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“Movies are a collaboration and I play wrong notes often.
As far as I’m concerned there are dangers lurking on every page.”
styles and how different people cre- ate light and energy.”
Mere mention of Ackroyd spurs further memories of Ken Loach: “He’s such an inspirational director. The last film I did with him was Fatherland in 1986. I would go back now to Ken if he wanted me. Am I too expensive? No, I’m very cheap,” he smiles.
The sort of stimulation he finds in working with new DPs, he also still clearly gets linking up again with the likes of Jordan and Frears. Of their col- laboration on Double Down, producer Steve Woolley comments: “It is never going to be easy when you make a film with Chris and Neil. You know that their ambition is always going to be to go one step further than they’ve gone before. The results, however, are exhilarating.”
As for Frears, with whom he has- n’t worked since 1983, Menges confess- es, “I’m really excited.”
Dirty Pretty Things marks Frears’ first film back in the fray since taking a year’s sabbatical to teach. Does teach- ing appeal to Menges?
“I don’t think I could. I couldn’t really explain what we do. I was once asked to do a lighting class. Ossie Morris did it instead and I actually enrolled as a student. Some people can explain what they do very articulately.
“But in the same way I find it very hard to shoot a commercial because I can’t believe in what I’m doing, so I couldn’t really teach because the structure tends to mean you’re in a vacuum. I can’t be driven by a vacuum - only by a dynamo, whether it’s the script, a fine director, the writer or a good actor.
“I’ve learned from so many people, so what I’d pass on would have been learned from someone else anyway. If what I do inspires someone, that’s a
wonderful bonus. We’re living in a cir- cle of excitement.”
Menges is also operating on Dirty Pretty Things. “The film is real- ly low budget, and Stephen feels it might help give it a sort of rough edge.” A “touch of the Fujis,” he characterises it, referring to the stock he has now used on his last three films (after it was recommend- ed to him by Eduardo Serra).
Although he also did a bit of operating on Double Down, the main operator, as with The Pledge, was Scot, Alastair Rae. Rae was having to fill a huge gap left by the late, great Mike Roberts, who had worked on many of Menges’ best credits. “Wonderful” is Menges’ gen- erous appreciation of Rae’s recent contributions.
And just because he now seems to have settled back into cinematography certainly doesn’t mean that Menges has given up on directing.
“As with lighting, for me it’s all about storytelling and script. I have a wonderful story set in Nicaragua, about a man and wife falling apart looking for their son. It would be my dream to direct that.
“But I’d always rather work with a director on a great script than be,” adds Menges, emphatically, “just a jobsbody on a script that doesn’t inspire me.” ■ QUENTIN FALK
The Pledge, Double Down and Dirty Pretty Things were originated on Fujicolor Motion Picture Negative
Photos top: Chris Menges with Neil Jordan and right: with focus puller and daughter, Oona below l-r: Jack Nicholson in The Pledge; Jeremy Irons in The Mission Barbara Hershey in A World Apart Haing S Ngor and Sam Waterson in The Killing Fields (courtesy Moviestore)