0:00:02 > 0:00:06This programme contains some violent scenes, some strong language
0:00:06 > 0:00:09and scenes which some viewers may find upsetting.
0:00:09 > 0:00:11TRAINS RUMBLE
0:00:13 > 0:00:14TENSE MUSIC
0:00:18 > 0:00:19TRAIN RUMBLES
0:00:48 > 0:00:51SYNTH MUSIC
0:01:03 > 0:01:09I don't think... that we embrace
0:01:09 > 0:01:14female directors in the way that we embrace male directors.
0:01:14 > 0:01:17And, when you think about what Antonia did...
0:01:19 > 0:01:21..she should be a household name.
0:01:21 > 0:01:23Really, she should.
0:01:23 > 0:01:27Antonia's career is extraordinary for people to know about.
0:01:27 > 0:01:30It's really extraordinary. And, you know, yeah,
0:01:30 > 0:01:32the statistics are terrible for women in film,
0:01:32 > 0:01:34so if there is a woman who worked as hard as she did,
0:01:34 > 0:01:36did as much as she did...
0:01:36 > 0:01:38actually, had as many successes as she did -
0:01:38 > 0:01:41her awards list is ridiculous -
0:01:41 > 0:01:43then people should know. And they don't.
0:01:46 > 0:01:47PEOPLE CHATTER
0:01:56 > 0:02:00We started this event about ten months ago, because I...
0:02:00 > 0:02:02I had worked with Antonia quite a lot.
0:02:02 > 0:02:06I worked with Antonia about six times over my career.
0:02:06 > 0:02:10When Antonia died, sadly, as you will see...
0:02:10 > 0:02:13this is such a fantastic image of her.
0:02:13 > 0:02:17And when she died, it really struck me.
0:02:17 > 0:02:21I was with her and talking to her quite a lot just before she died.
0:02:21 > 0:02:23But there is something, whatever we say,
0:02:23 > 0:02:27about women's careers in this world, in this industry.
0:02:27 > 0:02:31Perhaps they don't get quite the recognition they should get.
0:02:31 > 0:02:33And it was really bothering me.
0:02:33 > 0:02:35So they were brilliant here and I said,
0:02:35 > 0:02:37"Can we try doing something monthly?"
0:02:37 > 0:02:38And that is what we've done.
0:02:38 > 0:02:42But it was really started because of Antonia.
0:02:42 > 0:02:46I really knew that I wanted to do something to honour Antonia.
0:02:46 > 0:02:50There's a lot of people who do not have a voice, culturally.
0:02:50 > 0:02:51A lot of people.
0:02:51 > 0:02:54Right away, my first impression
0:02:54 > 0:02:56of Antonia was as the kind of street-fighter.
0:02:56 > 0:02:58You know, trying to fight for what she believed in.
0:02:58 > 0:03:01They're ordinary people and that to me
0:03:01 > 0:03:03as a film-maker is what I'm interested in dealing with.
0:03:03 > 0:03:05She was never...
0:03:05 > 0:03:08you know, a lady director.
0:03:08 > 0:03:11Never any sort of fine writing. She was always gutsy and juicy.
0:03:11 > 0:03:15You know, people were afraid of her political convictions.
0:03:15 > 0:03:19And her anger and her passion for social justice.
0:03:19 > 0:03:21Those are the issues that I'm interested in.
0:03:21 > 0:03:27And so we have to actually go and get the money...
0:03:27 > 0:03:28which is where the censorship comes in.
0:03:28 > 0:03:31Because the people who control the money,
0:03:31 > 0:03:35even if they are on your side with the subject matter...
0:03:35 > 0:03:36Basically, the word I just wrote down,
0:03:36 > 0:03:38when I was thinking about it, is "fear".
0:03:38 > 0:03:42There's a big fear about supporting stuff that is not...
0:03:42 > 0:03:44toeing the line.
0:03:44 > 0:03:47But actually, there was nothing Antonia liked more
0:03:47 > 0:03:48than a good belly laugh.
0:03:48 > 0:03:50She was one hell of a woman.
0:03:50 > 0:03:52MUSIC: Jerusalem by Billy Bragg
0:04:03 > 0:04:06# And did those feet
0:04:06 > 0:04:07# In ancient time... #
0:04:09 > 0:04:10Spare some change?
0:04:11 > 0:04:15I sat in my flat and watched a VHS of a film
0:04:15 > 0:04:18that had been submitted to me, called Safe.
0:04:18 > 0:04:23And hearing music by Billy Bragg and seeing Kate Hardie and...
0:04:23 > 0:04:25crying.
0:04:25 > 0:04:27It was about young homeless people
0:04:27 > 0:04:32and it didn't sugar the pill of their lives.
0:04:32 > 0:04:36And I was ill-formed. And my taste wasn't...
0:04:36 > 0:04:38I haven't necessarily great taste,
0:04:38 > 0:04:41but even I could see that this was remarkable.
0:04:41 > 0:04:44And this was
0:04:44 > 0:04:47more honest about the pain that
0:04:47 > 0:04:50most human beings have in some way in their lives.
0:04:50 > 0:04:53And there it was...
0:04:53 > 0:04:57hurled up on the screen, like a volcano hurls lava up into the air.
0:04:57 > 0:04:58SHOUTING AND CLATTERING
0:05:02 > 0:05:04Oh, that's right, mate. Call them.
0:05:04 > 0:05:07Here, look. Just put 'em on and we won't have to use 'em.
0:05:07 > 0:05:09- Slut!- Hey!
0:05:09 > 0:05:11You can either walk or we'll cuff you and drag you.
0:05:11 > 0:05:14- ALL:- Oh! - All right?
0:05:14 > 0:05:16I haven't got any clothes.
0:05:16 > 0:05:18Well, put them on downstairs. Let's just go, eh, Gypo?
0:05:18 > 0:05:20At the moment, I'm just helping you off the premises.
0:05:20 > 0:05:23LAUGHTER But, if you like, I'll nick ya.
0:05:23 > 0:05:25- ALL:- Ooh! - Up to you, sir.
0:05:25 > 0:05:27JEERING
0:05:27 > 0:05:30Gypo, this is a shithole!
0:05:30 > 0:05:32Come on!
0:05:32 > 0:05:36'And I just thought, here is something'
0:05:36 > 0:05:41so much more detailed with greater acuity
0:05:41 > 0:05:44and insight and care that I'm seeing.
0:05:44 > 0:05:46And I was running a film festival in those days.
0:05:46 > 0:05:50And when you run a film festival, you see loads and loads of films.
0:05:50 > 0:05:54And you can get their worldview quite quickly. And...
0:05:54 > 0:05:58this one just seemed far more...
0:05:58 > 0:06:03I would say, like, essential, or necessary, or useful.
0:06:03 > 0:06:05They sound sort of boring words, you know?
0:06:05 > 0:06:07But, back then, they weren't boring words, you know?
