Colin Firth, T. Ford Share The Secrets Of Making A Perfect And Unforgettable Movie

hello good afternoon everyone thank you very much for coming for one more press conference of today I'm gonna kindly ask you all to stay here for one minutes taking your pictures then after that I'll kindly ask you to go to the sides of the room leave some space for the volunteers you guys you're asking your questions please stand when you when you're asking the question then sit down I'd like to welcome on stage the panelists for the film a single men and Unruh bear thank you hello everyone and welcome to the press conference for single a single man sitting next to me of course the director and the leading actor mr. Tom Ford and mr. Colin Firth and then I think the first question will go to you lift afford is you're making all your decision to make a single man a one film only I have to make this movie and even if it's the only movie that I ever make in my lives not gonna be the only movie I ever make in my life or was it well had you for sometimes see been seeking to expand your range of activity toward cinema well I don't think of it as expanding my range of activity I've always wanted to make a movie it's been something that I'm passionate about film it's been something that I've loved for years and when I left gucchi a few years ago and in a certain stage in my life I realized now was the time and I started looking for the right project I think a lot of people know me from my work as a fashion designer which is very very different than what I wanted to say as a filmmaker you know I know what I'm about as a fashion designer it took me a while to figure out why would anyone want to see a Tom Ford movie what do I have to say and I think that film should challenge you and make you think and I don't know if I've answered your question and I could keep rambling but there's a question over here James Rocchi AMC TV news I'm the two-part question starting with mr. Ford and then with mr. Furth mr. Ford what was the biggest challenge in moving from still photography to motion picture photography that you didn't expect and mr. Furth was there any trepidation on your part to working with someone who is a noted and acclaimed photographer but who had not necessarily made a film before I don't want to sound egotistical at all but it was a very smooth transition for me there there is a certain similarity in the way works in fashion and you work in film you have to have a vision you have to work with a group of technicians fashion is much more collaborative than one would imagine you have to work with a group of technicians to help you realize your vision you have to encourage them you have to give them freedom you have to try to get the very best out of them and at the same time you have to also guide them to tour towards your vision so in that way there were a lot of similarities and having worked with image for a long time and in understanding the power of image and the power to tell a story with image that also helped I'm not going to say that you know there weren't moments where I thought God am I doing this the right way but I had a terrific team of people you know when you work with great actors that takes an enormous amount of the weight off you just call enough to just put a camera on him and he performs so I had every advantage that one could have and I feel very lucky and fortunate to have had that never trepidation I mean I couldn't have been further from they couldn't have been further from trepidation that those were never the kind of doubts I mean I the things tom has just explained about how you can make use of the same sensibilities that you might have in terms of your vision in fashion and the way they can be converted to a vision in how you convey a narrative I completely understand that sort of thing there are there are a million different ways you can be a wonderful director if you are working with a highly imaginative highly intelligent person with an extraordinary set of skills which are far beyond just the pure visual which I think Tom had already established and you are combining that with a very very interesting actually quite unique story to tell there was nothing but intrigue from the beginning really I didn't know Tom well enough to understand how he might want to tell the story and you know but that I started to get a very clear idea of that at our first meeting and for me it was a day of - into shooting where I realized that I think we had connected and harmonized in a way in terms of what we were both wanting to do which meant that you know it was never really much of a tussle I think Colin was very brave and I really am so happy that he took the chance with me I think that sense of both having taken a leap of faith I mean I didn't feel it was a huge leap of faith I feel that the other way around frankly without this you know having to ping pong back to Tom but to have something that was so personal a story that was so important to him and then to put so much of it in my hands you know where I'm good all the screen time I mean I I certainly felt you know the degree of trust that have been placed with me one question of picking on that and then the question goes to the lady to think you said mr. Deford that this was yes of course a collaborative endeavor as it always is however were the moments where the actors once the neural division has been defined and explained there are moments when they're good and that's why they hired them and if you come any better than mr. Firth where they would just take the character 1 step 4 of course and that's the wonderful thing you know when you have great actors they add a dimension that you couldn't even have imagined and and both Colin and Julianne absolutely inhabited the characters and it was wonderful to watch you know something that I'd said on my computer writing dialogue and all of a sudden there was and happening in a way that was even more powerful than I could have hoped so that was a great great feeling you mentioned something earlier or something that I wanted to mention which I didn't is that fashion and film for me are two very different types of expression fashion for me is creative but it's a it's a commercially creative endeavor for me film for me is a purely expressionistic form and for me you know