Clip from the Q&A, full video is on the DVD itself.
I researched a little bit into the aesthetics and structure of transcripts, just so I had an idea as to how to lay it out and structure it.
These are examples of script transcripts.
 |
| This transcript has numbered lines down the left hand side, perhaps making it easier to reference which line they are talking about in feedback. The names of the characters are also shown at the beginning of each respective line, with glyphs either side, perhaps to show it's the characters name rather than the start of the speech. The typeface is also very typewriter style, perhaps a reference to how scripts were first produced. There are also stage directions written in as well, such as <He and CLAIRE go into the next hallway.>, showing that there was not only talking but movement going on as well, unlike in the Drive transcript. The characters names in this transcript are also always uppercase, except when a character is speaking their name. I think this is important as it makes it clear that it isn't being spoken. |
 |
| This is part of a transcript from FRIENDS, and it different in many ways to the previous transcript, as the characters names are centrally aligned, but the speech is left aligned, which does seem rather odd and makes it hard to read. The characters names are also in uppercase though, the same as the previous transcript, highlighting the different characters. The typeface is also in this same typewriter style typeface. |
 |
| This is a transcript from Hollyoaks, which again is different to the previous two transcripts again. The stage directions are in red, which I think works really well as it differentiates between the script itself and any movements or changes to sets, so is a lot easier to follow. However directions to how to speak are in brackets at the beginning of the speech in black, which does make it slightly harder to read, but it relates a lot more to the speech itself being directly next to it. The characters names are again wrote out in full, only this time are situated above the speech, the same as the FRIENDS transcript, only left aligned instead of centrally aligned, which makes it a lot clearer. The typeface is a serif, rather than the typewriter style the previous two transcripts used, which I think is a lot easier to read, it flows better rather than the words looking disjointed from another, they all flow together nicely. |
I then went on to produce a transcript of the full Q&A from the DVD, which actually took a lot longer than I had anticipated.
Transcript:
(M) Ladies and gentlemen thank you very much for staying for our Q and A tonight. It gives me great pride, to introduce the director of Drive, Mr Nicolas Winding Refn.
(R) I’m sorry that I said “fuck” on the BBC this morning.
(M) We should just clear the air straight away. I don’t know if any of you saw, er, Nicolas’ interview, this morning, with, uh, with Bill Turnbull, but the F word was used, uh, uh live on air.
(R) It’s kind of difficult when some woman comes up to you and says “This is a family show please be very very polite”, you’re like inviting trouble when you say that.
(M) It was the first time apparently in ten years that the F words been used, ah, on the BBC before lunch. So I think, you know, exactly exactly. And the first time in more than ten that someone has discussed existentialism on the BBC before as well so, so hats off for that.
(R) I think what shocked her more than anything else when she, these very nice people on that show, I don’t know them but they were very nice, and erm, she, you know, she was going on, about how the violence was very shocking and how it suddenly came out of nowhere, and how, I did that…technically and I said to her “well, you know, violence is like fucking.” And, she had a heart attack. But I was trying to explain, that, you know, you use violence the same way you use sexuality, it’s all about the build up, like the pay off itself is all about mechanics. So the more you are invested in the build up, the more it’s going to pay off.
(M) It’s an interesting, uh, way to start talking about Drive actually, it’s the difference between the films attitudes towards sex and violence, because obviously there’s some really graphic violence scenes in it. Er, but the, much as there’s fantastic chemistry between you, Ryan and Carey, the relationship’s actually fairly chased, you don’t really do anything, and even once the husbands out of the way, er the most they ever share physically together is, erm, is a kiss in the elevator obviously. Now, erm, why did you approach the two sides of the film, in, in those very different ways?
(R) Well, erm, essentially I wanted to make a fairytale, and the Grimm’s Brothers side, I’d been reading Grimm’s Brothers to my eldest daughter a few years ago, and I remember thinking it’d be interesting to make a movie, where the love story was so pure, that it was all about the idea of love, that, that, and then afterwards it would be really violent and that’s usually what happens to the Grimm’s fairytales end. When, when Drive came about, what if I do a love story in LA, but there was never the complication of love, it’s more like, the innocence of love and, what we’d like love to be. And, in order, to have that, he would also need to protect it later on, so he could justify the extreme violence
(M) And Ryan’s character is, very unusual, in that respect, compared to a lot of cinematic heroes at the moment. Erm, when you were making the film, or even, back at the scripting stage, were you aware of writing him in the tradition of any other cinematic heroes, I mean, for me it was reminiscent of The Samurai, and even possibly Shane as well, was any of that, did any of that ever feed into it?
