Latest / Half the Picture / #12 - MARC WARREN & PAUL HILLS

Transcript

#12 - MARC WARREN & PAUL HILLS · Half the Picture

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I think the problem I have is for me, it's not a job, for me, it's a passion.
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I think if I'd had to die to make this film, I would have done it, you know.
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If someone has said to me, you can have the film completed, but you die,
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or you can not have the complete film completed and you live, I would have without
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thinking, taking the die option because I can only make a film by putting everything
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I have into it. That sounds extreme, but all I can say to you, Billy, is that I believe,
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or when he says that, I believe it.
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Hey, everyone. I'm Billy and welcome back to Half a Picture.
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I'm very excited to say that I guess this episode are actor Mark Warren and director Paul
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Hills, who came on the show to talk about their film Boston Kickout, which is
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celebrating its 30th anniversary this year.
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So Boston Kickout is this cult British coming of age film from 1995.
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It's based on Paul Hills own childhood and he says it was inspired by his
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childhood growing up in Stevenage and it's got a great soundtrack, you know, loads of
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great rip hop artists like Oasis and obviously people like Paramount Scream as
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well and the cast is amazing. You know, it's Mark Warren as I say, but it's also
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John Sim in his first film and Andrew Lincoln as well in his first film, who obviously
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has gone on to do the Walking Dead.
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So it was a lot of fun shot into Mark and Paul both about the film.
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So Mark Warren's an amazing British actor.
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I mean, I've been a fan of him since I was a kid when I first saw him in Doctor Who
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and it's done so much amazing work across the years, projects like Mad Dogs and
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Ban of Brothers, of course, you know, he's been, you know, fingers and all sorts of
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different pies. He's been around for a long time and Paul Hills as well as such
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an interesting director. It was such a pleasure to have them both on the pod.
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So without further ado, let's roll on my chat with Mark Warren and Paul Hills.
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Enjoy. So you guys, do you all right?
1:54
Yeah, good. Thank you. I like your hair, Billy.
1:57
Oh, thank you very much. I like and I like your office. Is that your office, Billy?
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Yes. Yeah, the office of the podcast.
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It's a half the pitch offices. We've got back here.
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So we've got a bit of Gilbert and George by there.
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We've got you know, a few, but you've been bits on the back.
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Yeah. So very, very roomy.
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Are you ready?
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Yeah, we're a bit, I'm in Brick Lane.
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This is where we're based in the, okay, perfect.
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That's why you got the Gilbert and George.
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Oh, yeah, they just down the road.
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They have their offices pretty close as well.
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So yeah, very exciting. Great.
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So yeah, I'm very happy to have you guys on the pod.
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You know, I've been a fan of both of you guys for a long time.
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You know, like, you know, going back to when I was a kid, I mean, your work, Mark,
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obviously, and things like band of brothers and and Doctor Who, obviously,
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and obviously your films as well, Paul.
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So it's real pleasure to have you guys both on half the picture.
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Now, but we start. So well, I guess let's just go right into it then.
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So this year is the 30th anniversary of your film, Boston Kick Up All,
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and obviously you as well, Mark, it was your first film.
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You've got the 4k remaster of it coming out.
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It's playing on Monday to our central.
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Do you guys have got the cast back together?
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You know, yourself, Mark and obviously Andrew as well and John Sim and, you know,
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you got the main cast back together as a kickoff.
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I was wanted to ask what's it been like with visiting the film for you both personally?
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I mean, after all this time after 30 years.
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Well, for me, it was, well, it's been a two year journey doing the restoration,
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but I've five year journey since I decided that I would do the restoration.
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I went back to the original negative.
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I took it out of storage.
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I had it re-scanned and then re-graded and I basically went through every
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flame of the film, 151,200 flames and cleaned every one of them.
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But I wouldn't say by hand because it's a digital thing you're doing.
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But, you know, digitally, we cleaned every flame,
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restored the scratches, the neck damage, the white sparkle, the watermarks,
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the cinch marks, we cleaned it up.
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And it now is the most immaculate version of the film that has ever existed.
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We also cleaned up the sound.
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We took out some dropouts and we remastered the sound.
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It's been a real labor of love and it's been two years.
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What's it been like?
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Well, it's strange.
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I hadn't seen the film for 29 years before I started 28 years and before I started doing the restoration.
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So it was an amazing experience to relive all the things which had happened
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while shooting the different scenes and to re-experience it.
