July 25, 2007
Croatia, Motovun, the filth and the fury...
Good evening meine freunde. A lot has transpired since we set foot in Motovun, Croatia. Colin is busying himself shooting footage that will be released soon as podcasts/vodcasts. As a purveyor of every single dvd extra feature i can tell you that you will not be let down. His work is exemplary.
Last night the Motovun Film festival played host to another of Sigma Films's projects Red Road and the audience response was amazing. It's very odd to see a film shot in Glasgow and in the English language, subtitled into the native language. Often the idiosyncrasies of the dialogue can appear to be lost in translation, however such is the strength of the picture that every beat and every cut was welcomed by the warmest of responses, by both the cinéphiles and residents of Motovun (for whom this invasion of thousands must be very strange indeed).
I leave you with my view from the terrace as i sip a cold beer and look forward to a hearty meal (truffles are big in these parts) and a screening of Audition at 01:30. For anyone that's seen it, i'll be coming back at 02:45 for the audience reaction.
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July 23, 2007
Only 766 Miles to go...
The most troublesome and exciting thing about blogging is just how reactionary you can be with it. I mean you can take a photo and have it uploaded within minutes. Hopefully I'll be bringing some of that to our blog.
In the main everything will be going here. With the best bits finely honed and delivered here at getyourpeople.
I'll also have a video channel running here. Viddler is just like YouTube except I'll be able to tag moments and people in the video, it's a little like a DVD commentary apart from you won't be able to hear me drone on. Let's hope the broadband connection at the top of Motovun is ready for team Hallam.
Image courtesy of bokutarik.
More here.
So where are we heading? The Motovun Film Festival. I first came here a few years ago with a film called Guy X when i was working at another production company F&ME. Mike Downey is the festival's Council of Advisors President, a man i used to work for and a throughly likable chap, therefore me and Colin hope we may get a lot of favours in meeting and bringing to you, lots of faces from the festival.
In the meantime I'm also working on walking the land (the web) connecting every single mention of Hallam Foe! Have a look at how far I've got over at del.icio.us. Not very far admittedly, but feel free send me you links at londonfilmgeek {a} gmail.com or tag links getyourpeople on your own del.icio.us accounts and leave me a comment below.
And if it's all just a bit too sunny for you here in Croatia. Edinburgh's Just around the corner, where we might have some more interesting things afoot.
Image courtesy of freekorps.
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February 22, 2007
IS IT GRIM? THEN BEAR IT.
JAMES CHRISTOPHER FROM THE TIMES SHOWS STRONG SUPPORT FOR HALLAM FOE
The Berlin Film Festival may have developed one of the biggest markets outside Cannes, but the lack of a single outstanding film made a mockery of this year’s competition. A good Berlin can set the agenda for the entire international circuit. This, though, was desperate. Who knows what devils beset the jury on the final day, but it seemed clear that the wrong Chinese film walked off with the Golden Bear.
Tuya De Hun Shi (Tuya’s Marriage), directed by the 42-year-old Wang Quanan, is a worthy melodrama about a nomadic Mongolian family under pressure to leave the steppes and move to a grim industrial town. Moving, sure, but hardly novel in terms of subject matter or craft.
The more spicy contender was the 33-year-old Li Yu’s controversial Ping Guo (Lost in Beijing , pictured above right) — a film destined to be cut to ribbons by the Chinese censors, if and when this female director (an oriental rarity) is allowed to release it back East.
Ping Guo is a sour and bracingly modern comedy about two couples on either side of the financial chasm in down-town Beijing. Lin Dong (Tony Leung), the owner of the Gold Basin Foot Massage Palace, is caught raping his top masseuse by her aggrieved young husband. Rage cools to compromise when Tony Leung promises the couple a huge sum of money in return for their silence, and even more when the childless boss discovers that he might be the father of the girl’s unborn baby. The dodgy politics, murky deals and sweaty sex scenes are very unChinese.
The winners of the Silver Bears made no sense. Julio Chávez won Best Actor and the director Ariel Rotter (an unfortunate monicker) picked up the Jury Grand Prix for El Otro (The Other), an impenetrable Argentinian/French/ German fantasy about a couple of dead strangers on a business trip.
The best films were sadly not in competition, or they were fobbed off with lesser prizes. David Mackenzie’s peeping-tom thriller Hallam Foe deserved far better than a Silver Bear for Film Music.
Jamie Bell is terrific in the title role. The star of Billy Elliot star has been aching for a serious break-out role and they don’t get much stronger than this. Bell plays a loner convinced that his father’s new wife murdered his mother. The more convinced Bell becomes of his stepmother’s guilt, the more she sexually appeals.