(R) Well absolutely, I mean he is certainly built on an arch type of certain, hero, that you, we have a lot in America, because of the cowboys, we always have it in Samurai movies and so forth which there’s this enigmatic man who comes out of nowhere, to protect innocents, and because of his past as this mystery, he becomes more, dangerous, you know and more mysterious, and also more romantic, and more you know iconic just because his behaviour speaks for him and, it’s, it’s something you know, when we look at characters, we, the strength we admire and, and vulnerability, we identify with, you know, the weakness we identify with, there’s an audience, but the strength we admire, and the Ryan Gosling driver is a man of pure strength, so we his almost like, ambiguity, and yet it becomes much more dangerous, and in Sallis’ book, which is brilliant, I highly recommend it, there’s a huge backstory of the driver. But I eliminated all that because I thought it would be more interesting for the film version, that he became more mysterious, and it became, it was more of a tradition of a great, American, hero, that basically comes, you know, to save the innocents out of the west, with, with violence.
(M) There were a few changes from the book, to the film version as well of course, I mean, am I right in thinking that the Carey Mulligan character, is not Irene, but Irina, in the book now, was that a change you made because you particularly wanted to cast Carey in the part, or, er, did that come for another reason?
(R) No, I was, uh, I was, a lot of the book takes place, a lot of it in Echo park, which is in some American part of Los Angeles, and, I’d found the location, there and, we were, I know, I was shooting there, but I, I couldn’t find the actress to play Irene, or Irina, she was, probably be pronounced, I met with all the great talents, in Los Angeles, of Latino backgrounds, and, there was was so much of it and, I was very fortunate, that everybody was able to do the movie, but I couldn’t make a decision I couldn’t, not make up my mind which was odd, because it was all in front of me. And, we were getting closer and closer to the start date, and a lot of people were getting, a bit nervous cus I, wouldn’t, make a, decision, and, out of nowhere I got a call from Carey Mulligan’s agent. Asking if I would meet with her, and I had not seen An Education, erm, my mother had seen An Education, and my, my wife had seen An Education said it was very good. So, of course, you would take meetings with, when someone says would you please meet with my client, she very much wants to say hello to you. And I said sure, she can come by the house if she wants to, and, er, she did. And the minute she walked through the door and I had never met her, well actually that’s not true, erm, I met her once, in Australia, er, where we didn’t really talk. We both felt very very arrogant towards each other, so I when she came through the door, I knew exactly, it was going to be her. And I think it’s because I fell in love, with the innocence that she kind of came with and it reminded me very much of my own wife and now, I could fully go on the journey of the driver, to go to his extreme dark place in order to protect her. So it was kind of weird that suddenly, over night, it went from something completely different, and then I just went back and changed a lot of the script, also that changed the Standard character a lot as well, so, and we were already almost shooting at that point, so, it kept on evolving. Through the progress of the film.
(M) Now, in terms of the rest of the casting of the film, erm, speaking as a big fan of Christina Hendricks, do I detect a note of mischief in casting her because certainly when she came on screen I don’t know anyone in the audience felt the same it’s like, er, how fantastic is Christina Hendricks, and then ten minutes later is like oh what?! I mean, was that an intentional thing, or, or did you also.
(R) Well, I, I was originally casting porn stars for that role, so, the erm. Hollywood works like this you have a list, the list consists of the same five people that, the list last year had, except if people are starting to flop they cross you out. And so of all the people that I was meeting for Irene, that I didn’t want, right away, they send in for Blanche. So it was a bit like recycling the same five people, and I was like come on give me a break this is not going to work you know. So, er, and, so I said why don’t you try to, the old x-rated world, and see if there’s something more interesting. They were like, well how do we find them, and I said you’re in Hollywood they’re all around you. So, that was like a huge thing, that they actually had to go and cast these people, a lot of them were actually quite good. And then I got a call from, her agent, asking if I would meet her and I never seen Mad Men, I really didn’t know anything about her, so I was like yeah sure, if she wants to and, and she came by the house, which was one of the rules, they had to come by my house and. She came by and, she was just so awesome, like wow, like who are you? And she was very nice and, fun, and she was very creative and we very much really designed the character there so, I gave her the part right away, and then I realised how big she was, because I’d not seen Mad Men. And, and I thought well okay, if she’s gonna die I’m going to blow her head off. So. It was like. Er. I blew her head off. So.
