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“It was revolutionary for people to hear,” Ackroyd adds, “and from what I understood by working on it, the way he used those instruments and brought the sounds out of the orchestra and into his symphony startled people.
“So Eroica is much more revolu- tionary in itself despite being a period story. We wanted a nice period look but there’s some quite jagged camera work using zooms and tracking and wild, free-form camerawork.
“I worked closely with the grip and the focus puller and just went with the music. Around 50% of the film is music played within the situations depicted, and it was recorded by an orchestra who specialise in playing period instruments and who recorded this particular symphony.
“It’s a beautiful piece of music. We all interpreted it in our own ways, and did lots of takes so we’d have a really interesting film with it.”
Directed by Simon Cellan Jones, with Ian Hart playing Beethoven, the 90 minute film recounts the turbulent peri- od in the composer’s life when he wrote a piece of music dedicated to Napoleon only to become disillusioned with the French Emperor and rename it.
“It’s documented that he ripped up the front cover of the piece and changed the title. It’s a good story, about the artist as a free thinking indi- vidual rather than as the patronised artist. It expresses the idea of the mod- ern artist, free to do what he wants to do. The modern genius, I suppose, is the idea behind it,” he said.
Shot indoors, using F-500T, the film afforded Ackroyd the chance to brush up his Beethoven.
“We spent a couple of weeks in this large house, listening to fantastic music on playback. That was really good.”
Upon completion of that project he resumed his association with Ken Loach, the tenth film on which Ackroyd has collaborated with the director
“It was all done by the same team, with Martin Johnson [who died of cancer in October] designing and Ray Beckett doing sound, so there was a real continuity there.
Filmed in sequence, with plot points revealed to the actors – and therefore their characters – on a need-to-know basis, Ae Fond Kiss is shot on a combination of Fujicolor F- 500T 8572 and F-250D 8562. Weather and light conditions were, Ackroyd reported, favourable.
“We’ve had some very sunny days here, as well as some very wet ones. Glasgow in the summer has endless sunshine, which might be difficult to believe, with daylight from four o’clock in the morning until eleven o’clock at night.
“You have an enormous amount of light, but we’re also shooting a sequence in Malaga. What I tend to
do is not to have the film stocks make a difference so much in a situation like that. You’ve obviously made this location leap and everything is differ- ent, but the difference should come from the external rather than what you do internally.
“The experience I had filming doc-
umentaries comes in handy in a situa- tion like that. I remember it was always a treat to film outside Britain because you got a beautiful look. It’s that extra element that you’re always going to add to a documentary film if you’re in a fantastic location.
“Light is obviously a big part of that. The sun is high, the buildings are more designed for sunshine but I’m
not going to change the stocks for that particular reason, I’m just looking for what’s interesting in the location.”
In addition some sequences have been shot in night-clubs where Casim plies his trade as a DJ.
“There it’s just a case of enhancing the light a little bit with some Varilights,”
Ackroyd continues, “and a little bit of fill to get the effect you want.”
Music of a different sort domi- nates Eroica, the project Ackroyd worked on immediately prior to Ae Fond Kiss. While Loach’s romantic tale has a traditional look and feel, Eroica is a much more modern style that reflects the cutting edge nature of Beethoven’s work.
Working with Ken is great, he’s very lively and enthusiastic and always looking to do something slightly dif- ferent. And this is certainly a differ- ent kind of story.” ■ ANWAR BRETT
Ae Fond Kiss was originated on Fujicolor F-500T 8572 and F-250D 8562; Eroica was originated on 35mm Fujicolor F-500T 8572
Fuji Motion Picture And Professional Video • Exposure • 17