0:06:07 > 0:06:10And we were all sort of slightly lost
0:06:10 > 0:06:15in that kind of weird puddle of postmodernism in the '90s.
0:06:15 > 0:06:19And Antonia Bird was like a kind of thing you could grip onto.
0:06:19 > 0:06:21The films that she was making
0:06:21 > 0:06:24was stuff that gave you a kind of bearing.
0:06:24 > 0:06:26MUSIC: Jerusalem by Billy Bragg
0:06:26 > 0:06:30A lot of it was shot at night in quite a lot of central London,
0:06:30 > 0:06:34which we think of as touristy. But it was in that same place
0:06:34 > 0:06:37and it was like looking into the undergrowth.
0:06:37 > 0:06:41It felt like it was showing you the famous streets in London
0:06:41 > 0:06:44in the truth of what was happening in those streets.
0:06:46 > 0:06:48HE MUMBLES
0:06:48 > 0:06:50LAUGHTER
0:06:50 > 0:06:51You know...
0:06:52 > 0:06:56..I knew I could rely on you.
0:06:56 > 0:06:59- Thanks. - I haven't got any money, Nost.
0:06:59 > 0:07:02We just want a bit of something to keep us going, you know?
0:07:02 > 0:07:04Aye, well...
0:07:04 > 0:07:05you could always pay in kind.
0:07:08 > 0:07:10Well, with two of us looking, we might find it.
0:07:10 > 0:07:12HE SNIGGERS
0:07:13 > 0:07:15I remember us getting together,
0:07:15 > 0:07:16talking about this thing.
0:07:16 > 0:07:18Actually sitting round a table,
0:07:18 > 0:07:21but not reading it. Just talking about it, which, again,
0:07:21 > 0:07:24was different for me. Because generally, it was always about
0:07:24 > 0:07:25the words, the words, the words.
0:07:25 > 0:07:28Suddenly, it was the words that are maybe not that important.
0:07:28 > 0:07:29The words will become important,
0:07:29 > 0:07:32but you need to understand what this thing is about first.
0:07:32 > 0:07:34Then she brought in
0:07:34 > 0:07:36not so much actors, necessarily,
0:07:36 > 0:07:38but people who were interested in acting.
0:07:38 > 0:07:40And what was important for Antonia
0:07:40 > 0:07:42was people who understood homelessness.
0:07:42 > 0:07:45And what was even better for Antonia was if they actually were,
0:07:45 > 0:07:48or had been, in fact, homeless.
0:07:48 > 0:07:51So suddenly, we went to this rehearsal room somewhere in London.
0:07:51 > 0:07:54I can't remember where it was. And it was suddenly filled with kids,
0:07:54 > 0:07:56basically, that had been through
0:07:56 > 0:07:59some pretty bad stuff in their life, you know?
0:08:01 > 0:08:03So we set up these improvisations. She would say,
0:08:03 > 0:08:06"This is Robert. He is playing Nosty, he's this guy.
0:08:06 > 0:08:08"And this is what he's like. And this is how you feel about him.
0:08:08 > 0:08:12"Off you go". And, of course, these kids would just go...
0:08:12 > 0:08:13Just run all over me, you know?
0:08:13 > 0:08:15So I'm trying to kind of shout at them
0:08:15 > 0:08:17and be angry and swearing and stuff like that.
0:08:17 > 0:08:19But they don't care, they don't care.
0:08:19 > 0:08:21They've seen a lot tougher than me, you know?
0:08:21 > 0:08:24So it wisnae working.
0:08:24 > 0:08:25I don't blame the kids,
0:08:25 > 0:08:29but they're not listening to a word I'm saying here. There was nothing.
0:08:29 > 0:08:33We were not able to structure any kind of scene at all,
0:08:33 > 0:08:36unless they were going to listen, you know?
0:08:36 > 0:08:38And, so... Again, typical of Antonia, she said,
0:08:38 > 0:08:40"Well, what do you want to do?"
0:08:40 > 0:08:42I was like...I don't know.
0:08:42 > 0:08:46And I said, "Well, you know, I've never been homeless, you know?
0:08:46 > 0:08:50"I've been close to it, but I've never been homeless, so...
0:08:50 > 0:08:52"maybe I should try that."
0:08:52 > 0:08:56And I knew, roughly, about where homeless people gathered.
0:08:56 > 0:09:00It was just a grim, grim, grim existence.
0:09:00 > 0:09:04There was a couple of really dodgy moments that happened during it.
0:09:04 > 0:09:06And...
0:09:06 > 0:09:09And terrible stuff. I remember...
0:09:09 > 0:09:11I only did the begging thing a couple of times,
0:09:11 > 0:09:13because I hated it. And I hated the thought.
0:09:13 > 0:09:14And that was interesting,
0:09:14 > 0:09:17the issue about how horrible it is for anybody who has to do that.
0:09:17 > 0:09:19Because I'm sure my thoughts
0:09:19 > 0:09:21and their thoughts about it are exactly the same.
0:09:21 > 0:09:24I've got to get one of those machines.
0:09:24 > 0:09:25A credit card machine?
0:09:29 > 0:09:31What you need is contactless payment.
0:09:31 > 0:09:32Aye.
0:09:32 > 0:09:33HE MUTTERS
0:09:36 > 0:09:39I remember sitting on Hungerford Bridge, Charing Cross,
0:09:39 > 0:09:40the end of it.
0:09:41 > 0:09:45And I had a wee piece of card saying, "homeless and hungry".
0:09:47 > 0:09:48And I would sit there.
0:09:48 > 0:09:50And a whole day went by, just about.
0:09:52 > 0:09:55And I think there was about 50 pence or something that had been thrown.
0:09:55 > 0:09:59Along with lots of spit as well.
0:09:59 > 0:10:03And two or three people went by and I'm sitting there and just went...
0:10:03 > 0:10:05spat on me. And it hit me, you know what I mean?
0:10:05 > 0:10:07I was like, not again. You know what I mean?
0:10:07 > 0:10:09That was harsh, that was harsh.
0:10:09 > 0:10:12And so it gives you an indication of what it was about.
0:10:12 > 0:10:15So it helped, and Antonia, she obviously loved this.
0:10:15 > 0:10:18She lapped this up. She thought this was great, you know?
0:10:18 > 0:10:20Telling her my stories.
0:10:21 > 0:10:23MUSIC: Piccadilly Rambler by Billy Bragg
0:10:23 > 0:10:25# I'm the Piccadilly rambler
0:10:25 > 0:10:27# The streets are my pillow
0:10:27 > 0:10:30# Up Shaftesbury Avenue
0:10:30 > 0:10:32# Down Leicester Square... #
0:10:36 > 0:10:37Is there any music on?
0:10:37 > 0:10:39KEYS JANGLE # I roam and I rove
0:10:39 > 0:10:42# Over London's fair city
0:10:42 > 0:10:45# Till some jolly policeman says
0:10:45 > 0:10:47# "Hey, piss off out of there!" #
0:10:47 > 0:10:50Prep with Antonia is like an amorphous, weird thing
0:10:50 > 0:10:52that you cannot put your finger on.