(M) I mean from the very moment the film starts and you get that electric pink typeface up on the cinema screen, it er, it wears it’s sort of influences on it’s sleeve Drive, very boldly. Did you deliberately make this as a genre film, or did you approach the material in that way? Or, or was it more an existential film, with, er, genre inflections?
(R) Well, I make genre movies, but, I make genre movies, which, are, about existentialistic characters, cus all the characters I make movies about have some kind of, deeper internal search whether it’s Bronson or Valhalla Rising or Pusher trilogy that always leads into the kind of violent climax, which is odd because I’m not a violent man, I mean, I’m a very non violent man I mean, and I’m a very feminine man, I don’t like guys stuff I don’t play sports and I, I don’t really like men but I love women, and I always, set out, to make films about women, and I always end up making them about violent men. And I don’t know how I get to that, it just always ends up like that it’s, certainly not the intention.
(M) And there is that kind of running theme, er, through your last three films certainly, of, of, of male protagonists who, erm, violence is kind of their trade, or, or part of what makes them them. You know, Bronson obviously erm, erm One Eye, Valhalla Rising, then then suddenly, there’s a stunt driver you know, but it’s kind of part of this very violent set piece. Is that something that you’ve consciously sought out to do or is that just the way things have worked out?
(R) Well, erm, it kind of came, while I was making Drive, but then I saw there was a pattern that would repeat itself about transformation and I mean, and, all those three films are about a man who transforms himself into something else. And you can say Bronson was a film about a man who transforms himself into, or as a violent act, and Valhalla Rising is about a man who transforms himself into a human being through mankind evolution, and Drive is about a man who transforms himself into a superhero, for all the right reasons, so hopefully I’m done, with that part of my life.
(M) Well look, on that note, er, lets open the questions to the floor cus I’m sure everyone’s got a lot to ask, so there are some roaming microphones around, I can’t quite see where they are, so raise your hand if you’ve got a question and we’ll, oh oh so, there’s a mike up there so lets, er, go to this guy here in the middle.
(S1) Hi there, erm, just want to say, really enjoyed the film.
(R) Thank you.
(S1) Did you ever consider filming Ryan Gosling, erm, hammering the bullet into the guys head?
(R) Errr, no.
(S1) Was that too violent?
(R) No. Er, it’s just because it was something we came up with the spur of the moment Ryan and I are very telekinetic so, we think, alike, so er, I think it was something we came up with while we were there. He’s like “why don’t I just like, hold it like that and, the hammer up”, I was like right, but if we had done the act would have been dead.
(S1) Save it for the DVD
(R) yeah, erm.
(M) And I love the look of the, the totally passive look of the strippers in that scene, I mean whose idea was it just to cus it’s such a great, it’s probably the most sexual moment, in the whole film I think but uhm.
(R) Well I mean erm art consists of two emotions it’s ah sex and violence.
(M) Come on it is!
(R) And er, and, so, and so the idea was that, as, as he becomes violent, he transforms himself into his own movie, becomes like an actor or a character in his own film about a man who saves purity. And so, you know, the sexuality, of the violence that is, shown generally in Hollywood films is very seductive. So there is a kind of sensibility where sex and violence becomes the same thing essentially. Because, the relationship between them is so pure that it gets complicated so it’s almost like, the sexuality almost comes through in the violence in the film.
(M) Next question, erm, where’s the microphone gone? Over there, okay, this, down at the front here.
(S2) Erm, hi, I was wondering when you started working on the music cus for me it was an addition that added colour to the film, and and just the sound effects as well cus it, just, it never stops.
(R) What never stops?
(M) The sound effects and the music.
