Summary
There is no film youll see quite likeJoel PotrykusVulcanizadora.
JOEL POTRYKUS: I went to college to be a film critic.
It just makes me feel fulfilled.
Image via Sob Noisse
I feel like its working, because I never know if these movies are going to work.
I dont know how to answer that without sounding really pretentious like It doesnt actually fit in any genre.
That, to me, is counterintuitive to what Im trying to do.
Image via Sob Noisse
How do you resist people trying to put you into a box and continue to push yourself?
It just has kind of happened organically.
It’s never something that I would ever use to describe my movies or my characters.
Image via Sob Noisse
I think that’s just inherent in the way people look at movies or art.
But, for me, the movies do evolve as I get older.
I think the older I get, the more emotionally invested I get in life.
I had a kid so suddenly Im starting to see the world through my sons eyes.
I dont think Well, Ill be dead in forty years.
I now think Well, my son will be alive for the next seventy years.
So thats a heavy trip.
Its more mature this time around maybe.
How Did Joel Potrykus Go About Bringing the Standout Monologue in ‘Vulcanizadora’ to Life?
POTRYKUS: The majority of the dialogue in the movie is improvised for Derek.
Like when he’s just kind of wandering around talking gibberish.
But that scene, specifically, was heavily written.
The cool thing is that I didn’t have to rehearse it.
Because I’d written it, it’s burned in my brain.
It mostly comes from making movies.
To me that was a no brainer.
Light me on fire before you make me anxious for the rest of eternity.
All those nightmarish things that Derek is talking about or all those anxieties are directly from me.
Which then causes anxiety.
Thats me speaking as a dude terrified of being nervous for the rest of my life.
Is making a film like this cathartic or is there still that nervousness?
How does it feel?
POTRYKUS: This is the first movie Ive ever made that I could describe as cathartic.
Things that really terrify me.
This one is the first one Ive opened up with which has been great for me.
POTRYKUS: Its even more difficult because you have less people to help you solve all the problems.
Its just a ball of overwhelming amount of details.
But that may also mean you have to figure out whether you have enough money to make your movie.
POTRYKUS: Oh exactly.
Its just gutting to me.
I cant think of moviemaking any other way than to work with the people I trust and trust me.
POTRYKUS: Its so real man.
It just totally happens to so many dudes I know.
I just cannot get into that system.
How Does Joel Potrykus Approach Editing a Film Like ‘Vulcanizadora?’
I think about the extended monologue and how that is cut together in particular.
POTRYKUS: Thats a great question, thats a really great question.
It sounds silly, but its 100 percent instinct in the moment.
I just want to look at somebody else for a second.
The other characters is the audience and I want to see the people around me.
I want to see how theyre seeing Pearl in that moment.
Is their expression happy?
Its just purely an instinct thing as seeing the film through the eyes of the audience.
You do it based on feel, based on what serves the scene, and what serves the moment.
At the end of the day, Im just making these movies for me.
I just want to make cool shit that I would want to see.
I think thats one of the first things theyre going to cut in half or cut out completely.
For me, as an audience, this is great, this is mesmerizing.
Vulcanizadorascreened at the 2024 Fantasia International Film Festival.
