The Estate is a wild ride of a movie. It’s got the intrigue and mystery of The Talented Mr. Ripley meets the fun camp (and often dark humor) of Cruel Intentions. From a script by co-star Chris Baker and first-time feature director James Kapner, the story is in capable hands. The pair have crafted a neon-driven, thrillingly stylistic world that's also vaguely reminiscent of Paul Verhoeven — if he’d ever done molly and came of age in the 1990s.
Baker acknowledges how much the movies mentioned influenced him: “I watched some movies I probably was way too young to watch growing up, like Cruel Intentions and Wild Things and Basic Instinct. Incredibly outlandish films with a very specific tone, antiheroes and plain old villains that you love to watch…. I also loved the idea of a main character who was gay, but the whole story was not about his gayness. I still feel like that’s missing in films today. I wanted to write a movie that has those twists and turns, but also I’m proud this movie has that kind of representation.”
The Estate packs a big punch mainly in one, well, stately estate. The home itself is a character in the film as Baker’s character George and his stepmom Lux (played by a hysterical, extra-tanned and blonde Eliza Coupe) feel they are entitled to the place, which is still owned by Lux’s husband and George’s father, Marcello (played by a stately-looking Eric Roberts). Lux and George find Marcello intolerable even though it seems he mainly leaves them both to their own devices. Nevertheless, determined he deserves to get what’s coming to him when the suggestion is made he could easily be killed off Lux and George are on board — so they can get what they think they deserve.
Kapner enjoyed the challenge of a mainly one-location movie. “It’s a question of mother of invention — how do you tell a story with scale and scope, while also being confined to a budget that doesn't allow for that,” Kapner muses. “It’s a fun puzzle to solve, but really rewarding to stretch every element of the movie. Chris did a great job of letting his mind wander into dark crevices while being mindful of what kind of movie we could tell. We needed to make as strong a movie as possible with the resources we had and keep audiences hooked. The performances and the style of different sequences as the movie progresses I think really helped.”
While limited in scope, the movie doesn’t feel that way. Kapner said the house was a lucky get after much searching. “There’s a ton of great architecture in L.A., but it had to be very specific and gaudy enough, and also have kind of symmetrical nature to it. Not a lot of houses that we looked at really do. But this house was kind of scary. You can get lost in it. Every room in that house connects. We utilized that in blocking and staging and in the fight sequences and it worked really well. The house also lends itself to a lot of character detail. Marcello clearly bought that house decades before and had it decorated by the best decorator in Beverly Hills in 1991, and just left it like that.”
Baker chimes in that he was convinced the house was haunted: “No doubt,” he insists. “Our production designer (Matthew Siltala) so skillfully made the house look both rich and decaying. That house really spoke to us in that it scared us.”
Coupe as Lux is often scene-stealing throughout The Estate. She waffles so much between bitingly funny, uncertain, and as fearful as the best horror stars around. Additionally, she and Baker have undeniable chemistry amping each other up with entitlement, booze, banter and boys. Baker says she was made for the role. “She came in to meet us and sat right next to me, and for 10 to 15 seconds it was just the two of us talking like no one was there and we finished each other’s sentences. We just had an instant kinship.”
Kapner agrees that it was serendipity. “We were fans of hers, and it was clear Chris and Eliza had so much chemistry. She came in looking like a rockstar and Chris needs someone like that to play against. It was an honor and a gift to work with her.”
While writing about the ultra-rich and sometimes irredeemable is definitely in vogue right now (Succession much?). Of course, it does also come with some challenges when a character is absolutely not going to get a "save the cat" moment. But skilled screenwriter Baker was clearly in control of his characters.
“I have seen and studied a lot of careers where a lot of writer/actors write these badass roles for themselves where they can handle a gun, or they’re a genius, or very special diamonds in the rough, and for me, I love the idea of writing someone for myself that didn’t know what he was doing and would experience an incredible amount of hardship — but hardship that he put himself into. It was a big swing, but I think it really worked.”
Kapner expressed just how well it worked for a hyperbolic film: “Truth is rooted in the imperfections of the characters because we are all flawed. Chris imbued these characters with certain qualities, but you stay along for the ride with George because he is so misguided but earnest in what he wants. He wants the acceptance of his father and the upper echelons of society and the more wealthy, and ultimately just recognition and acceptance in general. It’s relatable, a character that has such a strong burning desire for something…and it’s really funny getting to watch people doing imperfect things all the time.”
When a mysterious and very handsome assassin offers to do in Marcello, a lot of the story’s drive stems from the triangle born between Chris, Lux, and hot assassin Joe (Greg Finley). One quickly wonders how this relationship will evolve and additionally if any or all of them could possibly think they won’t face consequences.
Baker particularly loves the three's a crowd scenario. “A lot of my favorite stories [are] where there are three people and it’s so obvious that there really can only be two.
Sometimes the two within the three shifts, but when I think about The Talented Mr. Ripley, La Piscine, or Cruel Intentions, I am thinking of all of those ways in which everyone feels when they are in a trio. There’s always an odd man out which is very relatable. I'm also thinking of those great posters with three heads. The rule of threes goes all the way back to Greco-Roman poems, and there’s something about it that is inherently narrative and interesting.”
As first-time feature filmmakers, Baker and Kapner effused just how much they learned. Baker loved the editing room. “It was fascinating how the changes — even if just by a number of frames — would affect the entire story.”
“It’s all a Jenga Tower," Kapner adds. "It was really great to get to breathe life into this thing together and to get it to where it is now really feels like an awesome achievement.”
The Estate is now available to stream everywhere in the United States, the UK, and Ireland.