working with film was saying something that I I'm not being very articulate about it but that the two things mean very different things to me and they're two very different creative outlets and the film is something that is not meant to be commercial but of course you want people to see what you do because that's the way you communicate with them but it was really the most expressive and personal thing that I've ever done Wow I have a question um why did you think how was what was your first thought of casting calling Colin Firth did you happen to see him years ago in another country every time I've ever seen Colin in anything I have found him captivating and his restraint as an actor has always impressed me he's also got a very subtle sense of sexiness which is also not always so subtle and well meaning that he's a very sexy guy you know there were not very many actors who could have played George who were the right age who were English it was important to have a real English actor playing George and who could have played this character with the subtlety and the emotion that Colin could have Colin was my absolute first choice I thought of him immediately he was tied up working luckily our schedules shifted around in a way that just last August he became free and our schedule moved and I immediately sent him the screenplay got on the phone flew to London the next day we had dinner convinced him hand shook got back in the plane and was back in America within 24 hours and we started shooting a few weeks later it was one of those great things where everything just came together sir from Mexico City there is a part in the film of when someone has to define colors I would like to know which one is your favorite color and why say that again I'm sorry can you define which one is your favorite color in well there isn't a favorite color but the point of that was in the novel it's really an interior monologue of what this man is going through in a day and you have to have certain devices to help the audience understand what he's feeling I how you feel when you're depressed but when I'm depressed everything is absolutely flat I can't see there is literally no color in my life once this man decides that this is the last day he's going to live on the planet he starts to look at things in a different way and the beauty of the world starts to pull at him and colors and things and sounds and everything become really intense and so to help the audience feel what George is feeling that was the intention of the use of color by the end of the film when his depression is lifted and he's really absolutely living in the moment he's living in Technicolor what's my favorite color blue the rainbow ma'am hello Helen Barlow from Australia mr. Ford you've brought you've brought I think some aesthetics from your fashion work into this film did you also bring some of the models some of these boys are just so gorgeous and and fit and buff and mr. mr. Firth did you have to workout a lot to perform beside this what do you think I don't know Colin looked pretty good naked first of all fashion and film for me I want to separate them because they were not this was not an extension of what I do as a fashion designer and beauty and fashion and and the look of something without substance behind it is meaningless as far as film goes so the look of the thing was really really came from the characters you know what kind of house is George gonna live in what kind of person is he what does he do who is Julianne Moore's character how does she live what does she do of course she smokes pink cigarettes she listens to Sayers gasps Borg because living in her life she's vacationing in the South of France and much more advanced than everyone else so all of that veneer was really there to support the characters of course it's also there to be beautiful but it's not meant to be form without substance the only character in the film who is a model plays Carlos the hustler and he is my house model who I've worked with for three years I take my own pictures and working with him he's I knew he'd be a good actor he's an absolute natural it's the first thing he's ever done but working in still photography with him I can say one word to him and he immediately just projects and I thought he'd be great and the purpose of that character is that he's a human flower George doesn't want to pick him up he doesn't want to have sex with him just as though he's seeing beautiful things all day he encounters this absolutely stunning physical creature and he just wants to look at him so it was very important that that character literally look like and be a human flower well again the costumes are there to serve the characters you know it wasn't a costume parade for me that's not what it was about I worked with a brilliant costume designer called Aryan Phillips who I've known for years who was nominated for walk the line who I think you know this was a tiny budget film we shot in 21 days we had hundreds of extras to dress in period costumes as well as the principles I think she did an incredible job you know I just to reiterate what I'm saying from their point of view as a person wearing the costume you know obviously there's quite a lot of questions about this just because people know what Tom's history is I think if people didn't know Tom's history they would look at this and think what a beautiful cinematic Sensibility we're looking at what what wonderful film grammar it wouldn't it would be nothing to do with you know the decorative elements of these things yes it's beautiful but to me when I put George's costume on I didn't feel like I've been decorated by a great fashion designer I felt that this was this spoke of George's desperation his need this is very clear and explicit at the beginning of the film this need to fastidiously put on a body armour you know that this this constructed character that he had to be in order to be able to step out of his front door and that's what the cufflinks and the tie pin and that that's what it was all about he pulled one piece of that away this man could collapse I preferred having it on are you sure you Kay baby there was one commentary out of the screening last night which I found rather intriguing so I'm passing it on to you one woman was saying to her companion you don't understand