Determined to break this weird spell, he flees to Edinburgh and finds work in a hotel. He promptly starts stalking the personnel manager (Sophia Myles), who bears an uncanny resemblance to his dead mother. The queasy tension is cleverly turned into an unlikely romance when Bell tries to save her from another admirer. A splintering comedy lies between Bell’s naivety and the director’s mordant camera.
Morgan Spurlock’s brilliant idea for creating a super-sized buzz was to screen a few precious minutes of his next documentary, The Hunt for Osama Bin Laden , to a select audience of buyers who had to sign a 98-page confidentiality agreement not to discuss it with a soul, living or dead. Harvey Weinstein, naturally, bought it.
There are a handful of other gems coming this way. Sparkle , a romantic comedy by Neil Hunter and Tom Hunsinger, the duo who made Lawless Heart (2001), is a serious charmer about love and how to lose it in the slippery world of public relations. Shaun Evans finds his loyalties tied in knots by Stockard Channing, Amanda Ryan, Lesley Manville and Bob Hoskins.
Jacques Rivette’s compelling period drama Ne Touchez Pas La Hache (Don’t Touch the Axe), based on a Balzac novella, creaks like a pair of starched britches. But Guillaume Depardieu (who recently had a leg amputated after a motorcycle accident) is utterly compelling as an angry French general who has his affections rudely toyed with in various ballrooms and boudoirs by a beautiful aristocrat (Jeanne Balibar).
James Christopher, The Times, 22 Feb 2007.
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Dear Blog.... A Message From David Mackenzie
I have only just plucked up the courage to read these reviews. Wow they are really quite nice! I think that's the first time the Hollywood Reporter has said anything nice about one of my films. Phew!
This is of course the trade press. They are usually very pithy and aimed at the industry - and can be pretty swiping in their insults as I have learnt personally! Most of the normal press will hold back their opinions until the time comes to release the film.
Well Berlin was pretty intense! After a gentle warm up, we hit the day of the screening with a big wall of press and TV interviews. Some of them were what is called 'round robins', where you have 8 or so journalists sitting round with their microphones asking you questions, and some were one on ones. Most of these were video interviews. Jamie, Sophia and myself worked our way through each group or individual, getting circulated by our lovely PR folk (big thank you to the ever calm and sweet Matt Sanders) every 15 minutes or so.
I don't know what it is like for an actor - where lots of the questions are more personal and tabloidy - but I tell you it is pretty damned relentless and you start to lose all sense of what you've said before. I am so glad I decided to have an early(ish) night the day before because last time I did this with my previous film was on 1 hours sleep! Too painful to repeat.
While all this was happening, the film was being screened at the main press screening in the big Berlinale Palast cinema (1600 seats - only a few years old and one of the best cinemas in the world). Just as that was finishing we were whisked away to attend the press conference for people who had just seen the film. After a couple of well needed glasses of champagne, we went out to face the banks of photographers.
The experience of being almost blinded by the hundreds of flashguns is so intense - what it must be like for the big stars is unimaginable. For me it is almost overwhelming. But fortunately they were more interested in Jamie and Sophia, so I was able to sidle away after a short while to let them get on with it. Stepping back to watch, it was lovely to see the two of them together arm in arm with huge and genuine grins for the cameras - they looked so good together.
Then we had to face the press in a different room - by far the scariest part of the whole process for me. We walked out into this room with about 400 people in and sat down. They were clapping like mad - so maybe they liked the film , or maybe they were being polite. I hate all this stuff because I don't feel particularly articulate in that environment but the questions were not aggressive (they can be) and luckily Jamie was on top form and answered 80% of them. He was so funny and endearing and articulate (and I am not just saying that) that it all seemed easy.
Then time to prepare for the big premiere screening. Time to get the suit on (I had to pay for it btw - not one of those designer freebies that actors get to model! - ugly directors aren't going to sell any clothes) and head down to the prescreening drinks. Fantastically so many members of the Friends of Foe society had made it out to Berlin to be there for the film. It was lovely to be surrounded by so many friends for this brief moment of sanctuary.
Then the official world premiere of Hallam Foe! We had to get into cars to go to the red carpet - kind of odd considering it was less that 100m from where we had gathered, but I guess one has to arrive in style!! So we get out with the flashes and the bright light (so bright the flashes are kind of irrelevant) and walk the gauntlet of the red carpet and into the Palast.
In the press conference we had posed for big formal pictures and they were up on the walls of this enormous cathedral of cinema. We had to sign our pictures. (last time I was here I tried to thank Dieter Kossick who runs the festival in writing and I spelt his name wrong - I asked him how to spell it and he said like Pieter which of course is not like we spell Peter here, so it's only partly my fault. But I still cringe about it 2 years later) I decided to tread carefully and just signed my name in the bad scrawl that is my handwriting. Jamie meanwhile scrawled in huge lettering 'Hallam Foe was here' over his portrait.