(R) Right. Well, er, I erm, I don’t do drugs any more. And so music is very much a way for me to enhance my emotions cus essentially I am a fetish film maker, I make films based on what I would like to see, and music helps me with that, to wanting to see certain things, not always understanding why I want to see it, I’ll leave that to other people to analyse, so, erm, I always try to define if I make a movie between, what if it’s a piece of music what would it be, cus then I would listen to that music when I was developing it or writing it so forth and, erm. You know like Bronson, it was The Pet Shop Boys, so I would listen to The Pet Shop Boys twenty four hours a day, forcing everybody else to listen to The Pet Shop Boys twenty four hours a day, and with Valhalla Rising I was like Einstürzende Neubauten I had to like the sound, and here I always wanted electronic music so think this would counterbalance the masculinity of the car, this very American macho world of violence, you know men of doing violence as a noble act. But I wanted this very feminine sound, and I beginned to listen to a lot of craft work, when I was in the development stages and even when I was shooting it, and that made, when they made the first electronic music, it came out of these very kind of antique instruments and had this very feminine pop sound to it. And then, you kind of evolve into the Eurovision sound which of course ended up being the sound of the movie. Erm, and then when I had chosen the pop songs that were in the film, I then had Cliff Martinez emulate, the sound, of those songs into his score, and then, in terms of sound, erm, sound never stops. It just evolves through a movie but my favourite sound of all is always silence, cus it’s the one key note that you can turn around constantly cus it’s unpredictable and silence is actually when we feel the most, it’s also the most bare and sparse, approach to something cus that’s when you really touch somebody, deep deep because a voice is a dialogue is what you hear, becomes logic, but sound goes straight to the heart and there’s silence is the strongest, strongest element.
(M) I think another thing about the music that really, er, on watching the film is, the way, er, it’s just dovetailed so beautifully at the end, like going back to that song with, the reframe, a real hero, and uh, a real human being, I mean I am assuming the lyrics to that are chosen to be pertinent to that.
(R) Well that was, I mean the way that the songs came about was that, Matt Newman who edited the movie and my movies, the very part of my creative evolution, and, erm, he’s more obsessive than I am about certain things, and he, when I said electronic music he, would literally scout the world of electronic possibilities, and he gave all of these options, and then I chose the ones that I liked, and the real human being the real hero was a great way to book end the film and start it with because essentially that was what it was all about and also, because the drivers half man half machine, so by day, you know he’s a human being and by night he’s a hero and for her, half way through the movie, she’s a human being in her life and she needs a hero, so, coincidently, that, erm, there were a lot of people who wanted me to change the music, there were certain people involved in this project that wanted Kanye West, or other more, they were called audience friendly radio listening music, which showed they didn’t know what the fuck they were talking about. Erm, but I really strongly felt that this would best represent the film and, erm, and I er, I’m very happy and the way that it, because er it reminded me a little bit of my John Hughes period when I was in my teens in the 80’s John Hughes would always choose very, interesting music and he played the songs all the way through at the end.
(M) Next question? Ah yeah, this chap down on the, the front here.
(S3) The film was er, scaled down from $60 million was that right? As a franchise pitcher.
(R) Well, originally Universal had bought the book called Drive, and I think had a heart attack, because, essentially, it was a hundred page existentialistic novel about a stunt driver in Los Angeles. And then they spent x amount of percentage of it developing it into a kind of $60 million Hugh Jackman Fast and the Furious kind of spin off, and that was, a long time ago, and had never gotten made, so the script, had just been lying around in some kind of Universal vault, and nobody had been interested and then Ryan, had read it and kind of liked, some of the kind of concepts of the er, cars, and uh the man in a car. But then, you know, ended up changing a whole lot, because had a different kind of fetish that I was more interested and then I read the novel, which was brilliant and I said I wanted to make the movie about a stunt man, that’s what it is and Hossein Amini who had been adapting the script for many years, is a wonderful writer, and became a great collaborate with me in Los Angeles where we basically just tore the script apart, and, put it back into it’s place but um, with a different, sensibility, and all the studios passed on it, so it went way way way way way way down in budget, and so was basically back to shooting European movie and erm, LA for 7 weeks.
(S3) How did the screen writes feel about that? retelling it from the ground up when they’d been working it for years? And when you come along and smash it apart, what was the.
(R) I don’t care.
(M) But this is something you did with Bronson as well right, cus I remember when you got the script for Bronson in the first place it was.
(R) Sucked.
(M) Completely different film yeah, and you just rebuilt it.