this film has virtually nothing to do with homosexuality and everything to do with love a God apart from that phone call when you are told of your lover's death because their historical specifics involved her opinion was it has nothing to do with homosexuality I'm so glad to hear that because that was my intention this is a story of love it's a story of romance story of isolation it's a story of learning that the small things that we all go through in our day that we take for granted are really the most important things it's really all we have and and that's that's what it was about you know the fact that that George happens to be gay isn't really you know this could have been his wife that died in a car accident this could have been a depression that was brought on by that and he decided you know we could have almost the same story Christopher Isherwood one of the admirable things I think about him certainly for me as a writer was that most of his things were autobiographical and the stories were never about being gay there's just a gay character here humans and you know maybe I'm blind because I've been with the same person for 23 years I live a completely you know a life but if you ask me ten things to describe myself I guess I would say oh yeah I guess I'm gay you know I don't know it's not so so it was not meant to be a gay story it's meant to be a universal story and and that for me is what it was so I'm happy to hear that comment to go back to that telephone scene was it a difficult scene to shoot call him I actually can't I've had to come answer questions about that scene I don't know how it was arrived at I do remember it was the night that Barack Obama was elected yeah it wasn't the easiest day to be grief-stricken I don't know I don't remember I remember it vividly we shot three thousand feet because Colin just kept him moding and it was so beautiful no it was so beautiful and it was so subtle I just couldn't turn the camera off I would think we had it and you had the entire crew absolutely riveted and I just couldn't say cut and I noticed we were going on a long time and actually I it was quite early on in the shoot I think wasn't it it was very early on and I and the sense of I realized then that what Tom had established I mean this is where I think people who don't have never been on a film set the word directing is it can it can be it can be applied in all kinds of different ways it's very rarely well from its never really from a good director do this do that don't do that do more of that do less of this I mean that's you know the realm of mediocrity and it never works I realized at that point how much freedom we had notice me but you know camera operators people you know designers people people working on that so for for something which you know was create being created by a man whose reputation for perfection is so you know wide it was an extraordinary size and freedom you know there wasn't a fastidious control over things in that way at all it was a place where imagination could flourish and it just meant that dummy that's brilliant directly rather than can we have you know we have a bit more of that in a bit less of that it was I know what you are looking for here and you tuned to that and you're just set free and when that camera didn't start until the magazine run out I kind of knew where we were and then again yeah he rolled out three mags and so it's its own what it's awfully long what you see on the on the screen but it's only a fraction I think of what we did just to clarify at least for the four television audiences who haven't seen the film yet that seen your phone scene is is the scene when the moment when George is told that his lover has died and that he's not allowed to attend the funeral because it's for family only and that was the way it was in 1962 but that wasn't even the most important part of the scene the part of the scene is this is a moment where George is finding that his entire world is gone the person that he's lived with for 16 years his dogs even everything it's just gone all of a sudden and I don't know how many of you have had moments like that I have and it's really it's an unbelievable feeling where it just seemingly out of nowhere and and you don't really know how to react which is the way Colin played that which I thought was so beautiful question over there mr. Francis for French television would you say that it was important to you that the movie would be picked up here in Toronto it was picked up this morning by the Weinstein brothers he bought the rights of the movie you said earlier that mostly filmmaking is a form of expression for you how does the commercial aspect of everything that you you put in this movie important well if you have something to say and no one sees it you haven't achieved your goal so of course it was important that it's picked up because it's important that you know if you spend the time and the energy and the effort and you feel that that you have something that you're very proud of and that you want to be out there you have to have an audience it's just like fashion you can't dress up and walk around by yourself in a room you can but but but you know then you're not really speaking to anyone you're not you know contributing and you don't have a voice in contemporary culture mix of art and commerce in fashion and in movies well in creating this I wasn't thinking commercially at all I was thinking pure purely in terms of expression obviously once you do that and you have some that you're proud of you want people to see it so you absolutely need distribution so I'm incredibly happy that we have distribution for this now this is also a script that you wrote yes first time I assume yeah absolutely how how did that come about well when I bought the rights to the book there was a screenplay attached written by David Sears it was a beautiful screenplay very very much along the lines of the book followed it quite carefully quite closely and originally it wasn't my intention to write a screenplay as I started to work on the book and I started to think about how to turn this into a film I realized that I was going to have to take quite a few liberties with the story there's no plot in the book it's a beautiful book of prose really it's beautiful because it's so beautifully written