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Now I've seen it a million times again.
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I'm also sick of it again in the way.
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But, and I'm not sure if I'll even be able to watch it at the anniversary screening on Monday
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at the central pitch house.
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But maybe I will, maybe I will.
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That's how it's been for me.
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And it was great doing the new revised director's commentary.
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The original director's commentary was done with John Simm on the original Columbia Tri-Star release.
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But Mark and I did a director's commentary early in the year for this 4K release.
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And that was an amazing experience.
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I'm not sure we watched much of the film, did we pull?
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We were just, they started recording and pulling.
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I just, because we've had a 30-year friendship since there's like, you know, great friends, best friends.
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So we were just, we were off to the races really in that, in that country.
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It's amazing looking back barely after 30 years and, yeah, just seeing how young we were, you know,
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and young and stupid, really, you know, just crazy, very passionate.
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And, you know, heads full of dreams.
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But if I think back to what I remember of this, you know, I don't, I don't, all that time ago,
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I don't, I don't remember getting a script, I don't, I don't remember anything about it,
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apart from sitting in front of Paul, in Ward, or Strey, in Soho.
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And as soon as I looked at him, I felt like fireworks were going off.
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And, and I pretty much, I don't think that's ever really changed really when I've looked at Paul.
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There's something about him and certainly when him and I get together, I mean, it's the,
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it's completely going on from what anybody else thinks about.
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I don't know, I do, but we've always had that kind of relationship.
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And to me, it was an access into some way that I really wanted to go as a young actor, you know,
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and I, and I, and I saw this guy and I thought, OK, this is a, I could go somewhere with this, you know,
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you sort of trying to learn, learn what you're doing, you know, you're doing rep jobs in
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fields around, around the country, and then suddenly you meet a guy like this,
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who's kind of very passionate, very fearless, and he, and he cast me in this part,
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and then he told me to cut off my hair off and, and, and you know, when I did that,
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that was, that was kind of it really that I felt different, you know,
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I looked different, people reacted to me differently.
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Yeah, and the rest is, you know, in the film, but.
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Well, I was hoping to actually, yes, spotlight your character for a bit, your character of Robert
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Mark, because watching film back is interesting, because so you don't fear to
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and television, this was your first piece of your, you know, film debut.
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I had, I had done, well, pulled reminded me, I think I'd been in the film shine,
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and I think I've done a film called Be Monkey, but no, certainly nothing like this, no.
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On this level, yeah, and your character, the character of Robert that you play,
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he's this sort of incredibly volatile, you know, essentially, you know,
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skin-ed character in many ways, kind of for me, you run to me a lot of ways of Gary
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Oldman is in meantime, you know, that's a coxy, that kind of sort of very volatile,
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aggressive, negative, you know, character, but it's, in many ways,
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it's quite a challenging character to portray, because obviously,
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not only for the, for the violence and the aggression, but the fact that you kind of have to
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hijack the audience's attention, and as well as obviously the characters around you by John,
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and, you know, you have to hijack the movie, sort of every single scene that you're in,
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you kind of come in there quite bullishly, and then you, you hijack it, and then,
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sort of you leave again, then come back.
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And I was wondering as I was watching it, how challenging a role this was for you,
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especially as it says, quite early in your career, you know, you have to sort of basically
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hijack the movie whenever you're on screen.
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Did you find that challenging?
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No, I didn't, I don't think, because it was obviously just the right
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time for me, and it was the right environment.
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I was working with the right actors, and certainly the right director.
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So I don't know, that was kind of very easy to do that, and Paul just gave me a
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liberty to basically do whatever I wanted to do.
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And so it felt, it felt incredibly creative in that sense.
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And yeah, you kind of just trying to nick everything you're in basically.
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I've always tried to do that anyway, especially if you're not in the lead,
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just like, you know, John's the lead in it, you come along, you just try and nick a bit.
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What the bit, the bit that I found challenging was when the,
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whether it's when the film finished, because I never experienced this before,
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but when the, when the film finished, I, and I've never had it since,
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I found it very difficult to get out of that.
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I did struggle with that. Yeah.
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I think my approach was very methodological.
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You know, I, I loved, you know, the films of Brando and Montgomery Clifft.
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For me, I wanted to create an environment where everyone could become the character.
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So with Mark, that's a very special thing, because the character Rob is a bit of a
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nutter, really guy.