(R) Well it’s because I can only make the kind of films I make, I’m not the best film maker in the world there’s a lot of better film makers than me, but I can make my kind of films, but aside AMELIA is a wonderful writer who is about to be a director also, I think, for him, there was also this kind of fresh perspective on it cus, had basically been scrutinised till death.
(M) Okay next question yeah, just down, at, the very front here.
(S4) Um, one of the things I really liked about the film, um, which is great by the way, you should be really proud.
(R) Thank you.
(S4) Is er, the fact that you cast a lot of actors that were basically playing against type, for example you got Carey Mulligan as a young mother, Albert Brooks as a rough gangster and Ryan Gosling as, literally, bloody psycho, so er, was this always the intention? Or did you have other people in mind or er, how did it come about?
(R) No, I mean Albert Brooks was, essentially goes back to the list, because essentially you’re given the list of the five people that played bad guys, heavies, and I can’t read out the names cus they’re too embarrassing to read it out, but it basically consists of the same five people of the year before. But I was like, I really felt Albert Brooks would be an interesting choice also because, I had changed the character, in the original material and also the book, was more of a mobster, than I wanted him to be a film producer, that used to be a gangster so of course the film has to go back to be a gangster. And, but I wanted Albert Brooks, not that I really knew Albert, or had never really, you know, seen a lot of his movies, I did remember seeing Lost in America was very young in New York, and I was, kind of fascinated by him, he was like the psychotic version of Woody Allen. And erm, so, in order for it to work out I, I wanted to meet him of course first, before, you know, we could finalise anything, cus I spoke on the phone with him first and it was really interesting, and then, he came to my house of course, and, he er, he er, you know, he’s pretty neurotic and very interesting and very intelligent very smart, and actually just from our first conversation I came up with this fetish knife idea that he was fetish about knives and that’s how he kills people, and through the course of our, our conversation I realised this man is also king of all emotions, and that, essentially he would kill somebody in real life so lets do it in a movie kind of thing so, I, I gave him the part right away and it was great, because, having him not played a gangster before was really surprising because none of us really knew how it was going to work out. And, and it was such a pleasant surprise, and he’s again, you know, I’m very collaborative in a sense that a lot of time I let the actors, just, you know, even write their own dialogue if they want to or something because it, it, I shoot in chronological order, so it becomes a very communal, creative effort of saying “well lets try this lets try that”, of course the actors are very much into that so Albert is a very smart man he would really use that. You know in terms of his character and how to build him up.
(M) Is that where his monologue about being a film producer came from?
(R) Yeah, uh that came from the whole thing where he used to, I er, make movies, sexy stuff.
(M) Next question, yeah just uh two seats down perfect.
(S5) Hiya I thought all of the bits of the film interlocks to perfectly the music was absolutely perfect, and I thought the visuals were great I just wanted to ask, erm, where did you get that jacket from cus it’s amazing it’s definitely a fetish thing the number of shots where you’ve got Ryan from behind and seeing the jacket I was like yeah.
(R) Well the jacket came about from Kiss I Was Made For Loving You. And, er, I had this idea of this satin jacket that after hearing that song bout a thousand times, cus it kind of reminded me of, an era, where I was fairly too young to understand, like anything, but that fusion of rock and disco, that glam feel, and the way that a satin jacket what would illuminate him at night was kind of, interesting to me and, erm. When you then have great actors like Ryan. Er. An actors wardrobe then becomes really important to them because thats how they build up their character a lot of their DNA. So, Ryan would then go out and find the kind of jacket that he would feel comfortable in, and, as a character as an actor. And, he, we chose the one that really, you know fitted everything really well and it had a lot of these animal symbols, American iconic like an eagle, or, a shit tiger something like that, and, snake or whatever, and, erm, I was like great we should have an animal on it and then we got the jacket custom made in satin of course and, to have that whole 80’s kind of, those 80’s jackets with the satin feel, and, erm. The one day, while it was being made, Ryan and I and the costume designer would out in the mechanics shops cus Ryan was building his own car to understand the surgery of a motor, and. We were just looking around trying to see, how to shoot a garage scene, me and the costume designer. And, a woman called Aaron. And, er, I showed her the trailer to Scorpio Rising, which basically consists of men working on their cars. In a very fetishistic way, and eh, it starts with a scorpion. And because Ryan and I are telekinetic, we were able to right away say to each other mentally, that it was going to be the scorpion, well actually we were participating at Stanford on telekinetic people by the way, but, eh. It became right the symbol because this is who he was essentially, and, later on, Ryan came up with the idea that maybe he could use the story as a metaphor to describe his full transformation which, was a great idea and, so, that jacket really came out of Kiss. And it’s, only, there’s only like 5 versions of it around the world.
