The script opens with Joey Larabedo (Tim Roth) emerging from Sing Sing prison and finding his way back to the neighborhood where he grew up with his older brother Tommy (James Russo). We are slowly introduced to these two twisted personages, starting with a biting montage of prison flashbacks, during which Joey is glimpsed in a shower room being forced down and mutilated. Released back into the world after six years, with only forty dollars and the clothes on his back to call his own, Joey shows up at his old house, only to find that his key no longer fits the lock. He owns nothing, and believes he knows nothing. With his re-entry into the outside world, things are about to take a violent, and possibly enlightening turn for him.

In the shadow of an establishment bankrupt in every sense except the financial, inhabited by swinish dictators like Michael Eisner and Harvey Weinstein, I guess it's become easy for mainstream cinephiles to forget what kind of impact Scorsese's Taxi Driver must have had back in 1976. In those days, NO movie cost $100 million to make, and an aggressive mainstream opponent like Paul Schrader had a chance. Scorsese was not yet a legend and Hollywood, although corrupt and one dimensional since it's very birth, still remained open to new ideas — once in a while. If you can take a step back far enough to see how the lease once given to savage, bold films has now elapsed to an all encompassing prejudice, it might be obvious why another film that operates with intentions similar to Taxi Driver's would have no chance today. These intentions aim to question, examine, and plead for an end to the darkness that working people face, every day.

Hollywood doesn't know that darkness. And when they try to pretend, it's always a horrible insult. This talk of darkness and angst isn't to say that the mise-en-scene of Giovinazzo's No Way Home is existentially motivated. Far from it. The characters in this picture are too hungry and too broke to care about the meaning of life. No Way Home is a film that knows desperation like few others. Love him or loathe him, Giovinazzo is the genuine article, and he has achieved a blunt celluloid realization of himself in spite of a climate of artistic fascism. It is one of a very small number of such unlikely film break-throughs and is something to be celebrated. No Way Home brings with it a distinct, unflinching hyper-verité quality of unmerciful torment, of life without poetry or magic. And of the sort of redemption that feels like any other moment, because it is. The film glorifies nothing, and certainly not the urban starving class it accurately portrays.

The landscape is painted in shades of grey and sepia tone. Black and white, in color. Producer Bob Nickson jokingly remarked last year at a New York screening of No Way Home, that the film's last 15 minutes, especially in the unrated print, "make it quite obvious why film noir pictures were shot in black and white."

With the considerable development of Giovinazzo's literary skill, and the collaboration of three extremely gifted actors in the lead roles, a hard-nosed reality begins to drive the narrative along with subtle aggression.

Only a few short minutes into the film, Tim Roth brilliantly created a mystique and a depth for Joey Larabedo. Before the opening credits have even finished, Roth has you riveted by the small nuances of this timid character.

With his affecting sensitivity, intrigue is pulled out of you, which acts as a substantial aid to No Way Home's chilling dramatic urgency. In this role, he expresses a profound understanding of Joey's plight, the emotional schisms which only compound the severity of his own mistakes. James Russo is perfectly sleazy as Tommy. Russo is in a less empathetic position as a manipulative weasel, who, while at fault for everything that goes wrong, cannot be utterly despised. He is still family, which is the central tragedy at the heart of No Way Home. The film could even be seen as a modern day Cain and Abel story.

Caught between the two is Tommy's long-suffering wife Lorraine, played by Deborah Kara Unger of Crash. Being the most understated and least written character of them all, she makes her presence acutely known, eventually becoming a fascinatingly catalytic presence between the other two leads. Unger's dramatic sub-approach is both strikingly bittersweet and sadly distant.

The film's climax, astonishingly visceral, explicit, and drenched in all the right details, transpires so rapidly you've barely caught your breath before you realize what has happened.

In No Way Home, reality is merciless, true to Giovinazzo's intentions. It's New York hardship as expressed by someone who really knows, who has accepted that surviving is not necessarily any victory at all. Not for everyone.

Buddy Giovinazzo's been doing pretty well these days. His third film is slated for a stateside release any day now, re-titled The Unscarred (from Everybody Dies). His screenplay Potsdamer Platz has been optioned by Tony Scott, who plans to direct in early 2002.

