While unpacking during his move from New York to Berlin, Hal Hartley discovered a note that he had written to himself in 1994, three years before the release of his epic film Henry Fool.

“Did you know this?” Hal Hartley turns to Parker Posey and asks. “It said, ‘Henry Fool, first of an indefinite series.’ I forgot all about that.”

Hartley had joked about making a sequel to Henry Fool, even while shooting it, but he had forgotten about how far back he had constructed the master plan. The second film in the series of at least three, Fay Grim opens in theatres on May 18 and is scheduled for release on DVD four days later. (In Toronto, where it debuted in September at the city’s International Film Festival, it is scheduled for theatrical release on May 25.)

Henry Fool focused on the title character, a dismal author who enlisted the help of Simon Grim, a garbage man, to write a novel. After killing a neighbor, Henry escapes, but Simon is thrown in jail for abetting in his getaway.

Fay Grim, opening nearly a decade later, revolves around its title character, Henry’s wife and Simon’s sister, played by Posey, who is told that her husband is dead. She travels to Paris to retrieve his belongings and suddenly becomes part of a bizarre espionage thriller.

“Like Henry Fool, this film is built as an engine to reflect what’s happening in the world around this time,” Hartley tells andPOP. “I try to collect relevant examples of people of the world as it is. I’m kind of interested in these films being an imprint, a fossil from a particular period of time so that they will be dated. Thirty years from now you can look back it and say, ‘that’s 2006.’”

There’s a certain type of person who will see a Hal Hartley film – sophisticated, educated, well-versed in politics and world issues, cultured, but not snobbish.

So, desired, though not a description of many.

“When I make a movie, I’m hoping the most possible amount of people in the world who will appreciate it will see it,” Hartley tells andPOP. “If millions of people went to see a Hal Hartley film on its opening weekend, we would live in a different world.”

A better world, perhaps, but not this world. Fay Grim isn’t expected to debut at No. 1 in its opening weekend – not by critics, not by Hartley and not by the film’s producers.

Mark Cuban, owner of the NBA’s Dallas Mavericks and founder of HDNet Films, one of Fay Grim’s production companies, was well aware of the specific audience it would bring in. Cuban put up the cash anyway.

“Of course,” Cuban told andPOP recently, when asked if he considered the relatively small target audience. “Not every movie is going to be a box office smash. [But] I think Hal is an incredible talent and thought our audiences would love him.”

The name Hal Hartley may not sound familiar. Revered by the film industry, Hartley has opted to keep a low profile and direct low-budget independent features instead of taking advantage of his acclaim. In the early 1990s, when the praise started the flow in, Hartley could have become the biggest director in the world. Instead, he opted to keep directing films he wanted to do, not ones people necessarily wanted to see. An article from a 2005 issue of New York magazine was titled, “What Ever Happened to Hal Hartley?”

Despite some box-office, and even critical, failures in recent years, Hartley never lost the respect of the acting community.

“Artistically, he’s just amazing,” Posey says. “Actors love saying words that are well written and that have a lot going on.”

Jeff Goldblum, who appears in Fay Grim as a CIA agent, wasn’t in Henry Fool. When he was approached about joining the cast, all he needed to hear was that Hartley was the director.

“He’s one of the rare birds in the world of filmmaking who is high in integrity, and artful, and brilliant,” Goldblum says. “He is a musician, dancer, chorographer, intuitive guy. Eloquent even.”

And he trusts his actors.

“We tried to talk about his ideas and the plot and the character but he is confident and masterful to the degree that he trusts himself and trusts you and kind of leaves it to the moment,” says Goldblum, discussing the process of shaping his character.

The character of Fay has naturally changed since Henry Fool, because of the time elapsed between films. Posey hadn’t thought much about the character for several years, yet when it came time to shoot the project, she didn’t have to consider how much that character had changed.

“I didn’t have to consider it because I matured,” she says. “It was just happening. Fay’s changed. Fay’s grown.”

With a superb cast and perhaps more smarter people in the world than in 1997, maybe there is an audience for this film after all.

“I think Hartley fans will certainly love it, but I think Fay Grim will help Hal find new fans as well,” Cuban says.

“I think Fay Grim might surprise people.”






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