptation of Miral (written by someone else), which he didn't like. But when he read Jebreal's original book, he says, he agreed to make the movie. Jebreal rewrote the script herself, and she was on set with Schnabel throughout the shoot, in Ramallah and Jerusalem, advising on what looked authentic.
"Anyway, what were your reservations?" he asks, "because I'd love to talk about that." Trying to be diplomatic, I say I felt there was a danger, even though it's about specific people, of them becoming emblematic. After all, we're told at the beginning of the movie that Miral is "a red flower that grows on the side of the road. You've probably seen millions of them."
"Uh huh. I'm listening to you," he nods, fingers steepled on his chin. "The thing is," he says, "the fact that somebody from New York City who's an American-Jewish person is making a movie about a Palestinian girl is something that no one ever did. I'm not saying I'm the only Jewish person who cares about Palestinian people, but unfortunately, their voices are not necessarily heard as loudly as they should be."
"And as for emblematic: it's a real story. I didn't invent this; I'm making a portrait. If I were making a portrait of you, I would paint what I'm seeing. The light on your glasses, your jacket on the couch, the space between one side of your moustache and the other. And I apply the same rules to painting this picture of Rula. I don't include things that are not in that frame."
Why did he cast Pinto, an Indian, as a Palestinian? "I have other Palestinian women in the movie," he replies. "If you look at her [Pinto], she looks like she could be Rula's sister. And she's a damn good actress."
Schnabel was unable to audition Pinto in person, so he asked Danny Boyle to record a scene on video while the two of them were doing an awards ceremony for Slumdog Millionaire. On the video, she acted out one of the most emotional scenes from Miral, in which her father reveals to her that she is adopted as he lies in a hospital bed. Boyle played the role of the father. "She was so loving when she talked to him," Schnabel says."I thought, 'She's perfect'. But the other thing is this: when people wonder, 'Why do you pick an Indian person?' Why is Russell Crowe Gladiator? I mean the guy is from New Zealand. Ben Kingsley played Gandhi!"
Has Schnabel been disappointed by reactions to the film? "I think the subject matter is tough," he says. "I would be naive to think that it would be a walk in the park. We showed the movie in Venice – there was a standing ovation for 15 minutes." He goes on to list other accolades and personal thanks he has received as a result of Miral. "I think this film is something that people really can use and this can really change something. People respond to this film."
Whatever happens, Schnabel says he doesn't plan to make another film for some time, as he's got exhibitions booked up for the next two years. "I've never made a movie to make money," he sums up. "I've never made a painting to make money. Tom Waits said money is something you throw off the back of a train. If Arab people see a Jewish person can do this, they might think, 'Maybe there's somebody on the other side we can talk to.' I'm not a saint. I'm just somebody who thought this was a worthwhile thing to do."
