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FEATURE IN FOCUS
SEX&DRUGS&ROCK&ROLL
“I USED FUJIFILM ETERNA 500T FOR ALMOST EVERYTHING, INCLUDING THE LIVE PERFORMANCES AND ONLY SWITCHED TO ETERNA 250D FOR DAY EXTERIORS.”
ext year marks the 10th Nanniversary of the untimely
death of Ian Dury, one of Britain’s most original and influential singer-songwriters of
the past 30 years. And it’s also the 50th anniversary of the vaccination for Polio, which had disabled punk pioneer Dury from the age of 10. His extraordinary story is recreated in Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll, with Andy Serkis as the gifted musician and performer.
Directed by Mat Whitecross from a screenplay by Paul Viragh, the film co-stars Naomie Harris, Ray Winstone, Olivia Williams, Bill Milner, Tom Hughes, Toby Jones and Noel Clarke.
Artist Peter Blake who taught Dury at The Royal College of Art worked with production designer Richard Bullock on the look and title design of the film, while original Dury collaborator Chaz Jankel is the composer and the original Blockheads have pre-recorded the tracks for the film.
With only 32 days to shoot such an ambitious project that included mixed media, live gigs, special
effects, green screen, animation, rock ‘n’ roll, some really powerful dramatic moments, kids, disabled kids, hun- dreds of extras and three different peri- ods of history, producer Damian Jones and the team had quite a challenge on their hands.
“It’s been tough and really very ambitious for the amount of time and what we’ve fitted it, but I think the results are amazing,” notes Jones.
The key location base for much of the shoot was the old disused Brunel University campus at Runnymede, near Egham in Surrey. The old interior buildings and grounds were transformed to become sets for Chailey Heritage
Craft School, the school for the disabled in East Sussex that Dury attended as a young boy in the early 1950s for many years.
It also doubled for son Baxter’s school, the recording studio, father Bill Dury’s flat, the hospital that young Ian was taken to when struck down by polio, the band’s hang-out room at Rolvendon which
was Ian’s country house and the interior of Catshit Mansions - the flat Ian and partner Denise lived at together in Kennington.
For DP Christopher Ross (Eden Lake, Cass, The Cottage), who came on to the film at the very last moment: “There are some great photographs of Ian that really show his quirky personality and I used these as a reference when shooting close-ups of Andy Serkis.”
“Generally, in reacting to the performances I felt that a connected approach was called for, so I used longer focal lengths and dirtier frames with tight eyelines to pull the characters together.
“As on many of my productions I operated the ‘A’ camera myself and called in Rodrigo Gutierrez for help with the two-camera days and live
performances. My focus puller Tim Battersby, a regular collaborator of mine, coped with the long-lens/ handheld/no-marks scenario with quiet brilliance as always.”
So how did Ross cope with the varied lighting conditions required to tell Dury’s story, who through the course of a single day might have moved from daylight to streetlight to spotlight?
“I had my usual selection of medium sized HMIs, a fair amount of Kino-flo units and a small tungsten
package for night interior and exteriors,” Ross explains “For speed reasons one set was pre-rigged with Vistabeam units, a fantastic light that creates a soft yet punchy source with almost none of the extra grip requirements of frames, cutters and flags.” QUENTIN FALK
Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll
on release in January was originated on 16mm Fujicolor ETERNA 500T 8673 and ETERNA 250D 8663
6 • EXPOSURE • THE MAGAZINE • FUJIFILM MOTION PICTURE