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And there are these people in the new town of Steve niche, where I grew up,
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who love to dominate the surroundings and, you know, put across a version of
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themselves where they are a very important person, where they kind of, you know,
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called the strings of everything that's going on in their manner.
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And the character Rob aspires to be one of these people, you know,
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the thing is he's not very good at being a, being a nutter.
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You know, I mean, he wants to be a really good nutter, but actually he's,
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he's nowhere near as smart as he thinks he is, which is the problem.
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But he has an entourage, he has, he has, you know,
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Brad and he wants to have Phil in the entourage, but Phil doesn't really sit well
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within it. He's got Mandy as well.
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So we're, you know, we've marked still in the scenes.
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I'm very happy we've been still in the scenes because these characters love
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to steal the scenes.
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They want to come into a room and be the centre of attention.
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We played it out like that.
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And it worked wonderfully, I think.
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No, I agree. It does.
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And you mentioned something there, Paul, about how you grew up in Steve
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niche and how, you know, you were very familiar, you know, that, that environment,
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it was kind of in the DNA as you were making into the film and writing the film.
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Was this film at all inspired by so you're, you know, childhood and I was,
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it's very much so it's very autobiographical.
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Okay, all the characters in it are composites of people I knew when I was going up.
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It's very much about my own experience.
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I, I loved 2,000 film, 400 blows.
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And this is a film which I watched at a very young age.
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And so with the arrogance of youth, I thought I would make my own film about growing up.
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What happens to Phil and to the young lads mirrors exactly what happened to me
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after that first summer after I left school and, you know, what I'm going to do with my life.
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You know, in the film, Phil eventually chooses to pursue a career of photography.
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I obviously had at that time made a decision to pursue a career in film making.
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So the, the mirror is there and I also wanted to hold that mirror up to what was happening in my home town
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because my home town of Stegnitz is a very peculiar place and English new town,
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which is created by an act of government.
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People are transplanted wholesale from the slums of London into a concrete jungle
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in the hope of a new life.
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But none of the facilities and amenities and things which they,
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which you would probably want to have, you know, in a new society in a new town were in place.
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So people were bored and they got into alcoholism and drug addiction and violence and all these things played out.
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In fact, the, the problems of the inner city slums were actually just transposed to the idyllic concrete new towns
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of the 50s and 60s and this film is my experience of what it was like in the 90s.
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We shot it in 94, but strangely, I set it in 92, you know, so that I could have the music of that kind of era.
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And, you know, I could put it more contemporary with my own experience of growing up.
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I actually started writing the script when I was 19, the year after the film is set.
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And I finished the script when I was 22.
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So it's very autobiographical.
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Yeah, and you've got all that stuff in the background.
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The geopolitical situation of the Berlin Wall and that whole period, yeah, it captures the time very well.
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It's a very interesting snapshot.
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And as you say, it, like, one of the things that struck me watching it was how honest it,
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the portrait is of that, not, you know, of Stevenage at that time.
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It was kind of almost a love layer as much as it is.
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It's a love hate letter in many ways I found.
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And, and am I right in thinking that Stevenage, they weren't too sure how they felt about the film.
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Is that thinking that you wanted to say the premiere there?
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The premiere was going to be there and then they were like,
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I don't know if we, if we want to host it here because of the way it's portrayed in the film.
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Is that right? Yeah.
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I mean, I had a running battle with local council,
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even though they gave us permission to film when we turn up at locations, they would clean the locations.
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So we would choose the location which you'd have graffiti on the wall.
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When we turned up, the graffiti wasn't there, which use the location which had upturned
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supermarket tolleys in the town fountain.
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But when we turned up, they had disappeared, you know, they would basically be trying to clean
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a head of when we filmed to, to present an adirqueer of students.
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But I was making a film, what's an all showing exactly what it was like for me and for
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other people going up in that, in that city.
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So that was a running battle.
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And in fact, about five years after we make the film, they did a mural,
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okay, on the wall of famous people from Steednage or creative people from Steednage.
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And they made sure that I was not in that mural.
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Well, so they took it personally, then.
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Yeah, yeah.
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And instead of putting me, they put a guy who'd done one short film on the wall.
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Well, you know, what they like, because I see even is just not an area, you know,
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there's always talk about, you know, what areas of the UK are presented on film,
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a scene on film.
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And I guess Steven, he just not one of those areas.
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So that is, you know, it's a shame that there's a guess it is like it, like so it's a
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Watson all love letter to, to the town.
