Page 32 - Fujifilm Exposure_25 Jean Francois Robin_ok

Award-winning Canadian Mr In-Between fell upon me
out of the blue. I was approached to direct the project and within two weeks we were in prepara-
tion. There wasn’t much time to react. I was attracted to the hero’s precarious balancing act between
“the ‘real’ world of normal, function- ing citizens and the sinister region of his shadowy career.
Photos above: Paul Sarossey; main: Andrew Howard as Jon; right: scenes from Mr In-Between; far right: DP Haris Zambarloukos
cinematographer Paul Sarossy is perhaps best known for his long collab- oration with director Atom Egoyan on films like The Sweet Hereafter,
Felicia’s Journey, Exotica and, most recently, Ararat.
He now makes his own directing debut with the British underworld thriller, Mr In-Between, adapted by writer-actor Peter Waddington from Neil Cross’s first novel.
It’s a grim and often grisly tale set on and below London’s meanest streets about a dedicated young hit man Jon (Andrew Howard) who works for a ruth- less gangster known as
The Tattooed Man
(David Calder).
When Jon suddenly
meets up again with
childhood chums
(Geraldine O’Rawe,
Andrew Tiernan) from
his innocent past, he
suddenly begins to
question his brutal
trade – which puts his
own future as well as that of his friends in dire jeopardy.
Sarossy, 40, talked about his film which has already earned him a Maverick Spirit Award at the Cinequest Festival in San Jose and Andrew Howard the Best Actor Award at the Tokyo International Film Festival.
How can one deal with the colli- sion of the life of a killer and the mun- danities of, say, buying groceries? Is a professional criminal just that, a pro- fessional, or in some way a schizo- phrenic heading toward some inevitable rupture?
I felt that the basic tension in such a character was quite fascinating. Mr In- Between deals with the unravelling of a man who tampers with the veil that sepa- rates the two worlds. I wanted to be there with my camera when it happened.
The script was rather involved for the budget we were working with, yet the spectacular team we were able to
gather (both cast and crew) made the whole endeavour possible.
The shoot of Mr In-Between took me (a Canadian) to parts of London
that I think most Londoners have no idea exist. We filmed below the city in dank, rat-infested catacombs, forgot- ten by a century of progress, mere echoes of the lost glories of the Industrial Revolution.
In Bishopsgate rail sheds, produc- tion designer Matthew Davies built the Tattooed Man’s lair. We wanted to
30 • Exposure • Fuji Motion Picture And Professional Video
THE DARK IS
LIGHT ENOUGH
INTO THE UNDERWORLD WITH MR IN-BETWEEN