Jeff Lipsky on His New Film Mad Women

Jeff Lipsky has known both the warm embrace of critical acclaim and the lash of critics' scorn.

His 2006 film, Flannel Pajamas, was a Sundance darling and lauded by The New York Times as "one of the most intimate screen portraits of a relationship ever attempted." But his new feature, Mad Women, has a 0.0 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes. The psychological family drama features an ex-con running for office who is married to a dentist accused of sexual abuse while high on LSD, and its graphic incest scene has caused critics from the likes of Variety and The New York Times to balk at the film.

Despite the reaction, Lipsky-—who'll answer questions from the audience after showings at Cinema 21 this weekend—couldn't be more proud of it.

WW: You started as a distributor with a film by one of your idols, John Cassavetes' A Woman Under the Influence, so when did directing become your goal?

Jeff Lipsky: Since I was 10 years old. Now I've made five films in the past 10 years, and I've seen my films actually transform people's lives. That films can do that—I think that's a small miracle. 

Do you think Mad Women has that effect? 

It's probably my best work. I consider it a dark satire. Like all of my work, it's provocative and explores themes of mothers and daughters. I don't think a person like [the mother] Harper Smith could exist in the real world, but if there was such a world, it'd be one where anything could happen. Her platform [eliminating the post office; sentencing people for littering cigarettes] is a little ridiculous, and it does reflect my hopes and dreams a bit.

What inspired your female characters: Harper, the politician mother; Nevada, the lost daughter; and Julianne, the one-eyed grandmother?

Obama had just taken his second oath, and every 24-hour news channel was only talking about the next presidential race. I got so tired of listening to canned speeches from the same cavalcade of politicians that I'd all heard before, none of whom could entertain me like Donald Trump does now. So I thought up this woman character who commits a crime of conscience and becomes a folk hero running for office.

Also, at the time, one of the big-box films was The Hunger Games, and I kept seeing Jennifer Lawrence with her bow, so I thought the grandma should have an eye patch and be an avid archer. I joke that it should've been called Hunger Games 4: Mad Women.

But most critics say it's too explicit. Vulture's review basically said it is all about sex, and New York Daily News called it "perverted but boring."

There's significantly more nudity and a dollop more sexuality [in Mad Women] than in most American films, but this is probably my least graphic film. I was not expecting this reaction. There's an 800-pound gorilla in the room right now...incest. People might say it's abuse, but I needed to bring the mother and daughter together closer than they'd ever been. It's this flashpoint. The scene recalls an earlier one where Nevada is young and crawls into the bed. The audience should remember that and embrace the moment as a lovely pastiche, beautiful realism. But that [incest] scene happens, and the audience is blinded for 20 or 30 minutes—it takes them that long to catch up with the characters.

What about scenes like the final one [where a man vulgarly ogles a woman in a bike shop] that are so sexually explicit?

You describe it as sexual; I describe it as the general asshole nature of most men. The rest of it is a satire—an alternate reality that is all family and warmth. That part is the magic of cinema. The final scene is a return to the real world. For me, the movie is about how difficult it is to remain idealist when the world is trying to play Whac-A-Mole with you.

Has the harsh criticism fazed you?

For me, the worst criticism of my film would be two people standing up after the credits and one asking, “So, where do you want to go to dinner?” I want people to love it, to be outraged, to express hatred—I just want them to talk about it for hours and days. That’s what art is. If you see Ant-Man, are you talking about it three days later? 

SEE IT: Mad Women opens Friday, Aug. 14, at Cinema 21, 616 NW 21st Ave., 223-4515. Director Jeff Lipsky will attend Q&As for showings at 7 pm Friday-Sunday, Aug. 14-16. $8.50.

WWeek 2015