One of the most important aspect of making a cohesive movie is to make sure everyone is making the same film. That sound really obvious but not often the case. As you can imagine there are alot of interpretations of the past. There is the beautiful almost overbearing world of 'The Girl with the Pearl Earring' or the grittiness of Polanski's Macbeth, and everyone who comes to work on a film brings a whole lot of personal references of those periods. One of the most valuable lessons that came my way was to 'never assume anything' and when someone says "it's not a problem" begin to worry. So at the beginning I had shown the heads of department all the critical visual references, including the colour palette for BELLADONNA as a starting point for discussion and further development. To ensure that everyone understood we were not trying to re-create the most perfect 15th century location, but capture the essence of time before running water. The way I like to work is to start of with the visual references and then see what the heads of department come up with...ideas, inspirations and improvements, to feel they have a creative investment in this collaborative process. But never assume....come costume time and I'm presented with bright purple tights and a 1920's riding jacket, yes the perfect colour just the wrong era. So what happened?
I hear that Poland is bountiful with autocratic directors who don't entertain the idea of collaboration and apparently love to yell. So when this young director comes along and asks for their creative input, it must have been interpreted as 'anything goes,' or just get the job done. Well, a very tense meeting followed. I guess every country has a historical, culture foundation and what seems 'normal' in one is not in another. Polands whole shift from Communism to Democracy has had deep ramification on the patterns and attitudes of people lives. Interestingly these' misunderstanding occurred only with crew over 50 years of age.
(not all but most)
Regarding ' its not a problem' this is one of the most misunderstood, vague and unhelpful terms you can possibly hear when you're in a foreign country, there is a lot of money involved and enormous amount of work has to be done within a relatively short period of time. what does it mean? "Don't worry I'm taking care of my department everything is going to be OK." But I've seen the bright purple tights so I'm beginning to feel sick in the stomach.
Or does it mean I haven't done my work and by saying "No problem" you wont push me on it, or, there really isn't a problem and I'm a cool cowboy.
So now my responses are. "Please elaborate" "I know there is no problem but how have you solved this?" or " Show me where you're up to, see how I can help"
This sounds really obvious but beware of vagueness.
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