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An Inside Look At Nick Cave's "20,000 Days On Earth"

All images courtesy of Drafthouse Films On September 22nd, the musician Nick Cave will turn 57 years old—a total of 20,805 days spent on Earth. Over his 30-plus year career (or, roughly 11,000 days) as the frontman of the Bad Seeds and...

All images courtesy of Drafthouse Films

On September 22nd, the musician Nick Cave will turn 57 years old—a total of 20,805 days spent on Earth. Over his 30-plus year career (or, roughly 11,000 days) as the frontman of the Bad Seeds and Grinderman, Cave has established himself as one of the most notorious rock stars alive, and the man himself—offstage, without a mic—is hard to separate from the fame and mythology that surrounds his career and his iconic growl. It is this discrepancy between the character "Nick Cave" and the living artist who embodies him that marks the focus of 20,000 Days On Earth—the part documentary, part dramatic take on a day in the life of the Australian rock star and bona fide badass.

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Directed by Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard, the film tracks not just an impressionistic look inside the mind of the musician, but also raises larger questions about art and creativity. In The Creators Project's new documentary on the making of 20,000 Days On Earth—which features an exclusive clip from the film called "Mongolian Psychopath," as well as original music from Cave's score—Pollard explains that this "kind-of documentary" format allowed the directors to conspire with Cave to create a project that not only details "where his head's at and what drives him to make the work that he does," but that also explores the nature of "the creative spirit and what that burning spark in all of us is, and what we do with our time on Earth."

To achieve these lofty goals, the directors could neither make a run-of-the-mill, fly-on-the-wall documentary, nor could they use formal interview dialogue. Rather, they devised a structure similar to those of fiction films, but didn't write a script. "Everything that happened, happened live," explains Forsyth about the improvised scenes wherein Cave talks with his wife, his bandmates, and his therapist.

Furthermore, while the film examines constructed identities and human life, the directors also sought to ask, "What is it about culture that makes it able to consume its past? There has been a cultural slide towards doing things again—playing that classic album again from beginning to end." To engage with ideas about cultural memory and personal history, the film focuses on "those objects that act like mnemonic devices in your life, and are able to unlock the memory of a person or a place or a time."

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In the film, we see Cave pour over his own mementos and nostalgic treasures. Forsyth told us that the phrase Cave used to describe his objects was less than gratifying: "It's all shit, isn't it? But it was important to me at the time." Since the film wrapped, the directors have continued exploring this theme, designing a new sort of museum with help from Film Forum. Fittingly enough, it will be called The Museum Of Important Shit, and it will be a virtual, online collection project with space that will be "the retainer that archives everybody's important shit, whatever it is."

To start, they plan to include Nina Simone's chewing gum (which is referenced in the film), Cave's own objects, and ultimately, an open call for anyone to submit his or her very own… "shit." Tongue-in-cheek or otherwise, the project ensures that the 20,000 Days On Earth experience keeps expanding.

So even though we may not ever breach the inner world of Nick Cave the human, the film preserves the part of his identity that informs his legendary legacy. "Those personas—the Cohens, the Dylans, the Caves—" says Pollard, "they're kind of fragile. I think we should look after them. Our culture is shifting in meaning where there won't be too many of those in the future because we see too much." But with 20,000 Days On Earth, we get the Nick Cave he wants us to see.

20,000 Days On Earth will be released in the US on September 17th. For more information about the film, visit its website here.

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Also, our sister site Noisey is collaborating with Drafthouse Films to present Nick Cave live at Town Hall in New York City on September 20. Find more details here, as well as on the flyer below.

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