David Lowery. Photo by Bret Curry, courtesy of A24
Asay: It seems like loss is such a big part of some of the films you’ve done. It’s a huge theme in both this film and Pete’s Dragon. Why is that?
Lowery: I think I’m just afraid of it. I haven’t lost anyone before their time, so to speak. I’ve had grandparents who have passed away because they’ve gotten old, and I’ve had friends who’ve passed away. But I’ve never lost people the way the characters in this movie do, or the way that Pete in Pete’s Dragon does. And I worry about that all the time. I think we all do. I think it’s a fairly universal fear.
And this movie and Pete’s Dragon—and all of my movies for that matter—have been an attempt to reconcile that inevitability. The fact that someday I will lose my parents.
I’m the oldest of nine children. I hope that I’m the first one to go so I don’t have to, you know, bury a sibling, but that might happen. I’m very aware that that might happen. And I don’t know how I will handle it. I know I won’t handle it well. I’m not a stoic person in that regard. And I’m very afraid of the emotions that I will feel when that inevitability comes to pass.
So telling these stories that deal with that and engage on that level is a way for me to prepare myself for the fact that, one day, I will have to be there when someone I love passes away, and deal with a world in which they no longer there. And that’s something we all have to deal with, and we all have to deal with it in our own ways. And my way is to make these films.