0:10:52 > 0:10:55Where she's not sending you out to do loads of stuff,
0:10:55 > 0:10:58but somehow you're completely involved
0:10:58 > 0:11:01in her thing, and you are doing it.
0:11:01 > 0:11:06So, with me and Safe, I was quite unhappy at the time...
0:11:06 > 0:11:08And she said, "Oh, come and live with me".
0:11:08 > 0:11:12So I went and lived in her flat. So I lived in her flat...
0:11:12 > 0:11:15through quite a bit of the rehearsal and the filming.
0:11:18 > 0:11:21Really clever, you know?
0:11:21 > 0:11:26I was under her roof. Exhausting for her, though.
0:11:26 > 0:11:29And Aidan was like an enormous part.
0:11:29 > 0:11:32But, really, what she needed for Safe from me and Aidan -
0:11:32 > 0:11:34you know, Bobby is sleeping on the streets -
0:11:34 > 0:11:37she needed me and Aidan to just be inseparable.
0:11:37 > 0:11:41And somehow, me and Aidan became completely inseparable.
0:11:44 > 0:11:48I just remember relentlessly wandering around with Aidan.
0:11:48 > 0:11:51But not as homeless people. Just as two...
0:11:53 > 0:11:56..slightly narcissistic mad actors.
0:11:56 > 0:11:59Just wandering around Soho.
0:11:59 > 0:12:02Becoming sort of inseparable.
0:12:02 > 0:12:05And I think she was much cleverer about that than I know.
0:12:07 > 0:12:10It would be easy to put Safe in a category
0:12:10 > 0:12:14of kind of Thatcherite protest films.
0:12:14 > 0:12:18And there are clearly elements of protest,
0:12:18 > 0:12:22of awareness of the negative effects of government policies.
0:12:22 > 0:12:24They weren't called austerity, at that point,
0:12:24 > 0:12:26they were called monetarist policy.
0:12:26 > 0:12:28But you can see that the limited resources
0:12:28 > 0:12:32that are poured into social care
0:12:32 > 0:12:35or hostels are inadequate.
0:12:37 > 0:12:40The number of homeless young people in London has increased
0:12:40 > 0:12:44suddenly and dramatically, according to the charity Centrepoint Soho.
0:12:44 > 0:12:47And the charity says new Social Security rules
0:12:47 > 0:12:50introduced by the government two months ago are to blame.
0:12:50 > 0:12:55Will the Prime Minister accept that ten years ago, in 1979,
0:12:55 > 0:13:00there were 2,750 households in temporary accommodation in London.
0:13:00 > 0:13:03The current figure is over 25,000,
0:13:03 > 0:13:07and a further 2,000 people are sleeping on the streets.
0:13:07 > 0:13:09Does she not agree that people
0:13:09 > 0:13:11sleeping on the streets of our capital city,
0:13:11 > 0:13:13being charged exorbitant rents
0:13:13 > 0:13:16and children being brought up in bed and breakfast hotels
0:13:16 > 0:13:18is a disgrace to a civilised country?
0:13:18 > 0:13:20- ALL:- Yeah. - CHEERING
0:13:20 > 0:13:26But alongside that political institutional critique
0:13:26 > 0:13:30is a willingness to engage with more profound questions
0:13:30 > 0:13:34of psychological distress, social breakdown,
0:13:34 > 0:13:37of abuse within the family,
0:13:37 > 0:13:39and which are not resolved for us
0:13:39 > 0:13:41within the form of the narrative.
0:13:41 > 0:13:44The script was written by Al Hunter.
0:13:44 > 0:13:48And Antonia seemed like a really obvious choice
0:13:48 > 0:13:50for someone to talk to about this,
0:13:50 > 0:13:52because of her great commitment
0:13:52 > 0:13:54and because of her incredible passion
0:13:54 > 0:13:57and enthusiasm about these kinds of subjects.
0:13:57 > 0:14:00She was not judgmental, but she cared passionately,
0:14:00 > 0:14:03obviously, about what she saw as grotesque injustice in society.
0:14:03 > 0:14:06On the other hand, it's quite a complex film,
0:14:06 > 0:14:09because one of the most interesting things is that
0:14:09 > 0:14:12when Aidan's character is given a flat,
0:14:12 > 0:14:15he didn't want to go and live in it, cos he's got so desocialised
0:14:15 > 0:14:18and so incapable of living within four walls.
0:14:18 > 0:14:22And so it's quite complex, the message of the film.
0:14:22 > 0:14:26Although at the heart of it is a very strong message
0:14:26 > 0:14:31about the injustice of homelessness and about these damaged people.
0:14:33 > 0:14:37Although the actors were kind of free around the margins
0:14:37 > 0:14:40to work and develop on it, I think it was quite true to the script.
0:14:40 > 0:14:44The characteristic of Antonia's work was its intensity,
0:14:44 > 0:14:48it's kind of rawness and its authenticity.
0:14:48 > 0:14:53And her trying to strip away any kind of accoutrements of acting.
0:14:53 > 0:14:56There were no inhibitions to be had.
0:14:56 > 0:14:58They just really kind of went for it.
0:14:58 > 0:15:00And the last images of the film
0:15:00 > 0:15:03are certainly not particularly hopeful.
0:15:03 > 0:15:06They are like an animalistic howling
0:15:06 > 0:15:10of rage and pain and grief.
0:15:10 > 0:15:13But somehow she managed to make this film in such a way
0:15:13 > 0:15:17that it was very accessible. It didn't put people off.
0:15:17 > 0:15:22And I think a great skill is bringing home to audiences
0:15:22 > 0:15:27stories and ideas and challenges and injustices
0:15:27 > 0:15:31which people have heard of, but not really thought of.
0:15:31 > 0:15:34They haven't connected in the same way.
0:15:34 > 0:15:37She was quite radical in her approach to film-making,
0:15:37 > 0:15:41in the sense that she wasn't interested in very formal things.
0:15:41 > 0:15:46She wanted to create this very live, highly charged set, where the actors
0:15:46 > 0:15:50were free to do what they wanted to do, to let the emotions emerge.
0:15:52 > 0:15:54To let the raw energy come out.
0:15:54 > 0:15:56And the camera had to kind of capture that,
0:15:56 > 0:15:59so it was different from the more kind of formal film set.
0:15:59 > 0:16:04And in that sense, she was quite radical and quite experimental.
0:16:04 > 0:16:06That's my memory of it.
0:16:06 > 0:16:09It's all of the cast running with her,
0:16:09 > 0:16:11with the camera,
0:16:11 > 0:16:12grabbing what we can.
0:16:14 > 0:16:17Trying whatever we could get away with...
0:16:17 > 0:16:19Just, you know, pushing it everywhere we could.
0:16:19 > 0:16:23And that felt incredibly special. It made you feel that you were...
