Page 23 - Fujifilm Exposure_19 Spider_ok

A t 15, Ryan Lee Driscoll won the
BBC’s coveted Young Filmmaker of the Year Award for his tense four-
minute short, Mark One. Now 33, Essex man Driscoll is putting the finishing touches to his first full length feature, which he’s written, produced and directed.
Making A Killing, filmed on Super 16mm in and around Theydon Bois, east of London, is, says Driscoll, “ a film noir thriller which, I hope, will keep people guessing until the final frame.
“I’d been having a prob-
lem with an insurance claim and thought of the character, the hardest of all insurance brokers, someone who wouldn’t pay out whatever the reason.
“I began to work it out... what if there was a serial killer out there slaughtering people and hiding their bodies? What a terrible situation for a bereaved person to be in. You find out a loved one’s been horrifically murdered and yet the life insurance people won’t pay out because there’s no body...”
For his film, Driscoll, a graduate of the Northern Film School and experi- enced editor on TV programmes like Naked Planet, The Real Full Monty and Discovery’s When Dinosaurs Ruled, gathered together a cast of familiar faces including veteran Milton Johns, Billy Geraghty (who played the lead for three years in the stage hit Buddy) and beautiful blonde Deborah Sheridan- Taylor, famous as perhaps EastEnders’ most notorious murder victim.
as a sort of multi-purpose studio. Currently in the final stages of post-pro- duction, Making A Killing is to be blown up to 35mm before getting, Driscoll hopes, a theatrical release here and especially in the overseas market fol- lowing a showcase at the London Screenings. ■ QUENTIN FALK
feature in focus
MAKING A KILLING
MAKING A KILLING
A natural born thriller from Ryan Lee Driscoll
He chose Ed Wright as DP after “being blown away by his showreel. Ed has an amazing style which I’d describe as hyper-real.”
Wright, who attended Bristol University’s post- graduate film school before moving into the industry as a camera trainee on films like TwentyFourSeven, Still Crazy and Plunkett & MacLeane, had made one feature, the comedy Laid Back, before signing up for Driscoll’s film last year.
“Thrillers tend to have
a rather saturated look so
the more natural look of
Fuji – I used the 500 and
the 250 Daylight – contrasted well with the convoluted nature of the story.”
The film had a five-week schedule and was principally based out of a six- bedroomed house, which also served
Making A Killing was originated on Fujicolor Motion Picture Negative
Photos: Deborah Sheridan-Taylor, Billy Geraghty and Hywel Morgan in Making A Killing and the crew setting up a tracking shot
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