(S5) Wow.
(M) What I love about the costume design in this film is, er, it’s not just shot, fetishistically, but, it’s also eh, miked fetishistically when you’ve got, Ryan, clenching his fist in the car, you get that fantastic creak of the leather around his knuckles.
(R) Well leather’s very seductive you know, I don’t know if anybodies into leather here, but it’s a very seductive sound.
(M) Have you seen my collar?
(R) Right, haha. Erm, and you can enhance things like that erm. My wife would never let me, but uh. Things like the become, also because when you strip away dialogue, sounds become so crucial just to tell the story, and also the body movements of the actors so crucial. And I’m sure in the beginning Ryan was a little bit confused why I wanted to kept on shooting his back with the scorpion but, but, uh it was also the way because his performance is so powerful that from the back and the combination of the jacket and the symbol, his aura that is quite unique, it was such a powerful image.
(M) Next question, erm, yep just up there in the middle.
(S6) Yeah hi there I've been surprised in the discussion of the film, not to hear the name Walter Hill mentioned a little bit more, as an influence, erm, I just wondered if you’ve seen The Driver, and if you’re a fan of his work generally?
(R) Well I love Walter Hill, and erm, and erm, I’ve never seen The Driver because The Driver was always very hard to get on VHS and on DVD and, he wasn’t really, right before we started shooting that we were able to track down a, a copy of the DVD and then I saw it and it’s a terrific film. But. I say we’re more like Melville and Sergio Leone films, were much more like an inspiration because they were genre movies, made by Europeans with American icons essentially and, in terms of their characters. And I know that I believe that James Sallis had seen the driver that inspired him to write the book as an indirect reference, of course to Walter Hill’s superb superb movie.
(M) Next question. Over at the side there yeah.
(S7) Hi. Erm, you’ve mentioned on occasion working with Ryan, erm, whilst you were directing the film and I was wondering how, when working with actors, can it create like a healthy or unhealthy relationship, and where do you draw the line with how much influence you can take from actors when, basically shooting your film?
(R) Well it kind of depends on your relationship with them I mean. This whole film came about in a very strange way because I was in Los Angeles doing a movie called The Dying of the Light with Harrison Ford, where he plays an ex-CIA agent who goes on like an existentialistic journey and dies. It was a beautiful script by Paul Schrader and I was so happy that I got to kill Harrison Ford. Erm. And. It was great, LA, killing Harrison Ford, the money was there, we were gonna go make it, and then Harrison decides not to die. So we’re like, fucking hell. And er. I was really annoyed and distressed, and erm, I got a call from Ryan, out of nowhere we’d never met, asking, he knew I was in LA, and if there was a way for us to maybe get together and talk about, doing something. And I was like yeah sure why not, I’m here you know I would only be in LA in very short stretches of time because my second daughter was born so, even though I was ill, actually in those couple of days when I was in LA, I had gotten the flu coming on the plane, I said yeah you know we can, we can have dinner tomorrow night. The problem is I was really really, sick, and, when guys are sick they get very weak. And erm, cus we can’t give birth we’re so weak, and erm. Harrison had gotten me these anti-flu drugs, that, took the flu down, but it, also made me high as a kite. So I was literally stoned out of my mind when I went to have the dinner with Ryan, and I, stumbled into the restaurant about an half an hour later and erm, sat down and er, you know, at the table and, became chair, I couldn't really have a conversation with him because I was so out of it and I couldn’t look at him because, I would be sitting here and he would be sitting where you are and I couldn’t turn and look at him so I’d be like like this, he’d be like that, and he’d be very, trying to have a professional conversation and I was just not able to say anything really. Erm, about an hour and a half into the dinner, I asked him “would you please take me home?” It was a bit like a blind date gone wrong. And and, Ryan was just like “er er er yeah sure, ok you know you don’t drive?” “No i don’t drive i failed eight times”. So, and I was basically too cheap to get a cab, you know cus it was going to cost me fourty bucks. Cus, this was not going to lead to anything, essentially you know, this was not a very productive meeting and I was so out of it anyway and pissed off that Harrison wouldn’t die. Erm, so anyway we get out of the restaurant, and we get into the car. And up until then, while we were having dinner we talked a little bit about music, and movies and so forth. And erm, as he’s driving back to Santa Monica that awkward silence you know that awkward blind date silence where you’re like, no action lets just get out of the fucking car, erm. It’s unbearable so Ryan turns on the radio and it’s soft rock. And er, it’s very seductive, and REO Speedwagon I Can’t Fight This Feeling Anymore starts to play. And I’m a child of the 80’s again, so that wow, you know, and then when you’re ill and you’re stoned out of your mind.