0:16:23 > 0:16:27And that collaborative thing - she was very good at
0:16:27 > 0:16:30making you feel that everybody's point was valid.
0:16:30 > 0:16:32"If you've got something to say about it, just say it.
0:16:32 > 0:16:33"I mean it. Even if we are about to go.
0:16:33 > 0:16:35"If you've got a point to make,
0:16:35 > 0:16:38"if you don't like what's happening, just say it."
0:16:38 > 0:16:40And that was incredible as well.
0:16:44 > 0:16:48The best, best bit about being a director is working with actors.
0:16:48 > 0:16:51The only bit I genuinely enjoy.
0:16:51 > 0:16:55I believe that the actor is supreme on a film set
0:16:55 > 0:17:01and must be treated with all respect possible.
0:17:01 > 0:17:03And that's my biggest...
0:17:03 > 0:17:05I suppose my biggest thing, with a crew.
0:17:08 > 0:17:12I think people who do understand actors are often people that
0:17:12 > 0:17:13have dabbled in acting themselves.
0:17:13 > 0:17:15Because obviously, if you've done something,
0:17:15 > 0:17:18you understand how to tell other people about it.
0:17:18 > 0:17:20And I often thought, you know,
0:17:20 > 0:17:22that she would have been a really good actress, very good.
0:17:22 > 0:17:24Because she was very expressive.
0:17:31 > 0:17:32I think she saw a lot of stuff
0:17:32 > 0:17:34to do with theatre when she was very young.
0:17:34 > 0:17:37And she started work, I think, when she was 17.
0:17:37 > 0:17:39And at the time, she was working as a stage manager.
0:17:39 > 0:17:43Ian, her partner, often says that being a stage manager in those days
0:17:43 > 0:17:46meant you could be pushed on set and told to be in the chorus,
0:17:46 > 0:17:49or you could end up being a small part in a play,
0:17:49 > 0:17:51which she absolutely hated.
0:17:51 > 0:17:53She gave it a go, but didn't like it.
0:17:53 > 0:17:56She got really bad stage fright, apparently.
0:17:58 > 0:18:00She'd had a very, erm...
0:18:01 > 0:18:04..quite a difficult upbringing.
0:18:04 > 0:18:07Her dad was an actor, so there was no money.
0:18:07 > 0:18:10He was also... He drank a lot.
0:18:10 > 0:18:11And he died young.
0:18:11 > 0:18:14So then there was really no money.
0:18:14 > 0:18:17Antonia grew up with a not successful dad.
0:18:17 > 0:18:20I think you then see someone working really, really hard
0:18:20 > 0:18:22and getting rejected.
0:18:22 > 0:18:25And so I think there is something about her protectiveness
0:18:25 > 0:18:28towards actors that I think came from there.
0:18:28 > 0:18:32She was quite a sensitive person and felt things really acutely,
0:18:32 > 0:18:35which I think is why she was able to...
0:18:35 > 0:18:38do such sensitive and extraordinary work.
0:18:44 > 0:18:47Her mum had a place, which Antonia had bought for her,
0:18:47 > 0:18:50on the Suffolk coast in Thorpeness.
0:18:52 > 0:18:55And so they were two women thrown together
0:18:55 > 0:18:58and having to support each other and...
0:19:00 > 0:19:03..and they had a very strong bond.
0:19:03 > 0:19:06And I talked to Rosemary about it.
0:19:06 > 0:19:09Obviously, when it's Antonia's mum,
0:19:09 > 0:19:11I'm not going to go into it in any great detail,
0:19:11 > 0:19:14but I got the impression that it had been pretty hard.
0:19:15 > 0:19:17PIGEONS COO
0:19:19 > 0:19:21But there were aspects of Antonia that...
0:19:21 > 0:19:24You know, just when you thought she was...
0:19:24 > 0:19:27like most people in that kind of Royal Court environment,
0:19:27 > 0:19:31pretty kind of switched on and connected.
0:19:31 > 0:19:33But she had this wonderful thing...
0:19:33 > 0:19:35You must know about the thumb-sucking,
0:19:35 > 0:19:37where she would just sort of go into a foetal position
0:19:37 > 0:19:39- and suck her thumb. - HE LAUGHS
0:19:39 > 0:19:43You know, in rehearsals, in crisis meetings, you know,
0:19:43 > 0:19:45there'd be Antonia, in the corner.
0:19:52 > 0:19:54I kind of rose through assistant director of the Royal Court
0:19:54 > 0:19:57to running the theatre upstairs.
0:19:57 > 0:19:59And I was lucky enough to work with
0:19:59 > 0:20:03some fantastic writers. I mean...
0:20:03 > 0:20:06A big turning point in my life was working with Trevor Griffiths.
0:20:06 > 0:20:09And one of the things that he talked to me about
0:20:09 > 0:20:11was reaching a wider audience.
0:20:11 > 0:20:13We were talking to the converted.
0:20:13 > 0:20:16That, in theatre, you are very much really playing to
0:20:16 > 0:20:19middle-class, liberal, intelligentsia audiences.
0:20:19 > 0:20:21And the subject that we were dealing with...
0:20:21 > 0:20:25I was doing plays by Hanif Kureishi, by Jim Cartwright.
0:20:25 > 0:20:28Fantastic, new writing, issue-based stuff.
0:20:28 > 0:20:31And I thought, I'd much rather be doing this to a wider audience.
0:20:31 > 0:20:35And the only way I knew how to do that was television.
0:20:35 > 0:20:39So then I heard about this new innovatory series
0:20:39 > 0:20:40that was going to be made.
0:20:40 > 0:20:44A working-class soap, BBC, called EastEnders.
0:20:44 > 0:20:47And I also heard that the producer was a woman called Julia Smith.
0:20:47 > 0:20:50And I thought, "It's a woman. Right, OK, I'm going for this.
0:20:50 > 0:20:52"I'm going to write to her. If anybody should give me a chance,
0:20:52 > 0:20:54"it should be another woman."
0:20:54 > 0:20:58So I wrote to her, and she came up with the goods, God bless her.
0:20:58 > 0:21:00She actually took me on.
0:21:00 > 0:21:02She gave me a sort of informal training,
0:21:02 > 0:21:05which is very unusual at the BBC.
0:21:05 > 0:21:09She hired me about six or eight weeks before she needed me
0:21:09 > 0:21:10to actually start directing.
0:21:10 > 0:21:13And what I did was trail other directors.
0:21:13 > 0:21:15And I think it's important to say in the circumstances
0:21:15 > 0:21:18that two of those other directors I trailed were women,
0:21:18 > 0:21:21right back then as well. So, you know, that was great.
0:21:21 > 0:21:25And it was a progressive, confidence-building
0:21:25 > 0:21:28trust thing for me. And by the end of the process,
0:21:28 > 0:21:31they entrusted this very special episode to me,
0:21:31 > 0:21:33which was a two-hander between Den and Angie,
0:21:33 > 0:21:36which I think was a kind of innovative thing.