This interview was conducted in 1998, while Buddy was in Los Angeles.

GG: How did you feel about working with name actors, after only having previously worked with unknowns?

BG: Very natural. I'm an actor's director. Even in Combat Shock, not all the acting is really good, but the people that had talent, I think I got a really good performance out of them.

GG: Ricky was great in that.

BG: Yeah, my brother never acted before. He wasn't an actor, but in Combat Shock, I think that he just... makes the film. You know, I'm really very caring with the actors. I try and bring as much as I can to the table, as far as making it comfortable, and making sure they understand what's up. And you know, casting is... casting is probably more than half of it, although the casting job is much easier.

GG: What happened between Combat Shock and Gasoline Alley, or No Way Home? You were teaching at SVA weren't you?

BG: Yeah, I taught at SVA, and I also taught at the college of Staten Island. That's how I was paying my rent and surviving. I was trying to make a film; I actually came so close to so many films...

GG: I've never been [to Staten Island], but is it really as depressing as it's depicted in your movies?

BG: Worse. (Laughs) It's just... well, for the exteriors, we didn't have to do anything. We didn't have to dress anything down. Now, when I grew up... I grew up in Staten Island, on the streets, and it looked just like Mayberry. You know, it was a bustling, shopping... before there were malls, everybody shopped out in the street, just the one main street, in No Way Home. [That was] like the mall, it was packed with people. So what happened is, during the decline of the '80s, or in the '70s I guess, it became... a shithole.

GG: Well, that's something that... well, I'm reading your book [Poetry and Purgatory] right now, and there is a mention from a character in the book, Uncle Ted, that the construction of the bridge somehow led to the decline and fall of Staten Island prosperity.

BG: Yeah. That's exactly right. Staten Island was like a country, you know, it wasn't part of the city. When I was a kid, people would ride horses along the street, and people owned horses, and there was a lot of wildlife, and then once the bridge came up, they just overbuilt everything, and all the woods and swamps that we used to play in as kids were gone, for these big apartment buildings. And they weren't prepared for that type of growth. They never built up the streets. All they ever did was... they'd knock down one house, and put up ten houses, where there used to be one. So, it really just added up to overcrowding, and economic decline, and... Staten Island, actually... the Chamber of Commerce is not happy at all with my two films.

GG: They've commented on them?

BG: They've commented on Combat Shock. I had a screening, on the Island, and they just... really did not like the film at all, and felt that I was doing an injustice. And I said to them pretty much what I said to you: "I didn't touch a thing. That's how it is." I found those places, you know. They weren't hard to find, they're right out in the street.

GG: Now do you see your films as... do you see yourself as a spokesman for Staten Island, in a kind of way that John Waters stays in Baltimore, or George Romero in Pittsburgh, that type of "hometown" thing?

BG: No, not at all. You know, it's just where I grew up, and obviously the sense of home and the sense of place, are a strong pull for me, but it's... well, let's face it, they're not very pleasant places in either film, to live. But you know what? Staten Island is for me, indicative of a lot of places in America, of decline, where instead of it getting better, it's getting worse. And your sense of security is no longer there; you don't have a home there anymore. The whole thing of "home" ... no way home. There is no home, you can't go back.

GG: So you don't think you're making your third film in Staten Island then? Have you had your say on the place?

BG: (laughs) That's kind of a coincidence. From a production standpoint, I love shooting in Staten Island. Nobody bothers you, nobody fucks with you. You basically go in, take over American Nightmares a.k.a. Combat Shock, the neighborhood, and become part of the neighborhood. And people are really great there. And plus, being that I'm from there, it's almost like, "this kid's coming home to shoot a movie." But... I don't know. I might. The next film I'm doing takes place in East Berlin, so it's a far cry from Staten Island. I might come back, I can't say I never will.

GG: Both of your films are totally 100% Staten Island.

