Page 21 - Fujifilm Exposure_13 Shiner_ok

Boxing Clever
Boxing Clever
Landau, Kenneth Cranham, Frances our reservations and we started again Barber and Coronation Street’s with another writer, Scott Cherry,
Matthew Marsden.
It’s Marsden, as Shiner’s beloved
son and aspiring champ, Eddie “Golden Boy” Simpson, who unwit- tingly helps accelerate his father’s dramatic decline in fortunes. The set- ting for this key moment in the film is a crucial and increasingly brutal Anglo-American boxing bout being recreated with steamy intensity at Bethnal Green’s famous York Hall.
On one side of the ring, under the close-up gaze of Irvin at his video monitor, is an increasingly frazzled Shiner/Caine and his baying entourage. Crouching low down on the other side of the ring operating the ‘B’ camera as the two young pugs rip into each other is experienced Aussie cine- matographer Mike Molloy (Scandal, The Hit). Enthuses Molloy, “I love operating, it’s my treat and I don’t often get the chance. It makes a lot of sense here because you’re right in on the action ... also it stops you sitting around reading the newspaper.”
It’s Molloy’s second collaboration with Irvin following their work togeth- er Down Under last year on an effects-packed Biblical epic, Noah’s Ark, starring Jon Voight. This time round, Molloy persuaded the director to use Fuji. Irvin admits he was at first “reluctant” because when he was making Turtle Diary (1985), “I thought the rushes looked terrific but when we went on to release prints, it didn’t look so good in the theatres. Mike told me that things had changed, that they’d got this fantastic fast stock – ‘really good blacks, flesh tones great’ – so we did some tests. The results,
especially with the interpos stock, have been absolutely fabulous and so we’re doing the whole thing on Fuji.
“Before I start any film I try and devise a colour palette. I studied oil painting for a long time so I also hope I bring a painter’s view. The idea is to find a palette to suit the story. Here, I’m trying to get as close as I can to a feeling of black-and- white, so we’re keeping very much within the blacks, greys, blues, magentas, reds and yellows. I like to call this ‘London noir.’ I particularly like the noir genre. It worked well for me on Tinker Tailor and there was even an atmosphere of noir about my first ever feature, The Dogs of War. More recently, City of Industry [with Harvey Keitel and Stephen Dorff] was my sort of noir tribute to the LA film- makers of the 40s and 50s.”
Adds Molloy: “I’d loved this to have been black-and-white. I’m trying to make it look as realistic as possi- ble. There are a few scenes lit by fluo- rescent lights and instead of changing the tubes we’ve left them as they are. It’s a pretty gritty story and quite a bit of stuff we’re pushing a stop. But, everytime I catch a glimpse of the video split with its black-and-white, I just sigh, ‘Oh. My God.’”
Shiner, produced by Geoffrey Reeve, with whom Caine had previ- ously made Half Moon Street and The Whistle Blower, was, says Irvin, “first submitted in a slightly different ver- sion with a different writer.
“Michael was already attached and I had always wanted to work with him. I liked the premise but felt the concept was better than the script. So the producers, Michael and I shared
whose previous work had been noted by Geoff. We met and talked and he then wrote a treatment. His script has made me feel more energised than any other script for a very long time.”
Irvin, 60 this year and already a forty-year industry veteran having start- ed out as an editorial assistant with the Rank Organisation after film school at the back end of the fifties, was schooled in documentary and realism.
“One of the reasons I stopped making documentaries,” Irvin confess- es, “was that I hated the sense of giv- ing up control. I always wanted to stop, make people say something dif- ferently, perhaps put the camera in a different place; in other words, re-dec- orate it all. On the other hand, it also gave me a sense of what was honest. Having seen actual people in all con- ditions of life and often death, I can always sense what’s true or false. So I can’t work with actors unless I feel that what they’re doing is good and, above all, true.”
Which conveniently brings us back to his star. Says Irvin” “As far as I’m concerned, Caine is a master. He makes acting seem almost effort- less. He has that chameleon quality. Every day I’ve come to work here, I look forward to looking through the camera at him. That’s rare these days. He’s not flashy but he’s always honest.” ■ QUENTIN FALK
Shiner (and Scandal) were originated on Fujicolor Motion Picture Negative
Photos main left: Michael Caine as Billy ‘Shiner’ Simpson; inset top: Andy Serkis, Michael Caine and Frank Harper in Shiner Bottomfromleft:DirectorJohnIrvinonlocationinEastLondon;Inthering andCaineonthelooseinShiner;andright:CameraoperatorPhilipSindallinforegroundwithDirectorJohnIrvin