0:21:38 > 0:21:39DOOR SHUTS
0:21:41 > 0:21:42Is that you, Den?
0:21:51 > 0:21:54I became Head of Series and Serials, as it was called then,
0:21:54 > 0:21:56in the BBC, in the early '80s.
0:21:56 > 0:22:01And I was appointed to the job with two very specific briefs.
0:22:01 > 0:22:06The BBC was suffering yet another crisis.
0:22:06 > 0:22:09And the crisis was on two fronts.
0:22:09 > 0:22:10The main channel, BBC One,
0:22:10 > 0:22:13had taken a terrible dip in the ratings.
0:22:13 > 0:22:17And we had to fight back with some popular programming.
0:22:17 > 0:22:19The camera was still on the move, I think.
0:22:19 > 0:22:22- Oh, I see. Yes, yes, yes. - ALL TALK
0:22:22 > 0:22:25'It actually turned out to be a very fruitful period,
0:22:25 > 0:22:28'because EastEnders was a success.'
0:22:28 > 0:22:31It wasn't an immediate success when it started.
0:22:31 > 0:22:33It took six months to get going.
0:22:33 > 0:22:37But when the big relationship between Den and Angie happened,
0:22:37 > 0:22:38the ratings went through the roof.
0:22:38 > 0:22:42And we suddenly had a monumental hit on our hands.
0:22:42 > 0:22:44It was great. I loved the scene.
0:22:45 > 0:22:48'And so it was decided, because they were doing so well,'
0:22:48 > 0:22:50to do one episode with just the two of them.
0:22:50 > 0:22:53With one of their very famous fights.
0:22:53 > 0:22:56And so there was the two of them at home.
0:22:56 > 0:22:58Angie in her dressing gown most of the time.
0:22:58 > 0:23:01And we had one other character, which was the window cleaner,
0:23:01 > 0:23:03who just looked through the window
0:23:03 > 0:23:07and then slowly cleaned the windows and saw what was going on.
0:23:07 > 0:23:09I don't know whether he heard everything,
0:23:09 > 0:23:11but he certainly saw what was going on.
0:23:11 > 0:23:13And Antonia, because she was doing so well
0:23:13 > 0:23:16and everybody loved her, was asked to direct it.
0:23:16 > 0:23:19And it's almost unthinkable that you're just going to show
0:23:19 > 0:23:23two actors talking to each other for half an hour, you know?
0:23:23 > 0:23:25In a high-rated programme.
0:23:25 > 0:23:27And handling that. And, of course...
0:23:27 > 0:23:31there is nothing else but the performance.
0:23:31 > 0:23:34You know? There aren't...landscapes to shoot.
0:23:34 > 0:23:37You have to, as a director, be brave enough
0:23:37 > 0:23:39to allow the actors to speak for themselves,
0:23:39 > 0:23:43to allow the script to speak, too.
0:23:43 > 0:23:46In a sense, withdraw yourself.
0:23:46 > 0:23:48And that is hard for a director.
0:23:48 > 0:23:51And I think it takes
0:23:51 > 0:23:54real ingenuity, real maturity
0:23:54 > 0:23:58and real talent to disappear in the way that is required.
0:23:59 > 0:24:02Oh, I've been waiting for this. I've been waiting for the backlash.
0:24:02 > 0:24:05Oh, so you're ill, are ya? Well, what's wrong with you, eh?
0:24:05 > 0:24:08What you got? Got an 'eadache? Do you want to go and lie down?
0:24:08 > 0:24:11Do you want me to bring you breakfast in bed? Hot-water bottle?
0:24:11 > 0:24:15Eh? Some aspirin? Alka-Seltzer?
0:24:15 > 0:24:17Don't try that one on me, Ange, because it won't wash.
0:24:17 > 0:24:19No way you're ever going to get me back.
0:24:19 > 0:24:21- SHE SHOUTS:- I'm scared!
0:24:21 > 0:24:24You stupid, idiotic, little man! I'm scared!
0:24:24 > 0:24:26Do know what it's like since they told me?
0:24:26 > 0:24:28I feel like I'm locked inside a cell
0:24:28 > 0:24:30with the walls closing in, the ceiling pressing down,
0:24:30 > 0:24:33the floor coming up to meet me. I'm getting smaller and smaller,
0:24:33 > 0:24:36and it's crushing me and crushing me. I'm shrinking and I can't cope!
0:24:36 > 0:24:38Ah, shut up!
0:24:38 > 0:24:40She loved keeping the camera where it had to be.
0:24:40 > 0:24:42She knew where to put the focus.
0:24:42 > 0:24:44And I think, in that scene -
0:24:44 > 0:24:46it was only the two of us, it wasn't a huge room -
0:24:46 > 0:24:50she needed to see me, because I was the one that was delivering
0:24:50 > 0:24:52the bombshell in that particular scene.
0:24:52 > 0:24:55But she also needed to see Leslie's reaction -
0:24:55 > 0:24:57whether he believed her, or whether he didn't.
0:24:57 > 0:24:59And so it was a very clever thing to do,
0:24:59 > 0:25:02to have both of us in shot, I think.
0:25:02 > 0:25:05That's another mark of a really good director.
0:25:05 > 0:25:08Keeping the camera lens where it needs to be,
0:25:08 > 0:25:14so you, the viewer, you are getting the story right at you.
0:25:14 > 0:25:15Oh!
0:25:15 > 0:25:16What are you telling me, eh?
0:25:20 > 0:25:22I got six months to live.
0:25:22 > 0:25:24- SHE LAUGHS - What?
0:25:26 > 0:25:28I've got six months to live!
0:25:29 > 0:25:32Not long, is it, Den? Six little months.
0:25:32 > 0:25:35'You can see her hand in stuff that she's done.'
0:25:35 > 0:25:39If you look at her work, you can see her hand in it.
0:25:39 > 0:25:44And the kind of work she likes to do tells you a lot about the woman.
0:25:44 > 0:25:47Tells you that she is an emotional woman,
0:25:47 > 0:25:49that she does have a welter,
0:25:49 > 0:25:52a depth to her, of emotion.
0:25:57 > 0:26:01One of the gifts Bird gives us is she's a film-maker
0:26:01 > 0:26:05living and working in London,
0:26:05 > 0:26:09over a period where London becomes a stage set
0:26:09 > 0:26:15for all kinds of rapid social and economic change.
0:26:15 > 0:26:19London has become the bubble that ate Britain.
0:26:19 > 0:26:23It's a global city, it's a world city, it's a space unto itself.
0:26:23 > 0:26:25It's Londonistan.
0:26:25 > 0:26:30Its economic boom has overshadowed everything else in Britain.
0:26:30 > 0:26:32And Bird...
0:26:32 > 0:26:35is the poet of that transformation.
0:26:36 > 0:26:40Bird is the film-maker who's situated in a London
0:26:40 > 0:26:44which on the one hand is gentrifying rapidly
0:26:44 > 0:26:47and being filled with external money,
0:26:47 > 0:26:49the growth of finance,
0:26:49 > 0:26:54this huge, inflating house price and economic bubble.