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So exactly it's, and I just wanted to make a, a two full film about what it's like to
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go up in the English Newtown.
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And I don't know if anyone has done a film in such a milieu again since, you know,
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there were two films which were made from Steven, it's before we made Boston Kicker.
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There was a film called, here we go.
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And then we wish and little known there was a, there was a film called on a serious
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charge starring Cliff Richard.
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Both of those films are in the sound clips of when Phil flicks through the TV.
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He flicks coincidentally through those two films.
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You've got a small Easter egg as people would call it now of a sound trip of those films.
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You have to say copyright to that.
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Yeah, it's indeed.
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And in fact, one of them was, was copyright in the USA and it took ages to get the copyright for, you know.
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But luckily, as the film was made with no money, it took us a good while to finish the film.
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So we had a lot of time to pursue all these issues.
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And then back to you, Mark, for a second, because as you said, it said,
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you guys have, you know, you've worked with Paul since Boston Kick out.
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You guys made, do elephants pray together.
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I mean, you guys clearly enjoy working together and get, you know, gets on.
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And I mean, do you think on Boston Kick out, the shorthand you guys formed on that film
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carried through, you know, through the years?
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I mean, you guys, you say you've stayed in touch and it appears to me you guys have got a shorthand
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working together.
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Do you think that was formed on Boston Kick out?
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Yeah, I think, I think that was formed literally the moment we met.
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And it never, and it never changed.
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And I would've been, you know, the best of friends for 30 years.
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It's more than just the work in relationship.
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I would put our friendship, there's our friendship and then there's our work in relationship.
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But no, yeah, it forged a lot of things.
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And, you know, it's also the star, not only was the star of my friendship and work in relationship with Paul,
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but also with John Sim, who I went on to do stay a play with and I did a bit of life on Mars.
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And we did four series of mad dogs and a friendship with Andy, Andy Lincoln, you know.
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So it was an incredible thing, you know, this group of 20, some things, you know,
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very passionate, kind of doing their first film experience.
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Then going to the festivals afterwards, you know, and you can imagine like the chaos of that, you know,
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these just young, crazy, idyllic, guys.
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So yeah, no, it was, it was, it was an incredible experience, yeah.
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You know, I like to work very, very closely with, with the actors.
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I think it's really important.
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If I'm on a film set with Mark, you know, we're doing a film scene together.
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I can just look at him and I know what he's thinking and he can look at me and he knows what I'm thinking.
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It's amazing just how easy it is for us to work together.
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You know, it is really easy.
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I think that what I've experienced since then, because I also work on a lot of people's films,
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is I'm very surprised when the director doesn't have that kind of, you know,
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intravenous connection with the actors, which are in front of camera.
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But some don't, some, some just sit by the monitor and, you know, just are removed from the,
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what actually is happening in front of the camera.
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That's amazing to me.
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I actually like to stand right by the camera and, you know, be there for the actors.
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If they need me, you know, any opportunity.
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So it's a visceral experience working for Paul.
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They certainly was on, on this film.
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I mean, you couldn't do that on every job.
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You'd be absolutely exhausted, but we were young and you, and you'd do it.
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You know, normally a job is a job, you know, you just go to work and you do what you do.
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But occasionally you get films like this, the way it goes beyond it.
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And it's sort of a, it echoes in every, it echoes in every scene.
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It echoes at the rap party and everything else beyond it.
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You know, we were young and crazy, you know.
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So yeah, I think the problem might have is for me, it's not a job.
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For me, it's a passion.
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I think if I had to die to make this film, I would have done it.
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You know, if someone has said to me, you can have the film completed, but you die,
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or you can not have the complete film completed and you live.
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I would have without thinking, taking the die option.
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Because I can only make film by putting everything I have into it.
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That sounds extreme, but I, all I can say to you, Billy, is that I believe.
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But when he says that, I believe him.
20:15
Yeah, and it's a problem, I know, because not everyone else is as crazy as I had, you know.
20:22
All right. Well, I mean, well, that's it, isn't it?
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If you live in brief film, you know, that's how it's got to be, isn't it?
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I mean, it's interesting what you said there, Paul, about how, you know,
20:31
where you're directing, especially when directing Mark or directing a rat, is you're,
20:34
you're right by the camera, you're in the scene with them.
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And it's interesting to hear, like, different directors, as you say,
20:40
different directors have a very different approaches.
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Like, there's a quote from Paul GMA, sort of see, incredible actor.
