Filmmaker Jeymes Samuel, photographed in London West Hollywood in December.
(Darren Vargas / For The Times)
Jeymes Samuel not only makes films: he writes, directs and scores them. Forget the “author.” It's a cinematic trinity. Each of his two features, the 2021 revisionist Western “The Harder They Fall” and now “The Book of Clarence,” a new spin on the old biblical epic set for wide release Friday, is told with the voice of Samuel in almost all possible expressions, from the words to the camera movements to the letters of various numbers. He wrote 11 original songs for the film and sings on all of them.
“A lot of people pretend to be fearless in their work and believe 100% in what they do,” says Jay-Z, Samuel's friend and producer of both films. “And we all hesitate and think: Is this right? I don't know if I've ever seen Jeymes hesitate. Which is contagious.”
Samuel, 44, is a lively cyclone of exuberant energy. He wears a t-shirt with big capital letters that screams his mantra: “OBEY YOUR CRAZY.” Larger than life, he stands 6 feet 2 inches, he has a huge smile and giant hands that are quick to smack you or wrap you in a bear hug. Over coffee at a posh Beverly Hills hotel, he breaks into song to make a point or reference a Prince song or a classic movie soundtrack, and as Seal's younger brother, his voice is silky and silver
Samuel, a West Londoner of Nigerian and Afro-Brazilian descent, is unashamed of his inspirations, which, in the new film, range from “Quo Vadis” to the comedy “Taxi.” They are all filtered through his mind, unique eyes and vocal cords with the ultimate goal, as Samuel says, “to be as Jeymes as possible.” That begins with the declamatory choice to populate historically white genres with predominantly black casts. On their film sets – “Clarence” was filmed in Matera, Italy, doubling Jerusalem around the time of Christ – music plays from giant speakers between takes, triggering dance parties for the cast and crew, with Samuel joining in. head.
“I think there's a kid in Jeymes that's very alive, that you can see,” says actor LaKeith Stanfield, who plays Clarence and his twin brother Thomas in the new film. “He puts us all in this really jovial place. And creating from that place is something special.”
LaKeith Stanfield in the movie “The Book of Clarence.”
(Moris Puccio / Legendary Entertainment)
“Clarence” takes several pages from Hollywood’s Golden Age epics like “Ben-Hur” and “Samson and Delilah,” blatantly beginning with cards printed in a nostalgic scroll font and Samuel’s majestic orchestral music that It goes back to the scores of Miklós Rózsa. The premise of this original story arose from a reference in the New Testament to one of Jesus' apostles, Thomas, as a “twin”, so Samuel invented a twin brother named Clarence who does not believe Jesus' claims and decides get involved in this. the messiah himself, working miracles and preaching a gospel of knowledge.
On the surface, the movie looks like it's going to be a “Life of Brian”-type farce, and it's certainly full of jokes and anachronisms: Clarence smokes joints and a hookah, the characters go to a Roman nightclub and dance to the rhythm. of the 1981 funk song “Nights Over Egypt” and there's a wild joke starring Benedict Cumberbatch that's too good to ruin. There's also a Moog synthesizer and electric guitar featured prominently in the score, and modern and '70s split-screen viewpoints for the opening chariot race.
Samuel maintains that as long as a filmmaker is faithful to the internal logic he or she establishes for the world he or she is building, it's all fair game. “A blank page is the most beautiful thing ever,” he says. “We can establish completely new rule books.”
But “Clarence” is also heartbreakingly sincere, with earnest probings of faith, commentary on systems of oppression and depths of emotion in Stanfield's virtuoso double performance. The actor says he went even deeper than he planned. “Because of the freedom that Jeymes provides on set,” he says, “you feel free to explore and what you can take away from that is often really profound.”
At its core, Samuel says, his film is about self-discovery and redemption. It is also the story of the age of Jesus told through the prism of modern black identity: a film in which two friends, minding their own business, are suddenly harassed by a Roman stop and search, and where a mother , looking at her When her son is crucified, she laments: “They always take our babies!”
“The reason I have so much fun there,” says Samuel, “is because the hood is fun. So it's heartbreaking, right? So right before a car passes by, you're telling jokes, laughing, and doing all the silly things. Then the next minute you’re at a funeral.”
It's this complex mix of silly humor and dark joy, social gravity and real tragedy, erudite film references and guest bars from Lil Wayne, that helps create Jeymes Samuel's unique aesthetic. It's a mix of his many influences (the homage to “Taxi” can be seen in the opening credits) but taken to a completely new and crazy new place.
Samuel's recent explosion in Hollywood was preceded by his career as a hip-hop artist and producer under the moniker Bullitt. (He met Jay-Z after doing string arrangements for one of the rapper's songs in 2010.) But Samuel always planned to make movies. He got a Super 8 camera when he was 7 years old and, as he recalls, when he was young, he would call Pinewood Studios to ask for cans of unused film that he would use to make short films and music videos. (He made several with leftovers sent from the production of “The Mummy Returns.”)
Jeymes Samuel, photographed in London West Hollywood in December.
(Darren Vargas / For The Times)
It's a walking, singing film library, jumping from 70s film references to Yul Brynner quotes and vice versa. It was his childhood obsession with old Hollywood westerns that made him dream up his 2013 concept album “They Die by Dawn and Other Short Stories,” which was transformed into a short film starring Rosario Dawson and Michael K. Williams that Samuel financed. and filmed himself. four days.
When Baz Lurhmann asked Jay-Z to create the soundtrack for “The Great Gatsby” in 2013, the hip-hop mogul knew he had to hire Samuel. The two realized they needed an original project they could handle from start to finish, and the result was “The Harder They Fall,” filmed during the pandemic and starring an all-star cast that included Idris Elba, Jonathan Majors and Regina King. .
“I felt like I was making music so I could film,” Jay-Z says. “He was a filmmaker all the time. But I guess it's all part of him. Music was like his hit and his dominant hand is being a filmmaker.”
For Samuel, everything is part of the same creative ecosystem. He likes to say that he watches music and listens to movies. When he writes a script, he simultaneously creates musical themes for the characters and composes the music for the film. He came up with a different tune for Clarence and Thomas, and gave them to Stanfield before filming.
Jay-Z compares him to a child who never lost that sense of “wonder,” a time, he adds, “when our eyes are open to the world and anything is possible. It's like you're listening to someone's dreams and they manifest right in front of you.”
LaKeith Stanfield, left, and director Jeymes Samuel on the set of “The Book of Clarence.”
(Moris Puccio / Legendary Entertainment)
Stanfield, who also starred in “The Harder They Fall,” says he has never seen Samuel's energy drop. “The only time his energy changed was when he was eating and that was simply because he couldn't talk,” the actor says.
Samuel has been eager for this opportunity his entire life. He first came up with the idea (and one of the songs) for “The Book of Clarence” in 2004, when he was 24 years old and still “just discovering who I was as a human being. I still find myself. “I keep ignoring all the voices inside and outside my head that would say I should do something else with my life, not music or movies.”
He's already cooking up at least three more film ideas in his head (no hint from him), and he has a producer in Jay-Z eager to take the risk, plus a cast of disciples who would follow him anywhere.
Sometimes, Samuel admits, he questions his own ideas. “When you write, you find that your pen is fighting with your own mind,” he says. “But you just have to remember that you are telling the story that you want to hear. You're directing the movie you I want to see.”
Full of personality, “The Book of Clarence” could only have been written by a man. That requires a certain amount of faith, and Jeymes Samuel seems to have it in abundance.
