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May 24, 2005
Question: Pawel, you began studying film in England?
Pawel: I studied literature and philosophy in London and then Oxford. Then I
joined a filmmaker's workshop where I learned to use a camera and started
to do films and abandoned my academic career for this.
Question: You started with documentaries, correct?
Pawel: First I did short experimental films, which are unwatchable now. Then
I started making documentaries; I showed some of my films to a guy at the
BBC and they gave me a job making documentaries. In the old BBC there were
little pockets of independent filmmaking, the BBC's a bit like a film school
in England. A lot of filmmakers actually went through the BBC as a kind
of training ground.
I had 5 or 6 really good years at the BBC where every film I made was kind
of slightly weird and different and they won awards at festivals - they
gave me freedom to just fool around for a while. I had an idea, I followed
it through, and I really didn't worry about audiences at all. Then the
BBC joined the rest of the world and that became less fun.
I progressed to making feature films, a drama for a documentary budget;
we used non-professional actors and real locations to tell a fictional
story. That was a success so I got money on the basis of that to make another
fictional film, Last Resort - again quite cheap. That was a success and that got me to this place - with a bit more money than the last time.
Question: With the book, My Summer Of Love, didn't you just take the characters that you wanted and use them to tell
your story?
Pawel: That's true. I took the two characters that really felt authentic and
interesting to me. I introduced the third character, who was not in the
book, that of the brother.
Question: Where did you get the idea for him?
Pawel: There were several sources. I met this one guy when I was making documentaries
in Lancashire, a preacher who wanted to plant a cross on top of a hill
where 300 years earlier some witches had been hanged; he claimed that Satanists
and witches were attracted to that spot and he hoped to energize his brethren
and his flock by carrying this cross to the top of the hill. He failed
to get a permit, but I kept that idea for 15 years, just the visual of
it, his character was very different from the film's character. When you
make films and travel and observe, nothing is ever wasted. You gather all
your observations and at some point they come in handy.
Question: Any difficulties finding your cast?
Pawel: I looked around for actors and non-professionals and they're all so samey
and all so bent on imitating TV models, characters off TV, especially American
TV - in England, the working class is getting this intravenously, this
American culture. Their intonations are the same; they make faces just
like people on "Friends". Where's the authentic something to
bounce off from? I don't think you'll find it among non-professionals,
so you go back to the professionals and bring it out or create it. That
was quite a lesson I learned.
Question: I understand that Natalie Press was cast first, but you had a harder time
finding someone to play Tamsin.
Pawel: Nah, that's probably an exaggeration - I had a hard time in both cases.
It was just that I found Natalie first, then once I found her I knew I
had a potential film there, because she could carry the character. Then
we started looking for the other character and it took ages as well. We
wanted to find somebody who's got something extra, something going on behind
her eyes, the ability to show a liveliness inside, some spark - and it
was quite difficult.
Question: Emily, what was the most difficult part of this character for you?
Emily: I think it's a fine line when you play someone who's pretentious, but
also you have to really like her; you have to be enticed by her - and to
have enough mystery there, but not to give anything away. So you don't
quite trust her, but you're not sure.
I was playing someone who's very different from me as well so you had to
keep focused on people that I'd met or people that I had grown up with;
girls who had such an impression on my when I was younger. I had to keep
very fanatical on removing myself from Tamsin.
Question: Was it especially enjoyable to play a character who's so deceptive?
Emily: Yeah, sure. Whether they like to admit it or not, everyone's got a bit
of Tamsin in them. Of course, it's great to play a character like that
- she's not just a villainess, she's layered and with an air of mystery.
I had so much fun - to be able to control somebody, to feel you can sweep
someone into a world, to play someone so different from me, it's very exciting.
Digging deeper with these layered characters, I really enjoyed that.
Question: Did you already play the cello before this movie?
Emily: I played a bit. I used to be quite good and this was a bit of a pride-crasher
when I picked it up again. I used to play a lot and I stopped about 7 years
ago, but Pawel was open to anything that we had to offer.
Pawel: I asked you, "What can you do?"
Emily: I said, "I play the cello." "Great, we'll make a scene
with the cello," and that's what happened. He assures me it doesn't
matter that it wasn't note perfect.
Pawel: They wanted me to change it, but I put my foot down.
Emily: Oh really. You wanted to dump me? I think it's endearing that she's not
quite brilliantly talented; she can be quite cavalier. Anything to Mona
at that moment would sound beautiful and refined, so I think she, Tamsin,
can get away with it.