0:26:54 > 0:26:56And, on the other hand, with equal rapidity,
0:26:56 > 0:27:00it's chucking out the individuals that can't survive.
0:27:03 > 0:27:06- You all right? - HE LAUGHS
0:27:06 > 0:27:08She wasn't...
0:27:08 > 0:27:10what I would call a churchgoing lady.
0:27:10 > 0:27:13Right? She wasn't worshipping with us.
0:27:13 > 0:27:16But, lots of years ago, Antonia stood with me
0:27:16 > 0:27:19here on the tower of Shoreditch Church
0:27:19 > 0:27:21and, although we are in Hackney,
0:27:21 > 0:27:26the back wall of the churchyard, that is Tower Hamlets.
0:27:26 > 0:27:29And she used to live in Virginia Road -
0:27:29 > 0:27:33which we can see from up here, it's not very far away at all.
0:27:33 > 0:27:36Tending to think that someone could throw a cricket ball
0:27:36 > 0:27:40from here and land on her roof, it's very close.
0:27:41 > 0:27:43And the area where she lived,
0:27:43 > 0:27:46part of the old boundary has stayed overlapping there.
0:27:46 > 0:27:50One side was designated the most deprived place
0:27:50 > 0:27:52in the whole of London.
0:27:52 > 0:27:55It was as bad a slum as you could find anywhere.
0:27:55 > 0:28:00And even now, Tower Hamlets is always in the top seven
0:28:00 > 0:28:03of the most deprived boroughs and the whole nation.
0:28:05 > 0:28:09And behind me, over my left shoulder,
0:28:09 > 0:28:12you can see the towers growing in the City of London.
0:28:12 > 0:28:15And the United Nations say that the City of London
0:28:15 > 0:28:18is the wealthiest place on the planet.
0:28:18 > 0:28:19So you have...
0:28:21 > 0:28:24..a wealth that you can't begin to count
0:28:24 > 0:28:29and a poverty that you dare not believe still exists.
0:28:29 > 0:28:30And the two are side by side.
0:28:32 > 0:28:33SIREN WAILS
0:28:33 > 0:28:37She lived where she was very aware of the poverty.
0:28:37 > 0:28:40But more than just the bland fact that,
0:28:40 > 0:28:43oh, someone hasn't got much money,
0:28:43 > 0:28:46she was very much aware of what poverty does to people
0:28:46 > 0:28:48as an individual.
0:28:48 > 0:28:51And she could see there's an inherent injustice in that
0:28:51 > 0:28:55and she was trying to get behind people's exteriors.
0:28:55 > 0:28:57How are you a human being...
0:28:59 > 0:29:01..when that is happening to you?
0:29:01 > 0:29:04This is the thing about Antonia all the way throughout her career.
0:29:04 > 0:29:08She absolutely... It sounds pretty obvious to say she cared.
0:29:08 > 0:29:11Of course everybody cares. But there's levels of caring.
0:29:11 > 0:29:13And she absolutely...
0:29:13 > 0:29:18Whatever happened to her, in terms of, you know,
0:29:18 > 0:29:22problems with producers or finances or whatever it might be,
0:29:22 > 0:29:25she was always able to kind of retain her shape and...
0:29:27 > 0:29:29..and her belief in the project.
0:29:29 > 0:29:32And her belief in the piece and her belief in the actors.
0:29:32 > 0:29:35So she was starting... She's taught me so much about that.
0:29:37 > 0:29:40So everything I've really done since my relationship with Antonia
0:29:40 > 0:29:43has been kind of based on that premise -
0:29:43 > 0:29:45that you've got to know everything about this thing.
0:29:45 > 0:29:47You've got to absolutely love it.
0:29:47 > 0:29:49You've got to absolutely believe in it.
0:29:49 > 0:29:51If you can tick all those boxes, you've got a chance.
0:29:51 > 0:29:52That's for sure.
0:29:52 > 0:29:54She was not a narrow,
0:29:54 > 0:29:59politically motivated, tub-thumping...
0:29:59 > 0:30:01political film-maker.
0:30:01 > 0:30:02She was a political film-maker
0:30:02 > 0:30:05and she had profound beliefs and passions.
0:30:05 > 0:30:08But she knew what would make people laugh,
0:30:08 > 0:30:11as well as what would make people cry, and she went there.
0:30:11 > 0:30:14And that's the key, I think, to the accessibility
0:30:14 > 0:30:16and the success of her work.
0:30:17 > 0:30:19MUSIC: Casualty Theme
0:30:26 > 0:30:28The other thing that is fascinating about her career
0:30:28 > 0:30:32is that she really oversaw a huge change
0:30:32 > 0:30:33in television drama.
0:30:33 > 0:30:35I mean, the time when she first started
0:30:35 > 0:30:40on EastEnders and Casualty, those shows...
0:30:40 > 0:30:42We were only just coming out of a period
0:30:42 > 0:30:47where things were all shot in studios with slightly wobbly sets.
0:30:47 > 0:30:51And I think she brought a sort of fresh air
0:30:51 > 0:30:55and a sense of realism to what she was doing,
0:30:55 > 0:30:59which has lasted right through to the dramas we see today.
0:30:59 > 0:31:01If you look at the first two episodes of Casualty,
0:31:01 > 0:31:02which I think were well-directed,
0:31:02 > 0:31:04they are staged.
0:31:04 > 0:31:06Um...
0:31:06 > 0:31:09If you look at the second pair, Antonia's,
0:31:09 > 0:31:12where before she fully got her wings,
0:31:12 > 0:31:15they are emotional, they're cluttered,
0:31:15 > 0:31:17they're noisier.
0:31:17 > 0:31:20There's a feeling of human chaos going on here.
0:31:20 > 0:31:21That's Lindsay!
0:31:21 > 0:31:24- No, I don't think it is.- Vi! - Can I just see her?
0:31:24 > 0:31:26'But there is a purpose in where she puts the camera.'
0:31:26 > 0:31:28I'm sure that's Lindsay.
0:31:28 > 0:31:31'So that, for example, there's a scene'
0:31:31 > 0:31:34in which a woman is told that her daughter
0:31:34 > 0:31:38has been killed in a road-traffic accident.
0:31:38 > 0:31:41And that the daughter was carrying a donor card.
0:31:41 > 0:31:45And in some ways, it's the archetypal Casualty scene.
0:31:45 > 0:31:47I r... And I always remember it as one.
0:31:47 > 0:31:50Antonia shot it and edited it
0:31:50 > 0:31:54that we were on the mother's face so long
0:31:54 > 0:31:57that watching it - even 29 years later,
0:31:57 > 0:32:00yesterday at home on my TV - I had tears in my eyes.
0:32:00 > 0:32:02And it was... You could sense that
0:32:02 > 0:32:05her ability on the set had made everyone
0:32:05 > 0:32:07just know what they had to do and deliver it.