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He was talking about how, when he was working with some directors,
20:48
their way off in video village out in a different room, a pile set, and it's completely removed.
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And then you'll get people like, you know, you was talking about Alexander Payne,
20:56
specifically, and how he's right in there in the scene with him and with the
20:59
of raptors. And that is so much more immediate.
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So it's interesting to say that that is the kind of relationship you guys have.
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It kind of builds trust, I guess, it builds more trust.
21:06
It builds trust. They know they know that I'm there for them.
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And there any question, any concern that they have, I'm there to help them.
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You know, if you're sitting in video village, a mile away, then you're basically saying,
21:19
you get on with the acting, I'll get on with the directing.
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For me, I'm always scored in that the great director is the director who is in control of the camera,
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in control of the visuals and in control of what is being the camera has been pointed at.
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And what the camera's been pointed at is the actors and it is the actors that tell the story.
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And the story is the thing that people get emotionally moved by in a film.
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It doesn't matter how beautiful the compositions are, the lighting is.
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It's the story that comes from the actor's performance, which is the most important thing in a film.
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You know, the most important thing.
22:01
It's funny that thing, you know, as you're talking about that, the director of the monitor or the director by the camera.
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Because because the one thing you can't do as an actor, you can't see the image.
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You can't see it.
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And there's two people who have got a great privilege of that, the cameraman and the director watching the monitor.
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And I do want to know what you're seeing, you know, and if you're seeing something that works,
22:28
then tell me to do more of that.
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And if you've seen something that doesn't work, let's elbow that bit.
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I do kind of want to know that.
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And you know, I mean, it'd be easy if Paul was at the monitor because you can feel him anyway.
22:41
I know he's there.
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And I know he's he's completely invested in it.
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So yeah, I mean, the lucky thing is what you can get on a camera, you know, is you can get a little mini monitor.
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What I like is to have a little mini monitor on the camera.
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Now, if it's a huge wide shot of cars chasing down the street, there's no point being by the camera because you might want to be at the main monitor.
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But if it's something intimate, you want to be seeing the actual image and what's happening on set, similar tapestry.
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And you can look between the two.
23:17
An interesting story either is that Kim Loach closes his eyes whenever, whenever a take is being done because he believes or believed because he's made this last film.
23:30
That if it sounds right, it is right.
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And he doesn't even want to look at either one, you know, neither the monitor nor what is actually happening live.
23:39
That's extraordinary.
23:40
But again, that kind of proves there are many different ways of doing something.
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But for me, I don't want to be a mother.
23:48
You know, no.
23:49
And I can't remember if you actually did this, but you know, I would also expect to be doing a scene and Paul just to be shouting stuff saying.
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Do this.
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Do that.
23:59
And because I'm always a great fan of doing it many, many times, you know, because it's just the jigsaw and it you just do it loads of times and he's cut out what you want.
24:07
And so if you got somebody there feeding you in, I think that really works.
24:12
So.
24:13
Yeah, exactly.
24:14
That's exactly a great instance of where it's important to have the director might buy the camera because they can go, OK, let's just do that bit again.
24:22
But.
24:23
And then do a perfection upon what that, you know, what is what is needed.
24:28
And it could be some technical that needs to be adjusted for focus or positioning or fighting or whatever, you know.
24:36
And speaking of the technical theme, because I was also launching for back, there are many scenes like that where you were watching thinking, you know, how you guys set this up, how it was played, how it was rehearsed.
24:45
I mean, a specific instance of that for me is like when you guys, I think the first main club scene in the film where you've got, you know, primal screams loaded playing in the background, great song.
24:53
Obviously, you've got that in the background, but then it's, you know, to Mark and it's John and it's the other guys and we're all going to the club.
24:58
It's kind of a little tracking shot in.
25:01
And like, you know, you've got all these extras, all these background actors, you know, in the in the club.
25:06
I was just wondering, like, you know, what was, do you guys remember the experience?
25:09
So if I, everything you've just talked about how technical it can be, but also how it has to be kind of spontaneous and immediate.
25:14
Like, what was the experience like, you know, shooting that spit scene is specifically, if you guys, well, that scene is a scene that I remember so vividly because it was an enormous scene.
25:24
It was, it just sat in the schedule as this huge mountain that we were approaching because we had to shoot here on one day.
25:32
We didn't pay the extras, so we can only get the extras really for that one day.
25:37
It's a seven and a half minute scene.
25:39
It has 43 set up in it.
