Page 13 - Fujifilm Exposure_44 Damned United_ok

TOM TOWNEND
“MOST APPEALING OF ALL IS THAT ETERNA 400T IS A LOW CONTRAST STOCK, AND ONE OF THE MOST FILMIC I KNOW.”
➤ sure how to apply what I’d been taught. What I’d been especially in- terested in with my photography was 35mm black-and-white, more documentary style than portraiture so I didn’t really know how it would all go and I spent plenty of time star- ing at the telephone.”
But, of course, he’d reckoned without Alwin. Later, taking the break to “shoot my own stuff” was once again down, indirectly to Küch- ler. “This was for Lynne on a music video - the only one she’s ever done
[for Doves]. True to form, Alwin was originally lined up to do it and then suddenly wasn’t available.
“In her infinite wisdom, Lynne decided that the £50,000 -or what- ever it was - that’s normally spent over the course of one long day with a large crew, would be much better spent if it was just her, a producer and the DP over 10 days. We went off and shot it like a documentary - very liberating - and it turned out very nicely.”
It proved to be a useful calling card and may have even been instru- mental, Townend believes, in him being asked, a couple of years on, to shoot - in Glasgow (echoes of that student short) - Paddy Considine’s powerful, BAFTA-winning, 16-minute live action short, Dog Altogether, about the transformation of a vio- lent, self-destructive alcoholic, played by Peter Mullan.
Unlike Considine, making his di- recting debut, whom he’d never met before, Townend’s history with Morton, another helming debutant, went back six years when he and his costume designer partner had both worked with the actress on Morvern Callar.
Although originally sounded out for the project very early doors, Townend recalls he had to pass first time round because of domestic
commitments. He finally arrived on The Unloved, from Channel 4/Revolu- tion Films, just 10 days before it ac- tually started filming.
“There was,” Townend jokes, “no desperation in the producer’s voice when they asked me to shoot it! With hindsight, it was just the tonic I needed as one can tread water in the comfort of the commercials’ world.”
Scripted by Tony Grisoni from a loosely autobiographical story by Morton, The Unloved, part of a C4 trilogy on childhood which has al-
ready included the award-winning Boy A, is about a young girl growing up in a children’s home and was filmed entirely on location in Mor- ton’s own home town of Nottingham.
Says Townend: “I didn’t really know what to expect working with her as a director but as it turned out, she’s very confident, clearly drawing on her experience of having acted in more than 20 films. One of the things that can make first-time directors nervous is interacting with actors. That was no worry for her.”
For the DP, there was “in a strange way the advantage that by the time I came on the film most of the princi- pal locations had already been found so that was that. One had to turn up and deal with what was there. Sam was after naturalism, but never forc- ing it and, in terms of the lighting, keeping it as simple as possible.
“Most of the cast were young kids, with no prior experience so it seemed to me important to try and keep most of the tools of the film- making process off the floor, as it were. This was pragmatic anyway as we were often in very tight loca- tions. You could probably count on the fingers of one hand the number of times I moved a movie light inside a building we were shooting in.”
Citing a couple of film references which he and Morton discussed –
Wim Wenders’ The American Friend, which she liked for its mixture tex- ture lighting, and Alan Clarke’s Ele- phant for its “languor, long uninterrupted takes and use of avail- able light” – Townend shot on Fuji- film which he’d often used for his commercials.
“Sam would accept no compro- mise when it came to shooting on 35mm; no 16mm or any of the digital options. We ended up shooting a lot of stock which probably boiled down to two things: the unpre-
dictability of the young cast and also Sam liked to cover scenes in their entirety.”
Despite the last-minute nature of his hiring, Townend still managed to enjoy the rare luxury of testing vari- ous stocks.
“Within a week it became fairly obvious it I wanted to shoot almost everything on the ETERNA 400T simply because I think it’s the only stock of any description on the mar- ket which has this particularly quiet look and a very naturalistic rendi- tion. But most appealing of all is that it’s a low contrast stock, one of the most filmic I know.”
As for the future, Townend – who recently won a Creative Circle Gold for his work on the Skins TV trailers - refers back to his filmmaking roots.
“A lot of people I’ve worked with in the realm of music videos and commercials have long harboured ambitions to make films. If any of them ever get around to it, there are some I’d love to work with.”
QUENTIN FALK
The Unloved was originated on 35mm Fujicolor ETERNA 400T 8583 and ETERNA 500T 8573
Photo main previous page: DP Tom Townend; main this page: Director Paddy Considine and the crew hard at work with DP Tom Townend and top, left to right: stills from Dog Altogether, Skins and Empire, the Kasabian promo
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