We took our seats with big spotlights on us and enthusiastic applause and the film started. Help!!
The screen is huge and the print looked great, the sound was perfect and the audience laughed in all the right places and went silent in all the right places and the one and a half hours went by really smoothly and I only cringed a bit (I normally cringe a lot more which is a good sign). And then the last image of the film cut to black and the audience exploded into applause, cheers and whoops. We had to leave our seats in the middle of this and get ready to go on stage. The credits rolled (with the lovely Franz track going on) and when they were over more applause and I had to go on stage and introduce Pete Jinks (writer of the book), Matthew Justice (executive producer), Gillian Berrie (producer) and then my two stars Sophia Myles and Jamie Bell. The clapping was huge and felt great and someone came on with flowers for the girls.
But any thoughts I might have had about making a speech or thanking the Friends of Foe in the audience evaporated. I was like the proverbial rabbit in the headlights (as I always am in these scenarios - we should have had Jamie and Sophia do some talking, they at least know what to do in front of a crowd!). So we all gave a quick bow and modestly walked off with applause ringing in our ears.
After the clapping subsided we gathered ourselves and went off to a small Berlin music dive bar called 8mm (appropriate name for our roots I think) to drink and be merry. Which we did!
But I think now is the time on this intimate little blog to do what I should have done on stage while the audience were cheering and clapping and thank all those people who made the film possible. And in particular on this occasion to that all those people who were with us that night who worked on the film.
Pete Jinks, writer of the book, Ed Whitmore, co-screenwriter, Tom Sayer, production designer, Campbell Mackintosh, gaffer, Sean Gascoine, my agent, Alexandra Ferguson, line producer, Neil Cairns our production accountant, Jeremy Gawade, our lawyer, Alastair Mackenzie, (my beautiful brother and) exec producer, Matthew Justice, exec producer, - as well as just about all the films financiers - Peter Carlton and Katherine Butler from Film 4, Peter Touche from Ingenious, Carol Sheridan from Scottish Screen, Lenny Crooks (formely) from Glasgow Film Finance (And Hamish Walker) and the entire team of our sales agents Independent, Luc Roeg, Ana Ayesta, Andrew Orr, Sarah Godwin and our UK distributors BVI led by Robert Mitchell with Lee Jury and Charlotte Tudor. Jonathan Rutter and Matthew Sanders from Premier PR, Bart McDonagh, Clare McKinney and all the Domino Records team, Nick McCarthy and Alex Kapranos from Franz as well as Anna Duffield and Brian Coffey from Sigma, Tiernan from Film City Glasgow, Colin Kennedy, Lee Thomas and many of our long suffering partners (plus anyone who I have been stupid enough to forget - sorry)
Thank you guys for being there and for being part of the team Hallam. Sorry I was too tongue tied to say so when I was on stage, but I was enjoying the clapping. Thank you very, very, much.
'It really is all glamour!' as my brother used to say when we were picking up cigarette ends off the wet ground on our first jobs in the industry as runners.
David Mackenzie
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February 12, 2007
Franz Will Watch Hallam in Berlin
Franz Ferdinand will be joining team Hallam in Berlin to celebrate the launch of the film. As you know from previous blog posts, their track 'Hallam Foe Dandelion Blow' features on the soundtrack so it's only right they come along for the ride. A core team from Domino Records are also traveling out, Bart and Clare will be introducing us to some of their German colleagues at their Berlin headquarters.
Ed Whitmore, writer of the screenplay for the film and Peter Jinks, author of the novel Hallam Foe, will arrive in Berlin later in the week as will Alastair Mackenzie, Executive Producer for Sigma Films. The traveling party is growing by the day!
As David said in his post earlier, this week is exciting but also naturally a little nerve racking. Thursday sees the start of the main press activity for the film. The main press screening is actually on Friday though, at the Berlin Palast. This is the largest and most prestigious venue of the Berlinale, with a capacity of 1,600 it will also play host to our premiere later the same evening. Apparently, there is a club in the basement of this cinema that hosts some of the wildest parties at the festival after the films have finished... I'm sure we'll find some time to research this for you!
David and Gillian travel from Glasgow to Berlin early tomorrow morning, I'll post again on their arrival.
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February 11, 2007
Berlin Countdown
One hundred and twenty three hours and thirty minutes until Hallam Foe's World Premiere in Berlin and team Hallam are preparing to board the festival bus.