25:41
And to achieve 43 set up seven and a half minutes with 200 extra in one day, it takes a monumental amount of willpower because normally a set up takes 20 or 30 minutes.
25:55
You know, and as set up as complicated as that one going into the club, for instance, should take much longer than 20 or 30 minutes.
26:03
So I shot this to the film very stringently with Roger Belich, you might be, you know, we kept to the shot, and it's very much in that scene just to make sure that we could get we could get through it.
26:15
And it was just a very much a case of having two cameras and leapfogging one.
26:21
So it was being set up while we were shooting on another and shooting the scene totally chronologically and to keep the enthusiasm going through the beginning and to, I mean, it's it's in three parts as well.
26:36
There's the there's the walk in there's the mid part with with what's called the cheerleader, coquery, identity, end part with ending in the fight.
26:46
It was very tough to do that. It was one of the toughest days on the film.
26:50
And but everyone was up for it, you know, everyone was up for it or the cast and the crew were definitely up for it.
26:58
What do you remember about that? I remember it being a great experience because I mean, basically, if you're, if you're going hand and held up some stairs with a, that you're being filmed.
27:10
Well, for start off, you're making a film and they're filming you and you're coming at stairs and primal screams playing just what is it you want to do.
27:19
You're and then you walk through a door and this soundtracks going in this turned out extras. You're on. I mean, that, you know, you don't get that very often. That's a great, great experience.
27:30
So we would have been buzzing every single take of that. I mean, normally what happens is you come in and then you drop the sound so you can get the clothing dialogue or whatever, but.
27:41
But it's great when just when you start with your music, but I so I remember that and then of course I remember the fight at the end. I'm not going to go too much into that, but that that got a little bit controversial.
27:54
So we say and it may in the guy within it sort of got into a little bit of fisticuffs, but.
28:02
Yes, so that was that that was the, that was the interest and experience, but but joyous, you know, I mean, just get everything you kind of dreamed for, especially as a young actor, like, oh, my God, yeah.
28:13
Yeah, still never tell you, yes, we were weird, we were admitted to that song, the primal screams song before. So we were able to play it back, you know, for the first part of that scene.
28:25
The fisticuffs scene at the end, we actually discuss in the directors commentary for the 30 K edition of the film because the the 30 anniversary 4k edition will have the original directors commentary with with John Sim and the new updated.
28:45
The director's commentary would mark on it. See, so people could choose between the two. It was an amazing day.
28:52
Yeah, no, and you can feel that energy on the screen. It's part, it's palpable. And I mean, and you mentioned John there. I mean, of course, as we say, you know, this is one of your first films, Mark, and I believe was John's first film and Andrew's first film.
29:05
So you've all the, and the spirit, yeah, and the spirit of the film, I think also from you, Paul is, is, is you full. It's absolutely you full. It's a great some time capsule of that time and the energy, but also the ufulness of, you know, the cast and the crew.
29:18
So I guess for both of you, I'm working with John and obviously, Andrew and the cast, who is sort of starting out by were there sort of any, I what kind of memory memories, but you're sort of memorable stories you have from the set.
29:28
Working with those guys, and I guess also like, because we talked about how difficult that scene was to get like what were the scenes that I guess to count few is like all the more the days on the shoot. It's to count few the most as like the most joyous days like the best days that you guys had well achieving that day.
29:43
The nightclub scene was joyous because it really was I was possessed that day. I mean, I had a plan of 43 setups to do in 10 12 hours, and I was like a demon possessed, you know, literally an overdrive of where every shout needed to be what needed to happen.
30:05
And in a way, I always try and make the camera that's invisible to the athletes as possible, you know, even though they're, you know, a good act that's always going to have a kind of innate understanding of where the camera is and, you know, what it's going to be shooting.
30:19
I think I remember the first day very vividly and the first day, the 17th of September, 94 was also marks first time when he when he pulls up at the gates of the school.
30:32
That was our first day, and I remember it took a lot of time to, you know, get to the point of actually being able to shoot the film and to, you know, to get to the moment to realize your dreams of making a feature film autobiographically about your own life.
30:49
But one of the things that happened is we're in the middle of shooting it with the students and suddenly the headmaster of the school pulls up and he says to the first day, the first cake card in my office now.
31:04
Well, he went to the office and I carried on shooting, you know.
31:08
So it's around and off the sir, that's right, Ryan, this is carry on, this is plan one.