(M) I can’t wait to hear how this story ends up, this is, this is steamy.
(R) Well because, what was interesting what kind of defined us in the end but I was so out of my mind and, I started singing to REO Speedwagon’s I Can’t Fight This Feeling Anymore really loud obnoxiously loud in the car. And then I started to cry. And I really had tears rolling down my cheeks. And, you know, I was missing my wife, and my kids, and Harrison wouldn’t die, and I was all fucked up. And why was I here, and it was kind of like an emotional relief for me, I was building myself up to this. But it gave me an idea for a movie, and I turned to Ryan and I said, very loudly I screamed in his face actually, cus I really hadn’t looked at him for the whole time he was just petrified, there I was crying and singing in his car, I said “I know we’re, we’re gonna make a movie about a man who drives around at night listening to pop music cus that, becomes, his emotional relief”. And that, cemented our relationship so strongly, it was almost like a non sexual encounter between us, that led to, connections that we had so, when we started making the film, we were so, there was no boundaries of what one could do and not do, it was a true kind of collaboration and my point is that, as a director, if you can connect with your actors, on such a strong level, it’s a wonderful opportunity way to collaborate all the way through because essentially the director is there to help the actors express their emotions. Because that’s what the audience, buys, at the end, that’s what we live for, that’s what we react to. And, a director is not an expert, on something particular, but he has to know everything about everything else. And and, then you have experts to help you, tell the story cus the director is the author of the movie he, he is the, he is the creator of the film, you know film making is a directors medium. Well most films are. And erm, that way, if you the more you can connect with your actors, and and of course. Test and play and rehearse everything through, the more truthful it gets to it, cus essentially it is your movie, you’re the director and they’re there to serve your needs. But the more you can collaborate, on that journey, so they become one with you, it’s much more beneficial.
(M) I think there’s a really eerie parallel between the way that you know obviously you’ve got Ryan Gosling in this film, and there’s a sense that, his career is just, about to, explode. With the way that you cast Tom Hardy in Bronson two years ago, and what’s happened to his career since then, what’s this knack that you’ve got for, you know, putting your finger on someone, and saying this is, this is gonna gonna be big and this is the film that’s gonna make them big?
(R) Well it’s, I guess, to begin with I have to thank Jason Statham because he turned down Bronson. He was my original choice, and he was like nah mate can’t do it.
(M) I thought you meant the English Jason Statham?
(R) Haha, yeah. Funny.
(M) Well thanks for coming.
(R) I was. trying to do my Ewan McGregor accent. Er, so ah, erm. Tom got the job, and now it’s just been, very lucky, I mean it’s it’s luck, it’s pure and simple right place at the right time, and erm. And it’s its er, you know, its erm. Super cool.
(M) I think we’ve got time for a couple more questions er, who else, up at the back yeah.
(S8) Hi erm, you mentioned your desire to kill Harrison Ford, and, also your choice to blow Christina Hendricks head off, erm. The death that I thought was most affecting was probably Nino’s because of the relative peacefulness of it, and I was just wondering if there was anything you could, elaborate on, in terms of that choice?
(R) Err. Well. I don’t know how to.
(M) I think with that death there’s some. Someone help me out here. The thing with that death there’s a sense that you know, er, Ryan’s character is taking on the mental of the hero cus he’s got that, you know, the head cast of the, the erm, of the hero from the film that he’s acting in, and he sort of takes that on, and then goes to, sort of settle the score that way. The head cast was also incredibly realistic. Erm, was that one, I mean, what was, I mean how did that kind of come about was that something that you had?
