My Thoughts On McFarland USA and My Talk With Director Niki Caro

“McFarland, USA” is inspired by a 1987 true story, in which an unlikely band of inexperienced, under-equipped, young Latino runners with exceptional determination rise to become cross-country state champions under the leadership of their coach, Jim White. Over the years since then, the McFarland High School cross-country teams have won nine state championships and the small school is considered a powerhouse in the sport.

Coach Jim White is retired now, but if you go to McFarland, chances are you will see him out there on his bike, keeping up with the kids every evening with a lot of his original team running alongside as well. White retired in 2002 after teaching in McFarland schools for 40 years and coaching for 25 years.

A number of the original runners on the championship 1987 cross-country team became educators in the McFarland school district. The former teammates are not only working in their hometown, but also raising their families there and actively supporting the cross-country teams of today by coaching, helping out with the meets and practices and donating goods or money so the teams have what they need.

Three out of the seven young actors on the team in the movie are from the McFarland area—Sergio Avelar who plays Victor Puentes and Michael Aguero, cast as Damacio Diaz, are actual runners and Ramiro Rodriguez, as Danny Diaz, was a champion soccer player.

Director Niki Caro was amazing to meet.  It is so great to get the insights of the movie and why things are done they way there were. One of the first questions we asked her was how directing this movie different from movies she normally directs.

I like to work in a certain way. I figured out the way I work best which is real stories and real people. Go to the real community. Ask for their collaboration. Keep my eyes and my ears open and my mouth shut and just see how life is lived. Be really observant. It would be really arrogant and stupid for me, a middle class urban mother of two from New Zealand, to presume what life’s like to impose my will onto the lives of Mexican teenagers who work in the fields and run. I know nothing about that, but I can learn.

I’ve become I think really a lot more competent, because I have a lot of skill now and going into communities and representing them faithfully. I hope respectfully but certainly lovingly. Shine a light on what those lives are like. Nothing gives me a bigger thrill than to show people from little places how beautiful they are and show other people how beautiful they are.

We then asked about working with Kevin Costner.

It’s awesome. He’s so handsome. He’s one of the great actors. He’s certainly a bona fide movie star. If that wasn’t enough, he’s a really good director. He’s a mountain of a man, you know in every way. Yet, there’s nobody more humble. I couldn’t have wished for a better partner, collaborator, his skill, his experience, his wisdom, and just his decency as a man. Breathtaking.

The movie star, Kevin Costner, is gonna come onto my set and he’s gonna do this thing. We should all be so lucky, right? You hope because of the sort of director that I am that he will show up as an actor and not bring kinda the movie star stuff with him. Not only did he show up as an actor, but he showed up as himself and the man he is. He’s so decent. He’s so honorable, so humble, and so generous to those boys. It was very moving for me to watch the way — how fatherly he was with them and what the boys did to him.

I’m so happy. I watched the movie and I know that the relationship you see on screen is totally genuine. Now when I called cut, he didn’t go off and get in his trailer. He was still hanging out with the boys, subtly guiding them, not imposing his will ever on the production or on me, but just supporting those kids as young men. This goes right back to when they first met. We had a table read. He just said to them, “You boys remember this. You will remember this — what you’re about to experience, you will remember for the rest of your lives. This is about to be one of the most important and defining things you will experience as a human being and enjoy it, you know.” What a guy. There’s a long answer, wasn’t it? I could talk all day.

We then asked her favorite scene:

There are a lot for a lot of different reasons. There’s a scene, it’s really small where the kids go in the bus and there are kids holding signs in the road and they’re running behind the bus. There’s no sound except just for Antonio Pinto’s music. In the screenplay, I’d written that the kids on the bus were heroes for the first time in their lives. That for me that moment in the film I think it’s perfect. It’s perfect. It shows how meaningful it is for a small town when its own kids are achieving something. The kind of scale of achievement, it’s just tiny, but it’s so big for this town. That has started a legacy that will continue, and that’s so inspiring to me.

Of course, there are always challenges with a film:

Honestly from the filmmaking perspective, I looked at the story and I thought it’s not hard. I’ve got the goods to do this. What I completely underestimated was that virtually every scene in this movie has eight people in it. We were very, very clear — Disney and myself and everybody involved, that this was not going be a movie about Kevin Costner saves a bunch of little brown people. That’s a horrifying idea to all of us and to Kevin himself. The central idea of this movie is that this is not a big white guy saving brown people but a flawed guy that is redeemed as a coach, as a father, as a human being by these kids and by their community. As a filmmaker, that means when I go onto set to shoot however many scenes I’ve gotta shoot that day that it can’t just be lots of shots of Kevin doing his thing. They’ll all be in the wide shot. Every one of those kids had their own coverage. Every one of them had their own story and every one of them had all the care and attention put into them that I would put into whoever had a lead role. That meant it was really time-consuming.

We had to work fast because you know, you never have enough money, you never have enough time. It meant that everybody had to be right on their game all the time and they were. Those kids were amazing. Even the ones that had never set foot on a film set were just totally professional.

Did you know that they did some of the actual filming in McFarland?

We shot there, but not the whole schedule because we couldn’t afford it. Trust me, I would have been there. I would probably still be there if they’d let me. The first thing I do when I commit to a real story is go to the real place. Coach White and Cheryl were really kind. They hosted me. I went and stayed with them, and they took me all around. I met everybody.

The doors were flying open to McFarland, and it starts with Jim. He’s the unofficial mayor. When we went out there to shoot, the town couldn’t do enough for us. There’s so much love and pride there. So much. They were so happy that we were there. It’s so nice. You go into real places, and it’s so exciting.

They have a film crew there, and lots of lights and trucks. The circus has come to town. After a few weeks, you kind of get annoyed after the novelty’s passed, and they’re ready for you to go. Not so here. They just seem to love us, and we love them right back. Every time we shot, everybody would come. We’d put a bit of tape along the road so they didn’t get in the shot. All of those scenes that we shot there, the scenes around the market and stuff, believe me just out of frame there are 300 people.

Lastly, we asked how the movie had affected her. This is movie you can’t walk out of not affected.

I have the best job in the world. I get to go right into other people’s communities and their lives, and I love that. I didn’t anticipate having finished the movie and we’ve made a profoundly American film. That’s amazing to me. It really is. And it so happens that 99 percent of the people in the movie are Mexican American, but it is an American film.

I don’t know if any of you guys were in the press conference we just did with Kevin, but he said something that I’m so moved by and I will carry with me for the rest of my life which is that there is nothing more American than parents wanting more for their children. I’m from New Zealand. I’m a parent. My family is more important to me than any of it, but what I observe in this country is that how parents are so into their kids here. It’s so amazing.

I think this movie gives us a really accurate reminder of the lengths to which parents will go to give their children a better life. Nothing is more inspiring than that. Nothing is more American than that.

I love this movie. It is truly a story about these 7 boys, but it also a story about how a town came to rally for these boys. It’s a story of redemption and worth. It’s a movie you can take your kids to and not have to worry about what they will see in the theater. They will learn a something and walk out of the theater inspired to be the best they can be. It still amazing me how a good movie can invoke such strong emotions and this movie does just that. If you don’t find yourself yelling at the screen “GO, GO, GO!” by the end of the movie, I’ll shocked. You get so immersed into the story that you want these kids to win!  Since I have been home from this trip, I’ve told everyone I talk to that they need to see this movie!

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McFARLAND, USA is rated PG and is now playing in theatres everywhere!