Andrew Orr, Sarah Goodwin and Ana Ayesta from Independent (our sales agent) are already waving the Hallam banners in Berlin. We had our market screening last night at Cinema X and they have been busy meeting with potential buyers. Sarah has created a special Hallam pack for press and buyers detailing the key info on the film, it also includes a sampler from the soundtrack. Hopefully Berlin is full of journalist tapping their feet to Sons and Daughters and U.N.P.O.C! Hallam Foe's publicist, Mat Sanders is working his magic on the ground too, co ordinating all sorts of press activity for Jamie, Sophia and David next week. He's written a blog entry giving us an insight into just what he's up to, I'll post that shortly.
In the Glasgow office last week was a busy one! We have now booked all the flights and hotels, arranged the screening tickets and festival passes and worked with Domino Records (London & Berlin!) to organise a suitable Hallam Foe post screening celebration. Phew!
As you know, Jamie Bell has travelled in from NYC to London today to present an award at the BAFTAs, this is the first leg of his Hallam journey and he and Sophia Myles will be joining the Hallam band in Berlin later in the week. David and Gillian fly over on Tuesday and Brian and I will catch them up on Wednesday. There will be lots of familiar faces joining us for the premiere on Friday, Tom Sayer our Production Designer is venturing across as is Alexandra Ferguson (Line Producer) and Neil Cairns (Production Accountant). Looking forward to seeing the Hallam team together again, just got to decide what to wear!
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February 10, 2007
New blogger for Berlin
Hey all,
I am away at the moment working on a project with Hugh Macleod, Big Love
While I am away Anna Duffield will be posting the blog with news of the run up to Berlin and all that is being organised.
I will be back at the reins as soon as I return next week.
Enjoy x
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February 1, 2007
Who's going to be in Berlin?
Well we have quite a gang assembling for the trip to Germany.
Of course we will have our director, David Mackenzie, and our producer, Gillian Berrie. We will also have our stars, Jamie Bell and Sophia Myles.
They will be joined by a small army of people including exec producers, friends of the Family Foe and hopefully myself, all things well and good.
Exciting times.
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January 26, 2007
Golden Bears
As a result of some of the well-wishing from the blog commenters I thought I'd have a look into previous winners of the Berlin Film Festival and see what kind of company Hallam Foe would be in if an award were to come our way.
Golden Bear trophy
Looking up winners of Golden Bears is a sure fire way of finding some movies that are guarranteed to be good, and maybe great. If Hallam picks anything up in the trophy department then it will be joining the Berlinale hall of fame with these big hitters:
Year Title / Director / Country2006 Grbavica / Jasmila Žbanić / Bosnia and Herzegovina
2005 U-Carmen e-Khayelitsha / Marc Dornford-May / South Africa
2004 Head-On / Fatih Akın / Germany/Turkey
2003 In This World / Michael Winterbottom / United Kingdom
2002 Spirited Away / Hayao Miyazaki / Japan
2002 Bloody Sunday / Paul Greengrass / UK/Ireland
2001 Intimacy / Patrice Chéreau / UK
2000 Magnolia / Paul Thomas Anderson / United States
1999 The Thin Red Line / Terrence Malick / United States
1998 Central Station / Walter Salles / Brazil
1997 The People vs. Larry Flynt / Miloš Forman / United States
1996 Sense and Sensibility / Ang Lee / United States/UK
1995 L'Appât / Bertrand Tavernier / France
1994 In the Name of the Father / Jim Sheridan / UK/Ireland
1993 Woman Sesame Oil Maker / Xie Fei / China
1993 The Wedding Banquet / Ang Lee / Taiwan/United States
1992 Grand Canyon / Lawrence Kasdan / United States
Hallam Foe, a film by David Mackenzie starring Jamie Bell
Posted by colin kennedy at 11:31 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
January 23, 2007
First Festival
News just in...
...Hallam Foe in Berlin?
It's true, Hallam Foe has been accepted into competition at the Berlin Film Festival. As the savvy amongst you will have guessed and those in the industry will no doubt have heard rumblings last week, we have known about this for a little while. Out of courtesy we have waited for the Berlinale announcement in the press before we started blowing our own proverbial trumpet.
This was posted on the Berlinale website yesterday:
The film Hallam Foe by David Mackenzie (Asylum) is also from Great Britain. The young Hallam (Jamie Bell) is unable to cope with the loss of his mother and spends his days in the Scottish Highlands secretly spying on the people around him. Spurred on by the desire to uncover the true cause of his mother’s death and to escape from his father and unwanted step-mother, he flees to the big city. (World Premiere)
Suffice to say, we are very pleased.
http://www.berlinale.de/en/presse/pressemitteilungen/alle/Alle-Detail_3378.html#3378
Hallam Foe, a film by David Mackenzie starring Jamie Bell
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