torsdag den 3. februar 2011

Om "127 Hours": Danny Boyle, Anthony Dod Mantle og Aron Ralston

Aron Ralston havde besteget adskillige bjerge, overlevet en lavine og var sluppet helskindet fra sit møde med en vild brun bjørn.

Men i maj 2003 kom han bogstaveligt talt i klemme på en afslappet solovandretur i Utahs canyon-landskab. En fastkilet klippeblok rev sig løs og naglede Ralstons højre hånd til væggen i bunden af en kløft. Efter fem dage uden mad og vand måtte han amputere sin egen arm med en sløv lommekniv for at slippe fri.

Selvportræt af Aron Ralston i Blue John Canyon, 2003
 (fra bogen "Et umuligt valg", Lindhardt & Ringhof)

MIT INTERVIEW MED ARON RALSTON:
> Han fik livet tilbage – kløften beholdt hans arm
(kræver JP-abonnement)
Brian Iskov i Morgenavisen Jyllands-Posten, 30. januar 2011

I dag har Danny Boyles "127 Hours" premiere i ti danske biografer. Filmen, der sætter berusende billeder og farver på Aron Ralstons chokerende oplevelse i kløften, er Boyles første siden Oscar-slugeren "Slumdog Millionaire".

Jeg interviewer den energiske Danny Boyle i dagens udgave af dagbladet Børsen, hvor instruktøren fortæller om de mange forhindringer, han mødte før, under og efter tilblivelsen af "127 Hours".

MIT INTERVIEW MED DANNY BOYLE:
> Actionfilm på én kvadratmeter
(kræver Børsen-abonnement)
Brian Iskov i Børsen, 4. februar 2010



Endelig bør du glæde dig til det næste nummer af filmmagasinet Ekko, hvor hovedartiklen er mit store portrætinterview af Anthony Dod Mantle: Boyles foretrukne cheffotograf, som jeg har fulgt i to år gennem Oscar-triumf ("Slumdog Millionaire") og Trier-helvede ("Antichrist").

Ekko nr. 52 udkommer på onsdag den 9. februar.

> Hør Filmnørdens Hjørnes podcast med Anthony Dod Mantle



EKSKLUSIVT FOR BRIES BLOG-O-RAMA:
Danny Boyle forklarer, hvorfor han brugte to cheffotografer på "127 Hours" (2010)



TRANSSKRIPTION:

"It's a bit of a failure, actually. Because the plan ... That's Robert Burne's quote, isn't it? "Best laid plans of mice and men gang aft agley". The plan was that they [DOP's Anthony Dod Mantle and Enrique Chediak] would bring something different to it. Each one would have a different style, and that would be one of the variations that would compensate for the lack of characters. Because there is basically one character during 90 per cent of the film. And we thought, "Yeah!" 'Cos Anthony Dod Mantle is like Northern European, he'll bring a kind of cool diffidence to it. And Enrique Chediak is from Ecuador and would bring a Latin-American passion to it.

We were thinking, we'll manoeuvre the narrative around to suit their passions, or to get them to jump. And I also thought, in addition to that, "Wow. There's a fairly good chance that James [Franco] will prefer one of them to the other." 'Cos it's gonna be very intimate [in the canyon], I knew that. And I thought, he may even get that he really dislikes one of them and really likes the other. And then I could exploit that, like on a really difficult scene, I'd send in the one he doesn't like! There'd be tension, like "good cop, bad cop", you know?

None of that worked, of course, none of it. Because what happened, in fact, was something much better. It just shows you that, plans - you should always abandon them, if you can, if you find something better. I never really realized this, although we'd set up the equipment that would enable this to happen. Anthony and Enrique developed a style, with James, of the film, of how it's shot. We had these digital cameras, which we'd used in Mumbai on "Slumdog Millionaire", and they're very, very flexible, very intimate spaces they can get in, and yet they're proper film cameras.

Danny Boyle (t.v.) og Anthony Dod Mantle indspiller "127 Hours" (2010)

Hand-held is normally on your shoulder or on your hip, basically. Or running, aaaaagggh, with the camera at the bottom of your arm. Because a film camera, you can't really hold it in your hand, it's just too heavy. But with these digital cameras, you can swap hands. They have a little gyro underneath which stops them looking hand-held. They look smoother - not quite as smooth as a Steadicam, but sort of halfway there. And they were the key. Because there was no room in the canyon, there was just him [James Franco] and them [Anthony and Enrique].

They started to work, and if you'd stopped and started the whole time, we'd still be there. And it would look fake, because it would be impossible to sustain. So everything we did, we did in these long, long takes. And they would develop the movement during it. We wouldn't say, "Stop! Now we're doing a wide one. Okay, right, let's do the close-up." They would just go in for the close-up. And I think, American actors are like this, they know when a close-up is being taken. They can feel it. Whereas British actors are very different.

Anyway, they developed this style, and it dictated the whole film. We did virtually every scene like that, and when we did it differently, we never used it in the editing. Because it looked fake. Didn't look real, you didn't quite believe he was there, it felt like a film. So in fact, something much better than what was planned came out of it, and I love that. I celebrate that. You should always have a Plan A, but Plan B is always better, if you find it. It's always much better."

> Mere om "127 Hours" på Bries Blog-O-Rama




BONUSMATERIALE:

Danny Boyle løftede desuden sløret for sine kommende projekter, da jeg mødte ham i London. Allerede på lørdag åbner hans opsætning af Mary Shelleys "Frankenstein" på Londons National Theatre, hvor Benedict Cumberbatch og Jonny Lee Miller (Sick Boy fra "Trainspotting") skiftes til at spille hhv. doktor Frankenstein og hans skabning.
Musikken? Den er af Underworld. Og censuren? Uegnet for børn under 15!

> Læs også om Danny Boyles planer for "28 måneder senere" – den kommende treer i hans zombieserie!

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