31:12
Yeah, yeah, just Kyle. And then also another incident is when we were shooting in the market stalls with Emma McCourt's first sieve and many of the traders in the market complained about us and the manager of the market traders came and tried to stop us filming.
31:34
And he was in the documentary, which is also going to be on the 4k and blue ray limited edition release and he just interposed himself and Johnson, you know, said something to him that he didn't like and there was a huge.
31:50
It's awful where you try to, you know, stop the filming those two things spring into my mind as I don't know to about the shooting mouth.
31:58
I think I remember the thing I remember the most would be the two hander scenes with Joe on.
32:05
So be the scene where I pull a gun in the car and I think I put I put the gun to my head.
32:12
The traveling scenes in the Capri to Anders men, John, when we go around and see my girlfriend, Mandy, I just remember all that.
32:20
Yeah, and I've always loved working with you on and there's always been, you know, he's a fantastic actor.
32:26
There's always been an intensity with him, but we've less working together.
32:31
And the low point would be doing the stock car race because at this point, I've been driving the Capri, which I think is a front well drive car.
32:42
Throughout the whole of the film and driving it very well, sort of stopping it on a six points, doing all sorts of stuff, just driving it myself.
32:50
Everybody was very confident in my driving, but they put me in a stock car that had a real wheel thing.
32:57
And I had pulled in the car and a hundred grand camera and Paul said to me, whatever you do, don't crash the car.
33:05
And I took off as you do as a 20 something lunatic and I put it straight into the wall and the camera went straight between us.
33:16
Luckily didn't either of us that dented my pride.
33:21
And then all the crew ran across it was like they'd been an aircraft crash and they were running to the scene of the crash to see if anyone had survived.
33:32
Wow, and I'm assuming yeah, camera OK, Mark, obviously you're OK.
33:37
Yeah, it was gay.
33:39
The map box at the front of it was damaged, but because the wretched wraps had been sheared off completely.
33:46
And you know, I pressed on it.
33:48
Yeah, you did.
33:49
Yeah, I think I did too, actually. So even if so, but if it hits a bleak angle.
33:55
Yeah, you wouldn't want to be hit by that camera for sure.
33:58
Well, it was, you know, it was, it was going at quite a pace when it blew off the front of the car, you know.
34:05
Yeah, it's amazing.
34:06
Yeah, I couldn't, I couldn't feel it now.
34:09
Just go in my home.
34:10
Me too.
34:11
Me too.
34:12
Because it's there to see it vividly.
34:13
Yeah.
34:14
I mean, I had to be the one in the camera turning on and off the camera because no one was insured.
34:20
And you know, you know, it wouldn't be so bad if I was to run the diet rather than I couldn't.
34:26
Dying for the film.
34:27
Literally dying for the film.
34:28
I mean, that got some runs.
34:29
What were you in free concert when he was doing the French connection?
34:31
Like, you know, he was the one operating the camera.
34:33
We're buying Jean-Hatman and the car chase because the camera men all at both our families.
34:37
So it was like, OK, I'll do it.
34:39
I'll operate it.
34:40
You know.
34:41
I didn't know that.
34:42
Yeah.
34:43
That's exactly exactly what happened.
34:45
Risking your life for the film.
34:46
Yeah.
34:47
I mean, because there's actually about that scene in the, you know, the rate that the car is seeing.
34:51
And also, you know, some of the other scenes with you, Mark.
34:53
Because they had a great sense of sort of spontaneity about them.
34:56
Yeah.
34:57
And the feel of the film is very spontaneous.
34:58
It's like a lot of the camera workers, obviously, hand held and it's kind of, you know, it's alive.
35:01
It's kind of electric.
35:02
Was it, was anything kind of improvised?
35:03
Was it all kind of a head fatty?
35:05
Oh, yeah.
35:06
Of course.
35:07
But my, my thing, which I think I started on Boston kick out is I get the script.
35:13
And then I go.
35:16
Fuck the script.
35:18
Now let's make the film.
35:20
You know, so there was a lot that was improvised, you know, and Mark is a wonderful improviser.
35:28
I mean, fun out of every carbon steedage.
35:30
There's only two.
35:32
That's Mark.
35:33
Do you improvise our line, Mark?
35:35
I do.
35:36
I didn't even remember that.
35:37
I remember improvising all the time.
35:39
Yeah.
35:40
And because Paul, Paul gave me the license to do that.
35:44
So I just did it.
35:46
Yeah.
35:48
Yeah.