Question: Did the you and Natalie have any time to spend together before the shooting
began?
Emily: Yeah, we hung out a lot with Pawel; we had rehearsals and then we went
up to the location before we shot just to familiarize ourselves with the
area, so we did spend quite a bit of time together before we actually started
the shoot - it was essential.
Question: You shot this all on location. Was it difficult to get permission to use
that home?
Pawel: No, that home was a real find. I drove around looking for old homes, then
I came across this one but everyone said it was just a derelict home, don't
even look at it. I went there and it was derelict, but the ivy was sensational
and the whole position of the house was amazing. It was inhabited by people
who were camping in it - it was a nightmare. We had to redo it. It was
a main investment, redoing the house. We'd done it up very nicely, then
the people who moved back in ripped everything back to the way it was because
they hated what we'd done.
Question: Did you actually shoot this in the summer?
Pawel: Just at the end of the summer, because we didn't get the money until end
of July - so we shot it from mid-August on.
Question: So it still was pretty warm?
Pawel: We were lucky - we had two really warm weeks and we tried to shoot most
exteriors in these two weeks.
Question: So that final scene between the two of you in the spring wasn't too unpleasant?
Emily: No, that was really cold. That stream is always going to be cold because
it comes down from the hills and it's completely under the cover of trees,
and it's never still, so it's never going to be warm. Our lips were blue
- we were trying to look relaxed. The stuntwoman freaked out when she jumped
in to do a little bit and she couldn't do it.
Pawel: About the stunts, we had this scene where Mona rides her moped with no
engine down the hill. And her stuntwoman, it turns out she couldn't do
it because she was pregnant. So we had to ask our heroine to do it.
Emily: Natalie did it. She's great; I couldn't have done all that.
Pawel: It wasn't as fast as it looks.
Question: You filmed this in 2003, before In America came out with Paddy Considine in it?
Pawel: He shot In America before us, but it hadn't come out yet. He's a real cult figure in England now; people really love him.
Emily: He gets offered things and turns things down - he's very picky. He's a
very down-to-earth sort of guy; he's not at all lured by Hollywood.
Question: Was he well known when you cast him in Last Resort?
Pawel: No, he'd done one film only, where he was sensational, a thing call A Room For Romeo Brass. He wasn't known at all. I went to see that film and I was really bowled over by his performance. It's unusual for a British actor, that sort of energy and plasticity and magnetism on screen - that comes from inside, not just the face. I cast him as a very different guy from Romeo Brass. He came to acting in a roundabout way and he had to study acting; he still doesn't know his full potential. He wants to be stretched and taken somewhere he hasn't been before and he carries it off.
Question: Is it right that you never really had a full script for this movie, that
it was more of a story outline without a lot of dialog?
Pawel: In the key scenes, the structural scenes were written out quite precisely;
things that you need to tell the story - interesting moments to define
the characters, define the relationships. So very often, I write the [rest]
out just to fool the financiers or I just sketch them in - this is going
to happen more or less like this.
I work organically - you write something, then keep rewriting and rewriting
until you get to somewhere interesting. Keep notes how you got there -
this works and we'll use that. Sometimes I've done a scene I knew didn't
work and I'll say, "Let's scratch and redo this."
Of course you need to have a setup which plays with this style of working - a relatively small budget and friendly producers, and above all, actors who are not thrown by it who can bring a lot - their own energy, texture, ideas, who are generous and who really give themselves to the process.
Question: Was this the first time you've worked this way and how did it work for
you?
Emily: This was definitely the first time I'd worked like that. I've done theatre
and I've done a lot of TV dramas in the UK. It's very regimented.
Pawel: You cover 3 pages a day - the text is the thing; the continuity people
just checking things off.
Emily: Things like, "Emily, you didn't have your hand in that position in
that last take. You turned to the left." You feel very much like a
puppet, but it had been what I was accustomed to - so you just get on with
it and try to find something that rings true. Then I meet Pawel and join
this film and we're given such freedom. We felt very secure with a security
net around us, but within that net you're allowed to explore. It's all
controlled, it wasn't like we were freewheelin' every day, Pawel was definitely
the conductor. We learned to work in a very organic way, a very collaborative
way, and you feel the responsibility.
It intimidated me a bit at first, but you have to embrace it because you
know that it's starting to work and you find golden moments sometimes that
surprise you even. It was a revelation to work like that for me. It was
so far removed from what I knew and I fear I'll never get there again.
Everyone has to be on the same side and believe in each other - we can
make it work.
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