0:32:09 > 0:32:12- I saw a doctor.- In the corridor.- Are they taking her for an operation?
0:32:14 > 0:32:18- No.- Cos, as I was telling the nurse here, she's pregnant.
0:32:18 > 0:32:20- I thought you should know that. - Only just.
0:32:20 > 0:32:22Ten weeks!
0:32:22 > 0:32:25They...they told us about Derek.
0:32:25 > 0:32:27- Dead on arrival, that's what they call it, innit?- Yes.
0:32:32 > 0:32:36Look, I'm afraid I have some extremely bad news for you.
0:32:36 > 0:32:38Your daughter is dead too.
0:32:42 > 0:32:44But, er, I just saw her.
0:32:45 > 0:32:48She had extensive head injuries, Mrs Brown.
0:32:49 > 0:32:52We tried, but there was nothing we could do for her.
0:32:55 > 0:32:57Er, how...
0:32:57 > 0:32:59how did she actually go?
0:33:01 > 0:33:02Her heart stopped.
0:33:03 > 0:33:06She was in a coma from the time of the accident.
0:33:06 > 0:33:08I don't think she suffered.
0:33:14 > 0:33:17In the past, you have been a critic,
0:33:17 > 0:33:20are known to be a critic of the programme Casualty.
0:33:20 > 0:33:22What did you think about Friday night's programme?
0:33:22 > 0:33:24I thought it was very good.
0:33:24 > 0:33:26It was very, very moving.
0:33:26 > 0:33:28And it was...sad.
0:33:28 > 0:33:31I felt very sad at the end of it, for the family being portrayed.
0:33:31 > 0:33:32- I thought was very accurate.- Yeah.
0:33:32 > 0:33:34I think that's probably, in fact,
0:33:34 > 0:33:37what happens, what really happens in a casualty department,
0:33:37 > 0:33:39when there's been an accident.
0:33:41 > 0:33:42I think people forget,
0:33:42 > 0:33:43when they look at it on the screen now
0:33:43 > 0:33:45and they see this kind of hospital soap,
0:33:45 > 0:33:47they forget that when it was first on,
0:33:47 > 0:33:50it was actually quite a kind of radical project.
0:33:50 > 0:33:53Apart from anything else, it was very much a kind of response
0:33:53 > 0:33:58to Margaret Thatcher and that whole kind of era.
0:33:58 > 0:34:01We felt, as young socialists,
0:34:01 > 0:34:04this is our moment to create a television revolution.
0:34:04 > 0:34:07And it would be feminist and it would be anti-racist
0:34:07 > 0:34:11and it would be pro-NHS and it would be distinctly anti-Tory.
0:34:11 > 0:34:15So we were looking for someone who had those attributes.
0:34:18 > 0:34:20I guess the amazing thing was
0:34:20 > 0:34:23that you had two very young writers,
0:34:23 > 0:34:25you had a brand-new show,
0:34:25 > 0:34:29and you had a very, very feisty,
0:34:29 > 0:34:32pretty powerful, opinionated, uncontrollable director.
0:34:32 > 0:34:36Now, that is such a credit to the BBC of the time.
0:34:36 > 0:34:39I think Antonia was certainly
0:34:39 > 0:34:42very responsible for the...
0:34:44 > 0:34:46..a lot of the energy and the complexion,
0:34:46 > 0:34:48if you like, of Casualty.
0:34:53 > 0:34:57Then, she directed...
0:34:57 > 0:35:00Well, a serial and then a series that I produced,
0:35:00 > 0:35:05and that didn't go quite so well.
0:35:05 > 0:35:08It was a five-part thriller set in Docklands
0:35:08 > 0:35:12and the budget was a million pounds,
0:35:12 > 0:35:15and we ended up spending £2 million
0:35:15 > 0:35:18and being investigated by the BBC police
0:35:18 > 0:35:21in case we'd actually been pocketing some of that money,
0:35:21 > 0:35:24so it was all a little bit fraught.
0:35:24 > 0:35:28One of the reasons for the disastrous overspend
0:35:28 > 0:35:31was the fact that the medium that we were using
0:35:31 > 0:35:35was a mixture of film and video, if you can imagine,
0:35:35 > 0:35:38so the outdoor stuff was shot on film
0:35:38 > 0:35:40and the inside stuff was shot...
0:35:40 > 0:35:43studio lighting, multi-camera set-up,
0:35:43 > 0:35:46and the mishmash, quite understandably,
0:35:46 > 0:35:49Antonia found absolutely abhorrent.
0:35:49 > 0:35:50I should guess it's the difference
0:35:50 > 0:35:52between using crayons and oil paint, you know?
0:35:52 > 0:35:55On film, you do work with better crews.
0:35:55 > 0:35:59You work with people who are making drama all the time.
0:35:59 > 0:36:03On video, you quite often get the guys... And they're good guys,
0:36:03 > 0:36:05but they've just been doing the horse racing
0:36:05 > 0:36:08or Songs of Praise, you know, and it's just another job.
0:36:10 > 0:36:14She cared passionately, passionately,
0:36:14 > 0:36:16about what she did
0:36:16 > 0:36:19and, looking back with hindsight,
0:36:19 > 0:36:21which is difficult to do,
0:36:21 > 0:36:26there were very, very few women directors then
0:36:26 > 0:36:29and she was emphatically a trailblazer,
0:36:29 > 0:36:32and I think it's fair to say
0:36:32 > 0:36:36that, as a producer...
0:36:36 > 0:36:40There wasn't really major prejudice against women producers
0:36:40 > 0:36:44but I think there probably was against female directors.
0:36:44 > 0:36:48There's no question the film industry is full of women
0:36:48 > 0:36:53and it's very heavily sustained by women working in key roles -
0:36:53 > 0:36:56producers, production managers,
0:36:56 > 0:36:58roles where they work all hours,
0:36:58 > 0:37:02give their heart and soul to the films they're working on,
0:37:02 > 0:37:06hours that make it very clear that the issue for women film-makers
0:37:06 > 0:37:09is not necessarily one of the pragmatics,
0:37:09 > 0:37:13of managing hours and managing family life and a career.
0:37:13 > 0:37:15The particular challenges
0:37:15 > 0:37:19that I think may attach to women film-makers
0:37:19 > 0:37:23are to do with what we might call a kind of unconscious bias
0:37:23 > 0:37:27or an unconscious stereotyping of the kinds of roles
0:37:27 > 0:37:30we think women should be playing socially.
0:37:30 > 0:37:34I think the crucial problem at the heart of this
0:37:34 > 0:37:39is the notion of whether or not it is legitimate
0:37:39 > 0:37:41for women to be creative,
0:37:41 > 0:37:46to be egotistical, creative forces
0:37:46 > 0:37:49and I think, within the culture, in a very subtle way,
0:37:49 > 0:37:52there is a huge amount of resistance to that.
0:37:52 > 0:37:57Increasingly, it's looking as if we're comfortable with women...
