Andrew Dominik Talks Reuniting With Nick Cave & Warren Ellis On 'This Much I Know To Be True' [Interview]

The long-running collaboration between Australian filmmaker Andrew Dominik (“Chopper,” “Killing Them Softly”)and celebrated musicians Nick Cave and Warren Ellis is three films deep now with a fourth on the way. Cave and Ellis —who record as part of Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds, but also on their own as a duo—scored Dominik’s second film, “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford” (2007), and now have made two music documentaries in a row with the filmmaker. The first, “Once More Time With Feeling” (2016), was made under the practical circumstances of tragedy: Cave’s 15-year-old son Arthur had died from injuries sustained after an accident in 2015, and full of grief, Cave devised the idea of recording the final sessions of their impending Bad Seeds album, Skeleton Tree (2016) in lieu of doing any press. He approached Dominik to direct the film, and the results, “One More Time With Feeling,” are a mournful, elegiac symphony of grief, pain, and glimmers of hope (read our review here, we also named it one of the best documentaries of the 2010s decade).

‘This Much I Know To Be True’ Review: Andrew Dominik Captures Another Moody, Deeply Human Portrait of Nick Cave [Berlin Film Festival]

Cut to 2020/2021 and another calamity has occurred, albeit less personally seismic. The global pandemic has hit, Cave and Ellis have recorded a new album during lockdown (2021’s Carnage) and the global tour they were going to mount for their last record, 2019’s Ghosteen has been canceled. Once again, feeling lost, unmoored, and feeling the existential dread of the pandemic and their inability to tour and communicate with audiences, Cave and Ellis call upon their friend Andrew Dominik—who was never really out of the picture, having co-mixed Ghosteen—to record a new concert performance doc in lieu of touring.

The result, “This Much I Know To Be True,” which made its world premiere at the Berlin Film Festival to much acclaim (read our review), is once again, on the surface, a practical object, a collection of songs from Ghosteen and Carnage that Cave and Ellis weren’t able to tour around for two years. But on an emotional, deeply human level, if “Once More Time With Feeling” was a dark cathedral of grief (read our original interview with Dominik from 2016), “This Much I Know To Be True,” is a gorgeous, spiritual, hymnal portrait of healing, the process of trauma, and the existential wisdom that comes with loss, understanding our impermanence.

While little of this concert doc discusses these ideas in overt terms, somehow, just through the sheer power of performance and visual grandeur of the cinematic experience, both Cave, Ellis, and Dominik express mystical, divine restoration of the soul through the radiant depiction of Cave and Ellis melancholic chorales. “This Much I Know To Be True,” is another luminous performance doc, but also an insightful and engaging look at the ever-evolving humanity of Nick Cave and his wonderous, cosmic collaboration with the mystical genius of Warren Ellis. I recently had the pleasure of speaking to Dominik all about the film, his collaborations with the duo, and much more. Stay tuned for the second part of this interview, centering on Dominik’s upcoming 2022 drama “Blonde” and much more.

“This Much I Know To Be True,” is a global worldwide event that takes place, this Wednesday May 11. You can find your local screenings here.

I just saw the Nick Cave and Warren Ellis show here in Brooklyn, just a few weeks ago, and it’s kind of remarkable how similar they are in that it almost feels like the show was taking cues from the film.
Well, I thought the show—I thought the difference between the show and the film, is the film can be less performative. You know what I mean? Like during the show he has to project outward more.

Right, I can see that, but the show I was at, he was largely really still, relatively anyhow, sort of just quietly projecting and radiating intensity with stillness and minimalist movements.
Right, he’s better when he is that way, I think. That’s what he’s doing during the [movie]. It’s been basically about holding back the instinct to be Pentecostal, which he can get. The one thing that film can do really well is the intimate thing. What you see in the film is, he’s just about his relationship to the song. He’s not really doing it for us in the sense that we can see what’s going on but he’s not really doing it for us, in a way.

What are the origins of you and Nick Cave? And by that I mean, can you detail the relationship with him musically, professionally, socially, and beyond? I’m assuming you came to the music first.
Actually, no, he was my girlfriend’s ex that’s how I first became aware of Nick. Actually, no [pausing to think] I first met Nick at the drug dealers, you know? Like in 1986, I was just an innocent private schoolboy getting my first heroin habit. And I walked into the living room and, the prince of darkness was sitting on the couch, watching a documentary about earthworms. And I asked him, “What are you watching?” And he just turned around and bared his teeth at me. That was Nick. That was the first time I met Nick. He was terrifying. And then three months later I was going out with his girlfriend and the record that he wrote about it was all on the radio everywhere.