BG: Yeah, maybe, but in both films, there's really nothing that says it's Staten Island. Although in Combat Shock at the end of the film, there's a chase sequence, and you can see this sign, it says "The Refugee Church Of Staten Island". But people who don't know Staten Island have asked me if it's Pittsburgh.

GG: (long laugh)

BG: Yeah, seriously, I have a feeling it looks a lot like Pittsburgh. And parts of Detroit also. I've had a couple people ask me if it was Detroit. See, I know Staten Island, I go there to shoot. But I have a feeling that Staten Island is indicative of a lot of places in America. It's more about their characters, than where they are. I mean, these guys would be the same, whether they lived in Pittsburgh, or Florida.

GG: How did you get the deal for No Way Home? I mean, after so long, and so many years... I know that Combat Shock was recognized by some people [Steve Bissette, for example, in DEEP RED] as an important, brilliant film, but they didn't seem to be the types of people that might grant you access to James Russo and Deborah Unger and Tim Roth.

BG: To tell you the truth, anyone who thought Combat Shock was a brilliant film... I haven't met them yet. I'm in Los Angeles now, and... Combat Shock does not exist. I can't go to anybody out here, with Combat Shock. They never heard of it, they don't want to know about it, they don't even want to see it.

GG: So how then did you get financing, cooperation, production, etc., for No Way Home?

BG: I tried to make No Way Home for about four and a half years, with different people attached, and tried to... you know, I wrote No Way Home to do it like Combat Shock, for like $40,000. That's why it pretty much takes place in the house. I was thinking $40,000, the family lives in the house, and all this fucked up shit happens. And believe it or not, I couldn't raise $40,000. It's really hard. In some ways it's harder to raise forty thousand than it is to raise three million. Finally, after four years, Tim Roth read the script, and just loved it. He called me up, and said, "I want to do this." And on the basis of Tim's interest, I was able to raise the money.

GG: You seem to be really attracted to people in tough situations, and you have a knack for detailing and following, step by step, what happens to them along the way to the final collapse. What is valid, to you, about such bleak stories?

BG: (pause) It's more interesting to me. I'm much more interested in that part of life than happy, rich, you know, people that have everything. That's boring to me, and I'm not interested in that. I don't know. Maybe just trying to understand why people do the things they do. I really don't know. Believe me, it's destroyed my career. I repeat, it's destroyed my career. When I would try to get work off Combat Shock... I tried to get work even on bad horror films, you know, horror films that nobody wanted to direct, and those I would lose out on because of Combat Shock. Producers would see it, and they would just say, you know, "We don't want this! God forbid this guy does it again!" You know, "We don't want to do this type of film."

GG: The predicaments you create are scary as hell. This guy has no money, people are coming to kill him, so he's got to cut the drugs he's selling with oregano. The character Ricky played in Combat Shock was in a similar trap. They're both in hell, more or less. Did you grow up as poor as you depict them? Did you have any traumatic childhood experiences that left you pre-disposed to some things?

BG: I think everyone has traumatic childhood experiences. I mean, I could say I went to the circus when I was four and my balloon broke. You know, that's life. I can't say I was dirt poor, but I certainly wasn't wealthy. When I was growing up, me and my brothers were probably lower- middle class. But we never had money. Like, we'd have spaghetti every night. So, I'm much more attuned to the idea of not having money, and that pressure. People that have money, they don't understand what it's like to not have money. To wake up every day and realize, "What am I gonna do today?" Especially [in Los Angeles]. Out here, people just don't have any conception of what it is to not have money. To be poor. I find that interesting. To be poor in Los Angeles is different than being poor in New York. Being poor in Los Angeles means you only have $30,000 in the bank because you drive a BMW. Being poor in New York means, "Can I afford a slice of pizza for lunch?" I think people in New York have more empathy for the downtrodden, for the down and out. Out here, you can be broke, but you can't tell people you're broke. Out here, you have to pretend like you're doing great. Everything's great. Your project's great, your film's great, it's happening, everything's great. You don't need a thing. And that was different to me, after living my whole life in New York. New York is very real to me. In New York, you know who your enemies are, and who your friends are. And out here, you tend not to know the difference. Everybody's friendly. They're smiling as they're screwing you out of a deal. And it's only business, you don't take it personally. In New York, you don't take it personally. If you're fucking me on a deal, I take that personally.