(R) No, Ryan sent me a link to a, a place you can buy these masks, like a couple hundred dollars, cus there was a story that broke out while we were preparing the movie about a man whose basically had a mask of another nationality on, while he was robbing banks so they were looking for wrong nationalities, he was able to get away with it, because of this mask. It looks very realistic and quite creepy.
(M) Right, there was another question just up at the back, yeah, just over on the side there.
(S9) Hi, er, what I was erm, I was impressed by the levels of intensity of emotion between Carey and Ryan’s characters through the scarcity of dialogue and looks, and erm, I was wondering if you could sort of, describe how, sort of those scenes developed because I think you said this morning on Breakfast that, er, a lot of that was done sort of, in the process of the making of the movie.
(R) Well I shoot my films in chronological order, a lot of it had to do with how the actors build up their characters, and also it had to wait for me to change to moves it goes along, and not really knowing how the ending is going to be. Erm, the way that, we did those scenes, because the Americans are so nervous that, we wrote a little bit of dialogue and I, then I, we took it to hell when we shot it. But, the whole idea was, to tell a love story without them saying a single word. And erm. That meant that I would just shoot them again and again and again and again and again and again, and then, before each take i would go over and I would, and, I would start by hugging Ryan, and I would, you know, hold him until he gave into the hug. Which sounds, which in the beginning took a little longer cus he was thinking, that was a bit odd, erm. And that I told him that, you know, that erm, go with God. And then, when it came to Carey, erm, it was the same process again of, of of, of hugging her until she kind of just, gave in, and then I said to her “lets fuck”. And erm, then I would take it again and again and again. So sometimes I wouldn't even yell “cut” I would just continue with them, and, that way was a way to develop a language very early on how to do those scenes, so the further we got into it the easier it was, for the actors to basically strip away all their technical acting in terms of dialogue and movement, and it was just basically how they would perceive each other. And it was very interesting and erm, and it, erm, you know I would cry every time they would work, so that was kind of, and I would be listening to music at the same time, tears would be rolling down my cheeks it’s very embarrassing sitting in America macho crew and you’re like, but it was a way to cement, their relationship.
(M) Okay, time for one last question. Yep, right up at the back there.
(S10) Er, the chase scenes were very effective so erm, how much research did you put into erm, directing those scenes and how fascinated are you with the stunt drive world or?
(R) Er, well, I mean the stunt drive, well you know when you have seven weeks to do the whole movie including stunts you're really, under the gun in terms of, because, driving scenes are so hard to do because they’re so technical, and there’s so much safety and, there’s so much manoeuvring and they’re very boring to shoot. They’re fun to edit but they’re very boring to shoot. So I came up with this idea that car chase rather than, because I didn’t have the money or the time to do the sort of thing that other movies do so extraordinary, in terms of how the car moves and what they can do and the length of things. That, I, each car chase was more represent his, his, his emotional state, so the first car chase was the idea to makes a car scene where we never leave the car, we always see the chase from the cars point of view, it’s like a diver in the ocean with sharks, you never acknowledge the sharks you only experience from his perspective. The second car chase it was more about this, you know, the emotional turmoil that he was caught in after Standard got shot, and the sound of the machines, the you know the violent behaviour of an engine, and and the sound of it. And the third one was more like what would you feel like if you were to kill somebody with a car and kind of the determination that the driver has transformed himself into, also because he has changed his costume into this pure kind of, you know larger than life superhero.
(M) I think there’s no question as well that, that that way of shooting is, has really, erm, helped these things, really improved them I mean, when you see car chases in like the Fast and Furious series now, because there’s so much CGI at play, there no real weight, or or mechanics behind what’s happening, but in in this, especially in that scene, after Standard gets shot, there’s a real sense that these are huge you know, metal, things that can do a lot of damage.
(R) Well they were and, having been in so many car crashes I have a car phobia so, it’s it’s erm, it’s I find, I find them very scary but also there’s something sexually exhilarating about them.
(M) Scary and sexually exhilarating, lets leave it on that note, Nicolas Winding Refn thank you very much indeed.
(R) Thank you.
(M) thank you.
I used the letters (R) (M) and (S1) for the different speakers, Nicolas Winding Refn, the main interviewer, and the different speakers. I didn't want to use full names, as I thought this would take up a lot of space which was unnecessary, and especially repeating it over and over you don't need full names, you know which speaker is which through just the one initial.
No comments:
Post a Comment