and it's completely inside the character of George's had not much happens visibly on the outside so I had to create a plot I had to develop other characters that were not in the book and enhanced the characters that were in the books so that we could see what George was thinking and feeling without just literally making a story with a giant voiceover I bought final drafts sat down on my computer went to work at it it took me about a year and a half I went through quite a few drafts had friends in the industry read it corrected it worked on it corrected it worked on it and got it to a point where I felt strong about it and sent it off to a few great actors now there's this third stage of film writing so to speak as that's the editing process did you completely reassess the film as much as possible in the editing room that's the thing that I suppose surprised me the most about everything I had no idea even though you always hear hope films are met in the editing room I had no idea what one can do editing you can completely change a story you can change the scene you can change the intention you can change an actress performance I loved it it was like Rubik's Cube wherever you say that to me you know and I would get inside of it and it could twist in so many different directions and I spent a lot longer time doing that really six months I didn't intend to do that I found it an amazing part of the process and finally for me the film just kind of settled into place where it couldn't have been anything other than what it was and then you always finished with it question here therefore we are talking about right now with your first film but did you have plans for a second film or some other project I do but you know I just finished this two weeks ago and it wasn't just a film for me it was something that was really important and I don't want to just make films I want to make things that are important to me and hopefully important to other people so I need to have a little time in space and distance I'd love to have a parallel career I would love the opportunity to make a film every two or three years I hope you'll see more I'm determined that you'll see more so at the moment I just need a little space the lady over there hi Andrea case CTV News I'm a late arrival to this news conference so you may have touched on this but just after what you said mr. Ford about the editing process what made you think that you could make a film it's one thing to to conceive it but then you're almost learning on the job in terms of that editing process where did you get your ambition I don't know I felt very confident with that you know I think if you have a strong vision if you're imaginative and creative and you can visualize every you know what you want to say and you surround yourself with wonderful talented people I've been always one of those people and you know maybe I'm gonna be wrong maybe I am wrong that is I felt if I really put my mind to something and I had something to say and I could visualize it that I could make it happen so I felt secure going forward with that go ahead Mike here this is for Tom Larry from cnet.com are you good how are you good I love your work and love the way you carry yourself and you are huge in the fashion world what what makes you start in directing acting or filmmaking and how did you like your appearance did you learn something new about don't ask too many questions I'll forget the first night go back to the first one I'm already blanking the first one was huh you're blanking JC that's what happens and yes exactly well why did I want to do this yeah what makes you want to destroy you know like this I think you always have to do things new in life otherwise what's the point and I love a challenge but as I said it's something I've always wanted to do as a fashion designer it's fulfilling in a certain way you create something that has a power but it doesn't last very long it's powerful the first time you see a woman beautifully dressed in something you've never seen before it's one of the most powerful things that any of us can experience if you're a man or a woman who loves beauty however six months later well it's nice still a year later looking kind of old after that it's gone you can see it lit years later in a museum you can look at it wow admire the stitching isn't that cool wasn't that amazing for its time but it doesn't have that power if you're a designer you're someone who likes to create to create characters what they do what they say how they live how they die what happens and have it sealed forever in a bubble that 500 years from now whatever the medium is that people will be experiencing these things are you'd be able to open that world again be right inside it feel that emotion live all of that and I think that that's for me has been and hopefully will be one of the most satisfying things that as someone who's creative you could help to ever achieve you had a great experience of making your first film how did you like it did you learn something new about yourself I don't know that I learned something new about myself it's a different side of myself I couldn't have done this ten years ago you know I've been fortunate enough in life to have had a lot of material success and I think maybe I lacked a bit of spirituality and I recently have found that and reading this book in my in my 40s I found it to be a very spiritual book and I hope that then the film that's really what it's about so I don't know I think that we're all kind of we start out in our life to use a fashion reference as kind of Eau de Toilette and maybe we turn into parfait you know as we get older so as I've gotten older I think I've learned more and more and more about myself but I can't think of a specific thing that I was in in a way so everything that you've done so far has sort of moved toward making or has added to your filmmaking now that you've made the first your first film is there anything that you have discovered while making a movie that will find its impact in fashion of photography things that you already have done I think again if you keep your mind open and you can't help but be fed by everything that you do you know I hope in life we keep learning until the day we die that's kind of the point that's what George does you know George has an epiphany