GG: Now, I think when people see your films, it's obvious that you're catching every single blow that someone's going to get. Like, in Combat Shock, when Ricky pulls his sneakers on, his shoelace snaps. It's these assaults of disappointment you deal out to characters, that makes me wonder what you have been through, to allow you to convey this attack from reality so clearly.

BG: I don't think that's so horrible, that's just how life is. You know, your sock has a hole in it, and your shoe-lace does break. You find something and you think it's gonna give you some kind of reward, and you get fucked. That's nothing. I think that's life, how I see life as being.

GG: Cracktown was so hideous it became surreal. You'll have a dead dog lying in the street, a junkie convulsing, and hookers flashing knives, and this is all in the same scene, in that book.

BG: (chuckles)

GG: You're very much at home in a world of brutality.

BG: Well, that's more real to me. The world I'm living in right now. How long have you been living in New York?

GG: A few years.

BG: Well, Times Square really was like that at one time. Times Square was the biggest sewer... transvestites, drug dealers, criminals, murderers, dogs, I mean... garbage, porn, everything. It was nothing like it is now. And there was something real about that. That's the other side of life that you can't... just try and clean away. Because it's there. I'm really interested, I'm really curious as hell to know where everything went in Times Square. I mean, those places don't just disappear and don't exist anymore. They're somewhere, where did they go?

GG: Poetry and Purgatory is so sad, reading it is completely like drowning, just drowning in it. From people all over the world that were just screening the film. I think that's what's going to happen with No Way Home.

GG: Have you had any experiences with people in New York that you drew on for character details in your book? Junkies and prostitutes, lowlife types?

BG: Absolutely, completely. Everybody in Poetry and Purgatory is somebody that I know. They're composites. I can't say that they're direct, specific people. They're definitely composites... but just that shit that takes place on the street, the stuff that he's seen, I've seen.

GG: You told me you are working on a new film... is that the one that's going to take place in Europe?

BG: Yeah. I'm not writing this. This is a film called Everybody Dies. And it's being written by a guy called Todd Kolmenicki. We're going to be shooting in East Berlin. East Berlin is like the lower East side without crime. It's one of the most beautiful cities I've ever been to.

GG: What makes it seem like a Buddy Giovinazzo film, in the script that he's writing?

BG: It's actually the most commercial piece I've done. It's a thriller, involving murder with these Americans, in East Berlin... I think what's going to make it... make my imprint on it is... gonna be really compelling characters, the characters are really dark, and just, in the setting, the attention to detail. I'm going to go into a slightly surrealistic mode on it. My feeling is... I've been to East Berlin a few times, and I've gotten to spend some time there. To me, it's like this wild city that had been repressed for many, many years and now they are free, with art and film and books... and nightclubs, and I just want to try and capture that. It's almost like a child giddiness, of having this freedom, being able to travel wherever you want, into the west. And I'm going to try and capture that, by giving it a certain surrealistic quality in the details. I don't know exactly how, I mean, that's something I'm gonna really have to try, as a director, to just look at each scene, and try to give it a little kick. I don't want to tell a conventional story in East Berlin, that's for sure.

GG: What is your take on New York now? Because your books, and Combat Shock, were written and produced in a different era, when New York was still crime infested, when it was a lot dirtier. Now that it's become sterilized almost, by the mayor, how do you feel about it taking the appearance it has?

BG: Well, you know, for me, Times Square is that way, the East Village is getting that way. I still keep my apartment; I have an apartment on East 4th Street and First Avenue that I sublet. So, I'll always be a New Yorker. I'm coming back. I think that they... might be able to clean up the surface, but there's still going to be the mental degradation. There's still going to be poverty. But I don't think I'm ever going to be searching for a subject matter or material to work with, in New York. I'm not worried about it. It's cyclical. You know, they're having a good time, there's money all around. But the next time a recession hits, everybody's going to be starving. Everybody that has those expensive apartments in the East Village is going to be evicted.

Interviewer: Gene Gregorits