35:49
Listen, we were in a little creative streak, you know, they don't come along very often.
35:54
But the creativity was flowing and we all just went with it.
35:59
I mean, you don't get that liberty to just be improvising on normal jobs, you know.
36:05
And you always get a bit of magic when you improvise, providing you say something good.
36:10
But because it's just fresh, you know, you've never said it before.
36:14
So it's it.
36:15
Yeah.
36:16
It normally works.
36:18
Yeah.
36:19
I mean, I would say all the best lines in the film are most.
36:23
Although, I'd be very surprised if I went back and looked at the shooting copy of the.
36:28
Of the film that if that wasn't the case, I'd be very surprised.
36:32
And I guess those lessons that you guys are talking about.
36:34
It's what I guess the importance of sort of spontaneity and kind of an energy and passion.
36:38
I mean, but how much about do you think has sort of informed your work since both of you for you like since Boston kick out?
36:43
Like how many lessons do you think you guys learned that you then took with you onto layer projects?
36:47
And even onto the project, you know, do elephants pray that you guys did and, you know, later down the line.
36:52
Well, let me answer first.
36:54
I actually made a film after that called the poet.
36:58
And I didn't embrace improvisation as much as I would normally do on that film.
37:05
And the film suffered.
37:08
I think because of it.
37:10
So I learned a lesson when I made the poet.
37:13
I said, never again.
37:14
Am I going to make a film which doesn't have wholesale implementations and.
37:19
And when we made do elephants pray together, then boom.
37:24
We're back to wholesale implementations.
37:27
And I don't think I'd ever make a film not like that.
37:31
Mark.
37:32
Yeah.
37:33
Well, for me, the lessons I, the scene in the car with the gun.
37:41
Where I, I think I mentioned it earlier.
37:44
I think I, I've, I've get it from John, the footballer in John's feet.
37:48
And then I put it up to my head.
37:49
That was, I don't know.
37:51
That was a special moment for me.
37:54
I see it.
37:55
I don't know.
37:56
You can't just kind of release something in me as an actor.
38:00
And maybe I was just a little, I just was not as self-conscious as I'd been before.
38:06
So that, I found that very freeing.
38:09
And I kind of thought, I'll maybe I've got a few more gears than I thought
38:13
that I had, you know, and that was, that was an opportunity to expand.
38:18
So that was a very special moment for me.
38:21
And the other thing I sort of learned on this film was never give the performance in the rehearsal.
38:28
Wait till there's some film in the camera.
38:31
Because I remember doing a, I remember doing the scene with John.
38:35
I think it's when I've got a broken my leg.
38:40
And I remember rehearsed in it.
38:42
I did the perfect performance in the rehearsal.
38:45
And everybody was very happy with that.
38:47
And I never, I never got it again when we filmed it.
38:50
In my mind, in my mind.
38:52
And that's why I learned, wait, wait till you're doing it.
38:55
Nobody ever sees the rehearsals.
38:57
So.
38:58
So if, like, get the lay of the land in the rehearsal.
39:00
But, you know, yes, save the, you know, the main take for the IPO in the cameras rolling.
39:04
Yeah, I mean, I mean, I would always prefer to shoot the rehearsal anyway.
39:09
Because you never know what's going to happen.
39:11
And if it's no good, you just do it again, you know, which is the beauty of filming.
39:15
Sorry.
39:16
Yeah, if I have to do a rehearsal for camera.
39:19
I now, guys, would get the actors to say numbers.
39:23
One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine.
39:27
So that we don't lose the magic of the first take.
39:31
Because the first take is, you know,
39:35
our job is to hunt the magic.
39:37
That's what Mark and I, we're doing.
39:39
We're hunting the magic.
39:41
And so you don't want a chance that the magic is going to go before you're able to shoot it.
39:45
So if the rehearsal for camera, don't, don't get the actors through the lines.
39:50
That would be my policy.
39:52
And shoot the person.
39:53
Excellent.
39:54
Well, I think that's a, I find notes to end on.
39:56
But, uh, it's been absolutely fantastic, chat and tea, too.
39:58
It was a real pleasure, you know, you know, I really enjoyed the film.
40:01
And I wish you both all the best for the, uh, the anniversary screening on Monday.
40:04
You know, I'm sure it's going to be great.
40:13
Hey, everyone.
40:14
Thank you so much for listening to my chat with Mark and Paul.
40:17
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40:20
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40:22
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40:23
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