Punk Rock From The Sun

Director John Cameron Mitchell Talks Adapting Neil Gaiman’s Short Story How to Talk to Girls at Parties Into One of the Strangest Films You’ll See This Year…

Poppy-Jay Palmer

WORLDS COLLIDE IN JOHN CAMERON MITCHELL’S INDIE SCI-FI SPECTACLE HOW TO TALK TO GIRLS AT PARTIES. BASED ON NEIL GAIMAN’S SHORT STORY OF THE SAME NAME, THE FILM GOES FAR BEYOND THE PARTY AND VENTURES OUT TO EXPLORE A VERY UNIQUE ROMANCE BETWEEN TEENAGED HUMAN PUNK ENN (ALEX SHARP) AND AGELESS EXTRATERRESTRIAL BEING ZAN (ELLE FANNING), AND THE PROBLEMS THEIR LOVE CAUSES FOR THEIR RESPECTIVE CLANS. WE SPEAK TO MITCHELL ABOUT ALIEN COLONIES, PUNK CULTURE AND MORE…

PUNK’S NOT DEAD

“I grew up in the glam era rather than the punk era, but a lot of things rang true,” Mitchell says of reading the story for the first time. Though punk culture doesn’t feature much in Neil Gaiman’s short story, co-writer Philippa Goslett was keen to include the punk element because of Gaiman’s musical background. “He had a band when he was a teenager and they were asked to be signed but his dad wouldn't let him because it was a terrible contract,” Mitchell continues. “He always wonders what might have happened if he had made a punk record. I got more and more into it because of the punk [and] because of the central metaphor which is pretty much everyone is an alien when you’re fumbling around with sex and love at the beginning. Everyone’s an alien, period. Everyone has to go by their own rules.”

EXOTICA