And that’s how I knew of him. And then of course I got into the music, which it was just like, you know, Nick’s an amazing dude. I mean, all of it’s amazing. I couldn’t help but like it, and then he would call up to talk to her and we’d chat on the phone, that kind of thing. Me and Nick instantly got along actually, but we didn’t really become friends for years later, like not in a real sense. How far forward do you want me to go mate? I mean, it’s a 30-year fucking story [laughs].

[Laughs] Right, well the next major milestone as it were, is Nick and Warren Ellis scoring “The Assassination of Jesse James,” right?
Yeah. We became closer after ‘Jesse James’ and then, we actually became friends and then when Arthur died [editor’s note: Cave’s 15-year-old son who died from injuries sustained after an accident in 2015] that was just like… I just wanted to help in some way, you know what I mean? That it was such a shattering thing. And when he asked me to make that film [2016’s “One More Time With Feeling”], I did it more out of an instinctive friendship thing than any other reason. I didn’t even know what I wanted to do and I’m not even sure he knew what he wanted. I think he just had a kind of an instinct about—it was born out of this thing that he didn’t want to do press, cause there was no way to do press without talking about Arthur and he just felt it would diminish… it would’ve been lonesome to sit there and just talk about your dead child over and over and over again with journalists.

So, I got it. I understood. I had the job of, of filming the songs and also dealing with a state of the union about what was going on with him or what was going on with [the Bad Seeds] more accurately. It wasn’t just him. It was everyone, you know? I had to work out how to saddle up to this subject [Arthur] which was the only subject there was, but at the same time, really hard to talk about. Do you know what I’m saying?

Yes, for sure. In some ways, it feels like it was maybe your most difficult movie to make because you’re making a film, but it’s also potentially like emotional crisis management.
The amazing thing about making that movie was that it was a thrilling experience to make. It was the first time I’d ever been in that situation where the film just didn’t matter, you know? The record didn’t matter. It was more important creatively than the movie was. It was just about [the band] trying to make some sort of step forward. The film crew was very small, but just this irritating thing in the corner that was in the way. And that was my first experience ever of the film just not being important, and that was incredibly liberating. So, the experience of making the film was thrilling while at the same time, everyone around me is devastated. There was a mismatch between what was going on with me and what was going on with them

And there was this constant anxiety about whether what we were doing was somehow exploitative of a tragedy, and how we could mitigate against that. It was a constant topic of conversation. What I tried to do was just put things in the film that were about what it’s like to deal with grief. There was no sort of displays of emotion. It was always just about how it affects your life. And from that basis—and the fact that it’s handled honestly—I think it’s okay. It’s not exploitative, it doesn’t diminish Arthur. I thought that’s sort of where the line was, so that’s where it felt like the line was.

Yes, I really love that movie and the album and the way they go together cinematically. It’s kind of a cathedral, and I feel like you have a similar approach in this new one.
Yeah. Well, in the new one he’s recovered. The new one is like, what has he learned? And it’s very simple and he just says it in the movie. And it’s very sane what Nick has to say in the film. I think it’s incredibly sane, and sanity is in short supply these days it seems so it’s, so it’s nice to hear a little bit of it [laughs].

I get what you’re saying, but for those that haven’t seen it, what specifically is Nick saying in the film that you think is particularly sane.
Well, it’s basically what he says in his responses in The Red Hand Files [Cave’s website where he answers fan letters, usually quite in-depth, with long, very candid, very thoughtful responses and stories], which is… I mean, I think what Nick has figured out—maybe a lot earlier than a lot of people do—is that we’re going to lose everything in this life. We’re going to lose it all, and it’s about how you respond to that. What he says about the next best action in a crisis, it’s about the illusion of control.

It’s about when things fall apart—there’s the next best action. It might not be the most fun thing to do, but you generally know what it is and do that. And it’s about the responsibility he has to the people around him. I think that’s the basic message. But also the other thing is that he’s developed a relationship with his mind. What you see from the Red Hand Files is, in having to respond responsibly to other people, he’s bringing his own mind to heal. He’s having to sit and think, “What is the best way to answer this person?” Not the most reactive way. It’s like, “Somebody who’s in a desperate situation is asking me for advice, I’m going to give the best advice I can.” He really sits and thinks about it, and in doing that, he’s forcing his own mind to be responsible. He’s not allowing certain crazy thoughts to gain ground, you know?

The conversation continues on the next page.