Mike Figgis

Started by ono, October 24, 2003, 09:47:55 AM

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MacGuffin

Figgis takes 'Pleasure' in New Line pic
Source: Hollywood Reporter

Mike Figgis will indulge in New Line Cinema's "Guilty Pleasure." The Oscar nominee will direct the thriller about a young couple who engage in a menage a trois as a last sexual fling before their wedding. Ricky Strauss, who was one of the executive producers of "The Sweetest Thing," is producing with Figgis' longtime producing partner, Annie Stewart. The project is being overseen by New Line execs Stokely Chaffin, George Waud and Jeff Katz. Figgis was nominated for a best director Oscar as well as a best adapted screenplay Oscar for 1995's "Leaving Las Vegas." His other directing credits include "Internal Affairs," "Timecode" and "Cold Creek Manor."
"Don't think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it's good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art." - Andy Warhol


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MacGuffin

'This is seat-of-your-pants stuff'
Who says film has to be a costly, lumbering beast? Mike Figgis is capturing the capital with cheap cameras and a trumpet. By Will Hodgkinson
Source: The Guardian
 
Mike Figgis has lost his notebook. His big night, a live show featuring "digital postcards" of the capital made by seven film-makers, is less than a week away and the notepad contains all his ideas for the project. As if that's not enough, his film-makers have yet to deliver the goods. "I don't foresee getting much sleep between now and Friday," says the director, sitting in the London offices of his production company. With his necktie, fuzz of hair and T-shirt bearing the legend "Godard Is God", Figgis is looking very much the bohemian auteur. "Although I promised not to harass the film-makers on content, I think it's fair to harass them on delivery. Like getting the films in by Monday when the gig is on Friday."

He reaches for the guitar perched next to his desk to knock out a stress-busting riff. "I was shooting until 4am with a rapper last night, I was shooting until 4am with a dancer the night before that, and I was shooting in King's Cross station all night before that," he says. "But you know, it stops me from getting depressed."

The project, A Portrait of London, is the latest in his series of attempts to prove that cinema need not be a costly, lumbering beast. Only this time, he's also setting out to see whether a movie can be fused with theatre and turned into a live show. Tomorrow night, in front of Nelson's Column in Trafalgar Square, he's going to splice several five-minute "digital postcards" - including work by John Boorman, Ngozi Onwurah and her cinematographer husband, Alwin Küchler - with his own footage to create a near-instant feature. The resulting film is designed to celebrate the Jubilee year of the London film festival and the diversity of the city - and will transform film into a live, spontaneous art form.

Figgis was working as a fairly conventional, and successful, director of major features such as Leaving Las Vegas and Internal Affairs before he revolutionised his working methods in 2000 with Timecode, a low-budget, quadruple-screen digital movie in which the four segments could be watched in any order and still make sense. "I got excited by the possibility that the audience is aware of someone doing more than just hitting a button and making sure the projector stays in focus," he says. "And because of all this new technology, film-making need not be the art of watching paint dry. I said to the people I commissioned for A Portrait of London: give me a snapshot, not an oil painting. Take this lightweight digital camera out for a day and see what happens. Get off your arse and do some work."

As an example, Figgis describes the shooting of one of his own segments. The day before, the rapper Plan B and the singer Killa Kela came to his office with a song they had just written. They recorded it on Figgis's laptop, mixed it, burned it on to CD and went with Figgis to east London to make a film to accompany the song. "We finished at four o'clock, after Hackney Council said they would arrest us if we made any more noise. Then I lost my notebook. But hey, we made a film."

The diversity of the capital comes across in Figgis's choice of collaborators. Veteran director John Boorman has shot a film set in Hyde Park about a woman falling in love with a camera. Ngozi Onwurah and Alwin Küchler are trying to portray the city from the perspective of their adopted daughter, who was born in Nigeria. "Our daughter is nine going on 19," says Kucher. "When I am out in public with her, people are uneasy about the relationship between a white German man and a young African girl. We tried to capture that in the film."

Figgis also commissioned the music producers Luke Gordon and Andrew Skeet to write a soundtrack that could then be the basis for live improvisations. The director himself is planning to accompany the recording on his trumpet on the big night. "The whole thing is seat-of-your-pants film-making," says Gordon. "We're doing a soundtrack to a film we've only seen a few clips of, but that's what is exciting."

Then there are the problems that Figgis found in shooting instant cinema on the streets of London. Having received a letter giving blanket permission to film anywhere, he quickly discovered that "it's not worth the paper it's printed on. As soon as you get a camera out in London, someone will come along and ask you what you're doing. The irony is that the degree to which surveillance cameras are keeping an eye on you is remarkable. They're filming you and they didn't ask for your permission."

In the early 1970s, Figgis toured with the improvisational theatre group the People Show. It seems that digital technology is allowing him to go back to the techniques he learned before big budgets and major productions knocked the element of chance out of the picture.

"That's what I've been doing for the past five years - show me the budget and I'll show you the film," he concludes, when asked about his creative approach towards A Portrait of London. "And there are no such things as mistakes - only creative coincidences".
"Don't think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it's good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art." - Andy Warhol


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gob


Pubrick

Quote from: MacGuffin on October 26, 2006, 04:32:47 PM
T-shirt bearing the legend "Godard Is God",
i don't get it, is he saying God is irrelevant?
under the paving stones.

MacGuffin

Figgis to direct 'Law' pilot
Leary will produce drama for Fox
Source: Variety

Mike Figgis has signed on to direct "Canterbury's Law," the Denis Leary-produced drama pilot set up at Fox.

Helmer of pics such as "Leaving Las Vegas" and "Timecode" will make his pilot helming debut with "Law," an hourlong drama about a female attorney.

Dave Erickson wrote the pilot and will exec produce with Leary and Jim Serpico via Sony Pictures Television and Apostle.

While Figgis hasn't directed a pilot, he did helm an episode of "The Sopranos" three years ago. He also directed a segment of PBS documentary "The Blues."
"Don't think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it's good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art." - Andy Warhol


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MacGuffin

Figgis Detained After 'Shoot a Pilot' Comment

There are certain things one should probably refrain from saying at an airport, and director Mike Figgis unfortunately learned the hard way.

Figgis, who directed "Leaving Las Vegas," was reportedly held for over five hours at Los Angeles International airport after he told immigration officers "I'm here to shoot a pilot," according to The Guardian. In television, the first episode of a potential television show is called a pilot. However, the agents, apprently not in-the-know with industry terms, took it to mean Figgis had plans to gun down an airline pilot.

Figgis was then held in an interrogation cell for five hours, and was released after officers figured out he had no assassination plans.
"Don't think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it's good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art." - Andy Warhol


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Alexandro


Pubrick

Quote from: MacGuffin on May 29, 2007, 04:28:59 PM
[size=8t]In television, the first episode of a potential television show is called a pilot.[/size]

yeah, and "shoot" means to point a camera at something and record.

*silence*

..5 hours later.

airport security: "Ohhh."
under the paving stones.