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Interview with Lajos Koltai. We chat with the director of Evening. |
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Written by Steve Head
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Friday, 06 July 2007 |
Beyond Live Free or Die Hard, Transformers and Harry Potter, you'll find this summer's anti-actioner. The movie is Evening. And its director is renowned cinematographer Lajos Koltai.
"It couldn't be further away in type than those movies," says Koltai. "And that's the point. It's an emotional experience. Every frame of the movie has love."
Based on the book by Michael Cunningham (author of The Hours), Evening tells the story of a dying woman (Vanessa Regrave) looking back on her long life, the choices she made, and their repercussions. The movie also stars Claine Daines, Patrick Wilson, Natasha Richardson, Toni Collette, Hugh Dancy, Mamie Gummer, Meryl Streep and Glenn Close.
We recently spoke with Koltai about the making of Evening, which was filmed in and around Newport, Rhode Island.
Evening is now playing in select cities.
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Q: You've created a very 'New England' movie with Evening.
LAJOS KOLTAI: Thank you. It wasn't easy to capture that essence in some ways, but I think we did succeed.
Q: For most of your career you've been a cinematographer. And you've said you always tend to see things as a director with a photographic eye. So how does one photograph Newport? Is there a way to do it that really brings out the distinctness of the location?
KOLTAI: First what you always try to find is the message. What is the message you are trying to say with your image? Newport is beautiful and has a lot of messages, so I'm always trying to find them just through the images. This is because, the image will take you somewhere emotionally. A strong image. A strong composition. That is what I always try to do, from Mephisto to Being Julia, it is always the image is first.
Q: Is this the first time you've filmed in New England?
KOLTAI: I was here once before, filming a Sean Connery film. We'd spend 4 days in Boston, just because we needed to do some quick scenes. What I thought, and I still do, is Boston is a very European city. It is very distinct. So, we filmed here quickly and did every shot. It was second unit photography, so we had to be sure we had the same continuity as the first unit. And that meant with the film stock, too. It all has to look the same, and this can sometimes be hard to do: matching the style of a scene that was already photographed somewhere else.
Q: Now that you've turned to directing, what's it like for you to work with a cinematographer? Do you find yourself still wanting to address lighting issues, or do you leave that entirely up to your cinematographer?
KOLTAI: It is hard. (Laughs) Most always I want to say something to my cameraman. And I've learned that I need to. I've learned that I have to have a cameraman who is willing to let me tell him what do to. [Evening's Director of Photography] Gyula Pados is wonderful. He is very understanding and lets me work with the camera as I need to.
Q: You've said that you'd like to make a movie with one of your good friends, Vilmos Zsigmond, as cinematographer.
KOLTAI: Yes, but I know that we can never do that. Vilmos is a good friend, but I can't work with him, although I want to. He is such an artist. He is a master. I could not bring myself to tell him what to do. And I've learned I must be able to tell my cameraman what to do. I must have some control with the camera, and I can't do that with Vilmos.
Q: Something that's interesting about your style of directing is when you're on the set, you're rarely at the video monitor.
KOLTAI: I try to never be at the monitor. That style of directing comes from the commercial business. They want everyone to see it. Everyone wants to see the performances. And you want to see that you got the shot. But for years, this was not how movies were made. And it took the director away from the actors and the actors out of their element. You have to feel the right moment when you have a shot. You know it. You don't have to defer to a monitor. So I work with no headphones and I put myself in the same air as the actors.
Q: Do you believe that actors, in a sense, should have a real awareness of the camera; that they should familiarize themselves with it in their space.
KOLTAI: Oh yes. It is very important. Some actors are thrown off by the presence of the camera. It disturbs them.
Q: Yes, some actors are afraid of the camera. But actors are different. It is difficult to walk and talk at the same time when the camera is moving around you. So, some actors don't like too much camera movement. They don't like too much movement because they love their security. One time, in Hungary, one of my actors had to do a scene with hundreds of extras, with a complicated camera movement, and we could only do it one more time. There was a small error. She made a mistake and it cost $200,000 dollars. So, yes. Actors can be very tense around the camera. Actors who are comfortable with it, they can feel the camera. They sense where it is.
Q: With stars such as Vanessa Redgrave, Hugh Dancy and Patrick Wilson, they had to get their American accents down right.
KOLTAI: They did. We had an American dialect coach. And for Hugh it was sometimes a struggle. He has such a thick English accent, but he did it right. He does a wonderful job. With Eileen [Atkins - who plays the night nurse), on the first day I met with her she said to me, 'Don't try to convince me to do an American accent because I can't' And of course her character works beautifully with her Irish accent. There is much more irony in the Irish accent.
Q: For the movie, you filmed in two main locations. Two houses. In a way, they're also characters in the movie.
A: They are, very much so. I loved both of the those houses. The house in which Claire [Daines] character grew up, it's simply beautiful. It was built in 1860 and it has its own different world, visually. It is a very strong image. It's no the top of the rocks, in the middle of nature. And the bugs and the lights that we use for the house, there are just messengers that connect the past and future. Vanessa's house we found it in Tiverton, very close. Again, it was a wonderful filming experience. The owner was very nice. He played music to set the mood while we were working. I loved the music so much, he made a CD of it and gave it to me. Aesthetically, you can tell that this house was lived in by someone who is very close to the water and the sun. Very outdoors in nature.
Q: You'd considered building some sets to cover for the houses, but you decided to shoot on location.
KOLTAI: Yes. I think we always try to protect actors from the elements, and I didn't want to do that. I wanted to put the actors there. I think it is a mistake that some directors don't do this. Actors should be there, in the middle of nature. And I like to be with the cast early on the shooting day; to go to the set to and talk with them in the make-up trailer. Get into the mood.
KOLTAI: Always happy to go to the set to meet the cast in the make-up trailer. Get into the mood.
Q: What kind of experience did you have working with the New England crew?
KOLTAI: Every crewmember was happy to be working on this film. I give thanks to the Newport because everybody worked so well. It's a unique place to film a movie.
Q: One of your stars in the movie is Mamie Gummer, Meryl Streep's daughter. How did you arrive at the decision to cast her?
KOLTAI: I found her a year ago. This is kind of amusing. I did a test with her. She did a stupendous job. I remembered her and I wanted to call her back. But I didn't know was Meryl's daughter. I said I liked her. She's so similar. Then my producer told me she was her daughter. Both she and Meryl did such wonderful work.
Q: And you got to work with Merly Streep, who did some very emotional secnes.
KOLTAI: I'll admit, I was nervous about how some of the scenes with Meryl were going to work. But on the first day of shooting - it was in the garden in Newport - Meryl held my hand and said, 'Lajos, don't worry. I'm here for you." And she was. She gave me everything we needed for the scenes.
Q: Without giving anything away, let's just say, there's a scene between Vanessa and Meryl that's quite memorable.
KOLTAI: It is. They're asking, 'What is this life at all?' I think that last scene with Vanessa and Meryl is a piece of film history. It's not acting, it's something else.
Q: What is it about this movie that makes you the most happy?
KOLTAI: First, visually it works. Second, I was so fortunate that I did the move the way I wanted to; I shot exactly what I needed to, and the studio didn't force me to do anything I didn't want to do. And when they had a question about certain scenes, I could convince them because I knew what I wanted. But mainly, what makes me happy about this movie is I think the message - its message - gets through.
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