Page 20 - Fujifilm Exposure_31 The White Countess_ok

MOTION PICTURE & PRO-VIDEO cover story
SHANGHAI SURPRISES
SHANGHAI SURPRISES
Merchant Ivory take the high road to China for The White Countess, a 1930s-set drama set on the eve of invasion
Justly nicknamed “The Wandering Company”, Merchant Ivory Productions have, in more than 40 years of filmmaking, turned globe-trotting into a fine art. The latest
stop on their award-winning odyssey, which has embraced
the States, India, the Caribbean, mainland Europe and,
of course, the UK, is China – more specifically,
the mighty port city of Shanghai.
Its startlingly contrasting old world and near
futuristic cityscapes have been shown off to great
effect in previous Western film forays like
Spielberg’s period drama Empire Of The Sun and,
more recently, Michael Winterbottom’s sci-fi’ish Code 46.
Now, with Merchant Ivory’s The White Countess, an official
British-Chinese co-production, comes the most concerted
collaboration yet between two wildly different filmmaking
cultures in, as they say, the “city that never stops”.
continued on page 20
Photo main: Natasha Richardson in The White Countess; above l-r: Director James Ivory takes a photo of DP Christopher Doyle HKSC supported by Producer Ismail Merchant; on location with The White Countess; James Ivory directing Ralph Fiennes and Luo Yong Wang; Natasha Richardson and Ralph Fiennes
18 • Exposure • Fuji Motion Picture And Professional Video