Two Gates of Sleep: hitting the snooze button with Brady Corbet

A headcold pushes tears from Brady Corbet's eyes as he peers through a fug of medication at the TV screen above his head. His girlfriend is up there, doing a pixelated strut along a red carpet, and Corbet is being asked a question he can't focus on. On screen, a presenter babbles French at him, says his girlfriend's name, then babbles some more. The question is repeated. "I'm sorry", says Corbet, sliding his eyes from the TV. "I knew she was in Cannes. It's just that – that's really weird. What was the question?" He's here to talk about Two Gates of Sleep, the debut film by New York-based artist Alistair Banks Griffin. In the film Corbet plays Jack, a reticent, headstrong country boy living in an isolated shack on the Louisiana/Mississippi border with his dying mother and his – mysteriously ellusive – brother, Louis. Brady's sure that David Call, the actor that plays Louis in the movie, was supposed be here helping with these interviews, but he's yet to see him. In the film he and Call as Jack and Louis carry their mother's coffin for miles into Mississippi, through thick forest and along a deep river to what they've decided is her final resting place. As the two travel the coffin becomes waterlogged and picks up more and more weight. It weighed goodness knows how much by the end. Sat here, with this blossoming cold, and facing another hour of interviews, Corbet is drawing comparisons. For this kind of heavy lifting, he could sure do with Call's help. "The title is a reference to Homer's Odyssey", says Corbet, letting a stock answer take some of the weight. "Did you hear what he had to say about the gate of horn and the gate of ivory? Dreams can … dreams … dreams can pass through the gate of horn, but not through the gate of ivory. And so, for me, the title is in reference to these two vessels - one who accepts death by letting it pass through him and one who is so torn up that he can't go on". He coughs and swallows, dryly. "The film starts operating on a level which is metaphysical. Luckily, I think that there are enough visual indicators that it's not that vague, but it is strange." As he talks Corbet is aware of a familiar voice – Call's voice – punctuating his answer with comforting "sures", "rights" and "yeah yeahs". Brady turns, but he thinks there's nothing there. Besides, Call's shooting in New Mexico, isn't he? He drags his focus back to the interviewer, who's now asking him whether working on a film like this - a near-silent movie that smudges an already scratchy line between fantasy and reality - stays with you after you've finished shooting. "Well, a lot of it's very bleak", he says. "And … and so it was ummm … you know, it's, it's, it's, it's all pretendzies and all that, but what it's about is something that's quite, quite real." This time, he definitely heard Call. Corbet turns. And Call is there – explaining to the interviewer how playing Louis left him exhausted and "sick as a dog". Sat there telling the guy how he had to spend five days in bed to recover. And then he's not there. And he never was. And it's too much. Too weird. Corbet pushes on ("Nothing is ever exactly what it seems. It's not that simple … ") but now all he's thinking of is bed and sleep and rest from this wicked, wicked cold. The interview ends. Corbet drags himself up for the next one, over-hearing snatches of Alistair Banks Griffin's response to a question from the interviewer he's left behind. The director is being asked about identity and existence in Two Gates of Sleep. About what we can believe. And what we can't. "I love that there can be many interpretations of what's happening …", says Banks Griffin. [Corbet needs bed] "The way these characters move is not in any way, typical [Corbet needs rest]. I think in some ways they are the same person and not the same person at the same time [Corbet needs sleep] ." • This article was amended on 12 July 2010. A subheading in the original referred to Brady Corbet's character in Funny Games US as a psychotic preppie. This has been corrected in line with Guardian guidelines that counsel: "Terms such as schizophrenic and psychotic should be used only in a medical context."