he understands everything that's happened to him he understands life and so he dies he doesn't need to live any longer he's learned the lesson he has hit a moment that maybe most of us don't hit or if we do we we attain it and then it disappears again and and so he doesn't need to go on living he's learned the lessons of life I hope that all of us keep learning until the day we die I think that's part of the point was to grow and develop you had to a seventh question seven women the gentleman here as a personally I'm fashion photographer actually I want to do my first film to any advice you would like to give to the photographers what wants to tell story find a great story that's the most important thing something you're passionate about it's all about the story it's all about your message and then get great actors nice to see you two questions dawn and I don't know how to pronounce this last name back Bacardi a Bacardi crisis boyfriend you've consulted yes what did that consist of and what is the story of George's beautiful house well I talked to Don quite a lot because I had to veer substantially from the book and I wanted to make sure that a that it was accurate and that the intention of the story was maintained Don I'm very happy to say loves the film and is very very happy with it and Chris himself felt that he's also in the movie by the way Chris himself having written screenplays and worked on other projects in Hollywood felt that one should take something and then make it their own and add to it so I think he was very happy with it he's in the faculty lounge he's sitting on a long sofa with my boyfriend on one and Don Bacardi in the other and we pan past both of them and he has a line the house is a lot in her house thinking about what George's house should be and I thought about this for all the different characters you know he he should have had a contemporary house he was living in Los Angeles Los Angeles is a capital of contemporary architecture for residential but he's English so I wanted it to be dark I wanted it to be made of wood he's a professor so while he would have been attracted to America and the new America and the freedom of America there would have also been a certain English quality which we got I think from the dark wood and this sort of coziness in a way of contemporary architecture it's a lot in our house it's in Glendale California el magazine just wondering how this book came into your life you said you read it in your 14 to my life in my early Mundy's when I first moved to Los Angeles picked it up and read it and at that time I didn't understand the spirituality of it but I was kind of lonely and I fell in love with George a bit kind of wanted to run into him somewhere in Santa Monica even though it was a fictional character and then after that met Christopher Isherwood and became obsessed with his writing read all of his work and it just stayed with me and then had different meaning for me later on in my life as I think books often do I think if you picked them up at different stages in your life you see very different things why did it take on a new meaning for you well because I hadn't understood the spirituality behind it you know Christopher Isherwood in his mid life became very spiritual became a student of Vedanta studied with swami prabhavananda I can never say that man's name correctly at the Vedanta Center in Los Angeles and when you read the book understanding that it is a book written by the the true self about the false self the book is written in the third person and it's written from a vantage point of someone with a bit more wisdom than the character that's in the book going through the daily you know a little bit backed up and that I found you know quite amazing and Colleen had you read the book no I didn't know the book and I thought I knew a bit about Christopher Isherwood I just read like I think like a lot of people I knew I knew the Berlin period right which became cabaret that's right now i knew mr. norris you know i there's a wealth of christopher isherwood that i had no familiarity with and the whole los angeles period was it was new to me have you read the book since oh yes you know I mean I read it quite a few times actually because actors forage for what they can get anywhere you know if there's a clue there's something that just might unlock something or you'll steal it interestingly a source material it was both rich and limited because a great deal if the George I was taking on was Tom you know I'm not saying literally but that's that's you can't quantify exactly what was what quiet but a lot came from Tom and was not to be found in the book at all the suicide conceived for instance is not to be found in the book and it's absolutely critical to the story as we tell it because this man has written his own ending he thinks he has which I think changes everything about the way he lives through that day so it was you know connecting to Tom was more helpful and connected to Christopher Isherwood on that subject as far as other material I have there's a wonderful documentary about Christopher issue it and great on the cottage life together called Chris and Dawn a love story and I saw that a couple of times and actually I think there's a lot of the knot of the texture of the kind of love that I think exists between George and in his partner I think one can be found there really I found that extremely useful mm-hmm any other question anything you guys would like to add no just thank you thank you and thank you for having us mhm thank you very much for being here okay go ahead one more question guys sorry hey one question you guys look really styling today what are you guys wearing we look what do you guys look great today what are you guys wearing well I want thanks ladies and gentlemen thank you thank you thank you thanks it's nice to meet you miscast

Channel: Colin The Firth

Views: 12,608

Rating: 4.9281435 out of 5

Keywords: Colin, Colin The Firth, Colin Firth, Tom, Tom Ford, Ford, sexy, gay, beautiful, cute, actor, Oscars, man, professor, depression, fashion, designer, Toronto, TIFF, Canada, film, movie, festival, award, nomination, Julianne Moore, Nicholas Hoult, Mathhew Goode, A Single Man, Julianne, design

Id: FjttNRoFxII

Length: 36min 11sec (2171 seconds)

Published: Sun Feb 04 2018