"There are people
like Adrian Lynn, Alan Parker and Ridley Scott. Who are brilliant,
who could strip a camera down to its bare pieces in the dark
and put
it together again, load the film and could take over the job
of anyone on set. There are those people."
I always thought it was very tense on set?
"Yes it's very tense on set. In a way the very simplest
definition is the
director is the ringmaster. He orchestrates the circus that
has come together
to realise the dreams, stories and emotions of what the director
wants. On
set the director has to have an answer for every question."
The art director will ask about what type of ash tray to use
on the table in a scene, while the prop master will ask which
table to use. The actress will ask
on what part of the line she has to cry. The make up person
is asking whether you want mascara or eyeliner. The hair designer
is asking about if the hair is
up or down. The costume designer wants to know if the shirt
buttons need to
be all fastened up whilst the director of photography wants
to know which window the light is shining from. The director
needs to be able to answer all those questions and a million
more every day."
But don't you use the same people over and over again, because
they know the way you are and they won't ask all these questions?
"Yes, that's an advantage. That's why directors end up
using the same crew because you end up having easier communication,
a trust and an understanding which is very hard to get. Personally
I used a lot of people for
a very long time because we have that understanding. A film
set can be a
real community, a real family of people and there's a kind of
love, which is exchanged there and it can be fantastic. The
flip side is it can be fucking hell. You can be fighting. Samuel
Fuller always said that making a film was like
a waging war. That you start a campaign of war, you have to
go out
with twenty one different set ups and get twenty one different
shots or
three pages of a script that have to be filmed in a day and
getting that
is like a war. " >>
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