Filmmaker Taormina ’13 Takes Us Home for the Holidays with ‘Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point’

Tyler Taormina ’13 doesn’t make “traditional” films, though they often center on suburbia. His debut feature, Ham on Rye, was a surreal, satiric coming-of-age film that the New York Times called “disquieting and poignant.”

His latest film, Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point, trains its lens on family and memories, but with Taormina’s joltingly original spin. It premiered at Cannes in May, and opens Saturday, November 8, in select theaters, including at the AMC Boston Common next to Emerson College.

Emerson Today talked to Taormina about the meaning of Christmas movies, his attraction to ensemble casts, and why Emerson graduates are “the best. Like, by far.”

Why a Christmas movie? Do you consider it a “Christmas movie” in the traditional sense?

Because Christmas is an American tradition of excess! This is a fact that we can be quick to critique, but with my heavy heart for our country, I wanted to show the beautiful excesses in our lives — countless memories that take the form of specific moments, faces, songs, gestures, and ornaments that we are left with — years later, they’re all we have left. I’m not sure if it’s fair to call memories ‘excesses,’ but they feel like they serve the same function as Christmas decorations in our homes, details that help us declare that this life is worth living. 

Miller’s Point is not a traditional film at all, but I do realize that there are certain aspects of the Christmas genre that are a staple to this film. For one, our relationship with our homes and the act of coming back home, and also the Charles Dickens-esque call towards gratitude, to wake up and realize the gifts that lay before us! 

Both Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point and your debut feature, Ham on Rye, feature ensemble casts. Is there something about writing for that structure that you’re drawn to?

Yes, I’m drawn to ensemble casts because they’re a great way to explore our modern alienation. A single-protagonist film is so engrained in not only the way we watch movies, but the way that we live our lives. We unfortunately live in a world where it’s incredibly easy to ‘otherize’ just about anybody, and that is clearly reflected in our relationship with protagonists in storytelling. I’m intrigued by cinema’s possibility to show us a collective protagonist, where we can realize that everyone around us is trapped as the main character in their own lives. 

Miller’s Point stars the children of two of the most renowned directors of the last 50 years (Francesca Scorsese and Sawyer Spielberg). But no pressure, right? 

Ha! I should say outright that their involvement in the film is not part of the design. It was not even intended, and they came into the fold the way any other actor (or non-actor) did— through being a friend of a friend.

However, it’s interesting, because the film is so rooted in generational strife. I think everyone can relate to the abrasion the child feels towards the parent, and vice versa. And this also applies to our generation of filmmakers. We’ve gotten lazy and take this medium for granted. So this pressure you speak of is certainly on my mind when I consider today’s filmmaking climate. 

What does it mean to you, as a director, to have a film premiere at Cannes? 

It means a great deal. And for the readers who don’t know, my collective, Omnes Films, had two films in Cannes this year (the other being Eephus by Emerson alum and Christmas Eve DP, Carson Lund ‘13). Omnes Films is a group of friends and collaborators who just so happened to meet at Emerson College around 2010. We’ve struggled to appeal to American, market-driven sensibilities, but Cannes Film Festival has allowed our work to be celebrated around the world. It’s an extreme honor. 

You’ve made a handful of albums, recording as Cloud. Are you still recording music? 

Not anymore, however, I dream of making a musical someday. And I should say, much of my music sensibilities have translated to filmmaking— not exactly in the auditory sense, but in the act of sitting through a feeling.  When I studied at Emerson, I would go to four or five concerts a week; many of them involved listening to harsh noises or soothing tones for hours at a time. It really shaped my ability to sit with a feeling in a totally sensorial way, less so in a logical (or plot-driven) one. 

What was your favorite class at Emerson? 

Two come to mind: Art of Noise with [Associate Professor] Maurice Methot, and Coming of Age with [Professor] Wendy Walters. It only now occurs to me that both of their names are alliterative. 

What’s something you learned at Emerson that has stuck with you? 

I’m an enormous champion of our college. To me, it was a mind-expanding moment of my life, as college should be, but oftentimes is not. I think of how Emerson College exposed me to post-colonialism, Marxism, and so on. But not just that, perhaps I would’ve found my way into those discourses eventually.

There are things about an education that you can’t put in a curriculum or syllabus. I’m thinking about the teachers who really took their knowledge and work very seriously — it’s infectious. And It’s no wonder that whenever I hire on film sets, Emerson alum are always the best. Like, by far. And everybody in Los Angeles knows it, too. Let’s keep the fire alive!