What more do you think the internet could provide to ultimately cancel the effects of a remote business/production base?
Remote from where? Everything you might need is just a couple of clicks away from your keyboard. I have no problem with that, but others need to make a quantum leap in the way they see the world and the way they operate within it.The telephone system is holding us back. Eventually it will catch up and then infomatics will really take off. We will stream feature films out via the telephone in the way we can bounce them about now using satellites and dishes, but with open access and none of the expense of satellite access. Exhibition and distribution of films will change just as film production has been changed by technology. In the Highlands and Islands of Scotland we've now got a University that has no single campus. Instead the telephone network links all the local constituent colleges together. Lectures are delivered by video link to where they are needed. That's the sort of change that's happening along the information highway in apparently "remote" parts. Remote is just a condition of mind now, the reality is very different.Edit suites can come in a box labelled Avid. Penultimate is a production company that comes to you in a flightcase. Everything about our company and its projects can be presented on a laptop screen. It's a whole new way of working.
Tell us about your forthcoming project.How did the concept of 'Clint Eastwood meets Coronation St.' come about?
From the Portsmouth-based writer, Tina Walker. "King's Ransom" was the first film script she ever wrote, she tells me. It was her first assignment for her MA screenwriting course. She responded to our ad on Mandy's page, along with dozens of others, but the quality of Tina's writing impressed and it was a very amusing tale. It's about an elderly couple hitting hard times who are swindled by a conman. In desperation, they have to resort to unusual methods to get back what was stolen. That's the black comedy aspect of course, the comedy of absurd ideas. There's a hint of the teacher's challenge to the student about this one; "Make it short, have animals and children in it, make it a black comedy, make it minimal dialogue and then...well, go on then... go the whole hog and make it a spaghetti western!" If that was the challenge, Tina certainly rose to it and did a really good script. Here's a really clever twist as well; the film is almost minimal dialogue, so it should have appeal to overseas cinema markets because overdubbing or subtitles will not be needed.The film is set in a windy British terrace rather than a dusty desert town. That's the Coronation Street bit, with all the lace curtains twitching, but then you have the conflict of the exploited and the exploiter and the triumph of right through an avenging figure. That's the other difference. Clint Eastwood's mane-with-no-name is replaced with a little old lady who, in adversity becomes that cool, calculating figure, the old woman called Ethel. In widescreen and with a haunting theme tune, it is very cinematic, but we hope to make another Coronation Street connection. Thelma Barlow, who played Mavis in the Street's corner shop for many years, is planning to be available to for our lead.Tina suggested the spaghetti western style as a means of accentuating conflict. We have more than forty scenes and four locations in a ten minute short and quite a complicated narrative to get through. There's very little dialogue to slow things down, fortunately. Sergio Leones's style accentuates the sense of conflict. Lingering long shots intercut with meaningful glances in close up; unexpected focus on costume and property details; mood, lighting, incidental sound, all producing and building tensions and then those wonderful scores. Who could resist it for a cinema project?Of course music was going to be very important to such a film, so as soon as we found our writer we needed to find a composer to write a dedicated score. Marco Sabiu came to us through the internet. He composes and produces for Sony UK, for artists like Take That, Kylie Minogue and Tanita Tikaram and we found him through Raindance. On Raindance website they published a talk by Miller Williams of Sony on the cost of film music. He suggested a self/contained composer/performer with a digital studio could give excellent value. We called him up, had a chat and he recommended Marco. Marco's demo tape did it for us. Naturally, for a spaghetti western, he had to be Italian! Like most Italians he loves the movies. When the three of us went for lunch to Metz, I almost had to drag Andrew and Marco apart over the dining table, the movie talk became so deep and intense.
How have you gone about funding the project?
