As posted earlier this year,Gwen’s song ”Cool” is on the soundtrack to the critically-acclaimed movie,Somewhere,opening December 22.Now in this interview with FilmInFocus,director Sofia Coppola explains why she chose the song for a particular scene:
Q: Cleo is introduced in an ice-skating sequence. How did you conceive this as an understated turning point in the story – with the Gwen Stefani song [“Cool”] in mind?
SC: The story starts out darker, and just by herself, Cleo brightens it up. I wanted Johnny to have to do some parent thing in the beginning, so [it became Cleo’s] taking ice-skating lessons. The dreamy gliding on the ice is her purity, in contrast to the strippers [we’ve seen him with] in his world. I wanted the source music to be music that would really be playing there [at the rink], part of the experience. “Cool” is a sweet song, and you believe that an 11-year-old would be ice-skating to it. I’m so happy we got that song, because I love the way it works with that [sequence]; it’s so sincere.
I wanted to show that she’s a girl right on the cusp of transforming into a teenager; the way Johnny is with women, I thought it must be complicated to have a daughter who’s on the verge of becoming a woman. So, to me, the sequence is about that.