It has been hard finding the money, but it's never easy. The script, and a lot of goodwill put into the project, by people like Miller Williams, helped us sell it. We also had a very lucky initial break with Southern Arts. Tina Walker tipped us off about a development fund they run in Winchester to help writers from within the region, so we slipped an application in. It's a very good policy when the cash available has to be restricted, because it gives their region a lot of input into what gets onto the screen. From their point of view that makes it an extremely cost-effective screen investment. And it certainly was a lucky break for us.We were planning a number of other approaches for production money; to the BBC's 10 x10 new director's scheme, to Northern Production Fund and to the National Lottery Film Fund and we made Southern Arts aware of this. First they interviewed Tina, then they asked Andrew and I to meet them in London. They were very supportive of our project and felt our plans were sound. They offered some very practical assistance to us. First, they asked if they could host a London premiere of the completed film; second they offered us an experienced script editor, Sarah Golding, to work with Tina on rewrites; finally, they offered Caroline Freeman, Head of Film and Video at Lighthouse, Brighton, as an Exec Producer, to offer in her expertise in piloting shorts through the Lottery Film Fund. One more thing. The Lottery Film Fund wants to see practical evidence of marketability for the cinema and SA and South West Media operate a showcase circuit around cinemas in the south and west. They said they could plug us into it. Oh, yes, and they gave us best part of £5,000 to get us started!This was very heartening for a young company and we feel very lucky to have had such good, practical input. It is worth remembering though, it was the strength of the script, as well as our approach, which was opening so many doors.Once one funder is aboard, it makes it easier for others to commit to the project. For example, Northern Production Fund could see another funder was serious about us. They make their own assessment of the project, but having one funder already taking part of the risk makes it easier for another investor to take up another part of the risk. They came aboard with an understanding that we would shoot the film in their region. We needed terraced housing and there's no shortage of that in the North East of England. Mind, it was a serious challenge for the Northern Film Commission to find us unmodernised examples onto which we could graft a gone-to-seed, slightly run-down look. Too many DIY improvers at work these days as the Geordies go yuppie...Whilst the fund-raising goes on we still had to research our markets to get the evidence we needed to show our film could gain an audience. We got this through the net again, from the The Short Film Bureau, from a London based distributor, from two UK cinema circuits that like to support short film with a before the feature slot. We even have two US companies interested who came to us after viewing our website. We also got side tracked for a while by the BBC who invited us to London to meet them, almost committed themselves to equity on the project and then five weeks later, unexpectedly changed their mind. It was perhaps the best result, because it is too cinematic for 10 x10.The money raised is not just cash. There is massive goodwill in this industry to help fledgling companies. Remember, all the people you deal with have had a struggle to get recognition, to get where they are now, been-there-done-that kind of thing. They will help whenever they can. We just asked politely about discounts for cash-up-front, or for grant-aided productions, or for low-budget, deferred- payment crews. "Donations" like that mean cash you don't have to pay out, so they count as contributions to your project budget, which some funders are able to match pound-for-pound.Now, we are with the Lottery Film Fund for the last tranche of funding. With all the other support they can see the project is judged viable by many others. As long as we have met all their criteria properly there's no reason why they can't agree to fund. We have raised the greater part of £70,000 already - just £27,000 to go now.
Would you recommend this route to other filmmakers or do you think you must match the criteria entirely?
Yes, we would, but you have to plan very carefully. The Lottery Film Fund is set up to fund British films, not just short films. The application criteria treats our short just it treats a British feature, that is, searchingly. It is wonderful to know that money is available, but no one throws public money at any project. They deal in investments. You have to show that your proposal is a worthwhile investment for them. If they get no financial return, what else do you offer them? You must have that approach firmly in your mind when you draft your proposal. Their investment panels are all made up from experienced film practitioners, so passing bulls will get you nowhere. You have to be professional in your approach and you have to work very hard at getting it right. It has taken us precisely 12 months to get to the present, Penultimate position.
How does your current position compare with your past as a BBC producer?
Well, I was a network producer in steam radio, so it appears very different. In reality, there's a lot which is the same. In radio we got listeners to put the pictures up inside their own heads. A good film sound track will still help them do that. Actually, radio listeners and cinema-goers have the same kind of deeply personal relationship with the medium, unlike TV, which is a little box in the corner. Your relationship with a television is that of a voyeur and a detached voyeur at that. You are not fully involved with it. No one sitting in front of a cinema screen can be detached from the powerful images that appear upon it. Every detail of the image is exposed, every nuance of facial expression and body posture, every inflection, every cadence of the voice. It's the closest thing I know to radio with pictures, and yes, it is an improvement.I loved the cinema as a child. We had three cinemas I was allowed to go to and one flea pit I wasn't. When I did, my mum soon found out and I was in trouble, but she blamed cousin Barry, who was older and should not have led me on. Three changes of programme over seven days meant we had a dozen films to choose from. But the films all seemed to be made in Hollywood or London. We knew no-one who made films round our way, but that could not stop us from acting out all the roles from the screen all the way home. Now we have the means to make films. We get professional actors to act out the roles we can forsee in our imagination on the screen. I think I just stopped growing up, really and I'm in some sort of childhood heaven, watching movies, eating Eldorado ice cream and Butterkist. It's great.