0:37:59 > 0:38:03..using their creativity and labour and imagination...
0:38:05 > 0:38:09..to work hard supporting other people's creative vision,
0:38:09 > 0:38:12to produce a kind of environment
0:38:12 > 0:38:15in which genius creators can fly.
0:38:17 > 0:38:21But we may, as a society, at this point in its evolution,
0:38:21 > 0:38:23have more difficulty
0:38:23 > 0:38:25allowing women to have the kind of vision,
0:38:25 > 0:38:28the single-mindedness, the determination
0:38:28 > 0:38:31to drive through a vision
0:38:31 > 0:38:33that is inevitably going to mean they bug people,
0:38:33 > 0:38:36they rub people up the wrong way, they make demands,
0:38:36 > 0:38:39they ask for things, they don't always come in on time.
0:38:39 > 0:38:41Those are all aspects that are maybe
0:38:41 > 0:38:45more challenging for a woman director
0:38:45 > 0:38:50and require a woman with enormous amounts, as Antonia Bird did,
0:38:50 > 0:38:54of determination, of guile, of intelligence,
0:38:54 > 0:38:57of willingness to kind of work around the edges
0:38:57 > 0:39:00and, where necessary, of willingness to run into some of those obstacles
0:39:00 > 0:39:02and drive them through before her.
0:39:15 > 0:39:19There was an occasion when we were making Priest when...
0:39:19 > 0:39:23Which was shot on a television schedule,
0:39:23 > 0:39:24but she was making a movie.
0:39:24 > 0:39:27I'm not sure I realised that at the time, but she was.
0:39:27 > 0:39:31And so we were several days behind on the shoot
0:39:31 > 0:39:33and I was rung...
0:39:33 > 0:39:38I was in the production office and I was rung up by the first assistant,
0:39:38 > 0:39:41who said, "Antonia is refusing to wrap
0:39:41 > 0:39:45"and move on to the next location. Can you come down and sort it out?"
0:39:50 > 0:39:53So I went down to the location, which was just a block of flats,
0:39:53 > 0:39:56and the whole crew was outside this block of flats
0:39:56 > 0:39:58and they parted like the Red Sea to let me...
0:39:58 > 0:40:02And I went up the stairs and there in the flat,
0:40:02 > 0:40:05sitting in the middle of the floor with her thumb in her mouth...
0:40:05 > 0:40:07She hadn't got the shot she wanted,
0:40:07 > 0:40:10and, you know, what do you do as a producer in that situation?
0:40:10 > 0:40:12You give her another hour and then she moves on.
0:40:12 > 0:40:13And that was great, you know?
0:40:13 > 0:40:16You know, that's good directing as far as I'm concerned.
0:40:16 > 0:40:19But she was making a movie and I didn't know she was making a movie
0:40:19 > 0:40:21and it sort of gradually became clear.
0:40:21 > 0:40:26She was always so ambitious for her work.
0:40:26 > 0:40:28But for all the right reasons, you know?
0:40:28 > 0:40:30Not because there was some raging ego there,
0:40:30 > 0:40:33just because there was something she wanted to say.
0:40:38 > 0:40:42Priest is about two priests in an inner-city parish in...
0:40:42 > 0:40:44Two Catholic priests.
0:40:44 > 0:40:46You know, one of whom sleeps with the housekeeper
0:40:46 > 0:40:50and the other one's gay. And it was a fabulous piece,.
0:40:50 > 0:40:53It was originally going to be a four-part television piece,
0:40:53 > 0:40:55that was what Jimmy wrote,
0:40:55 > 0:40:59and then, for various kind of budgetary reasons,
0:40:59 > 0:41:02it got cut down and cut down,
0:41:02 > 0:41:04so he rewrote it as a single drama.
0:41:04 > 0:41:06You know, partly why, when you see the film of Priest,
0:41:06 > 0:41:08it has a lot of different strands to it,
0:41:08 > 0:41:10that's because it began life as a much longer piece
0:41:10 > 0:41:12that then got distilled.
0:41:12 > 0:41:16Antonia had just finished making Safe
0:41:16 > 0:41:20and there was absolutely no-one else I would go to in the first instance,
0:41:20 > 0:41:25and I knew she wouldn't be very up for the Catholicism
0:41:25 > 0:41:28and probably wouldn't have much time for the Catholicism.
0:41:28 > 0:41:31And it wasn't that Jimmy McGovern was anti-Catholic,
0:41:31 > 0:41:34he was not anti-Catholic, he was anti the church,
0:41:34 > 0:41:38and the film is very clear about that, actually.
0:41:38 > 0:41:40It's not an anti-faith movie,
0:41:40 > 0:41:43it's an anti-church hierarchy movie,
0:41:43 > 0:41:46and that was grist to Antonia's mill
0:41:46 > 0:41:48because it was a structure and a hierarchy
0:41:48 > 0:41:52that was misguided,
0:41:52 > 0:41:54in Jimmy's view and in Antonia's view,
0:41:54 > 0:41:55and was squeezing the life
0:41:55 > 0:41:59and the, you know, strength and the hope out of parishioners
0:41:59 > 0:42:01and the priests who worked in it.
0:42:01 > 0:42:05So a classic opportunity for Antonia.
0:42:10 > 0:42:12She had an instinctive sympathy
0:42:12 > 0:42:15for people who were at the rough edge of the world we live in.
0:42:15 > 0:42:19I suppose, also, just, you know, thinking of Priest,
0:42:19 > 0:42:23an institution that was hypocritical,
0:42:23 > 0:42:26cruel, insensitive.
0:42:26 > 0:42:29She took... Here was an injustice.
0:42:29 > 0:42:30You know, this was wrong
0:42:30 > 0:42:34and she was using film drama
0:42:34 > 0:42:36to say that.
0:42:36 > 0:42:39PRIEST SHOUTS
0:42:54 > 0:42:58Now, you can say that in a documentary, in a non-fiction book,
0:42:58 > 0:43:00in a newspaper article or magazine article, whatever,
0:43:00 > 0:43:02but I believe, and I think Antonia did too,
0:43:02 > 0:43:07that there's nothing like fiction, drama, to reach people,
0:43:07 > 0:43:11to get into their hearts and make them feel angry about it
0:43:11 > 0:43:15and that something should change or something should be done.
0:43:15 > 0:43:20That, to me, was the way Antonia was a political film-maker.
0:43:20 > 0:43:24I think she wanted to... She wanted discourse and debate.
0:43:24 > 0:43:26She wanted the discussion around the film.
0:43:26 > 0:43:28She didn't want them just to work as pure entertainment,
0:43:28 > 0:43:33she wanted people to walk out the cinema or to switch off the TV
0:43:33 > 0:43:35and just have this kind of whole
0:43:35 > 0:43:38kind of sort of discourse about it, you know?
0:43:38 > 0:43:40"What are we actually talking about here?", you know?
0:43:40 > 0:43:43And, I mean, like Priest just kind of...
0:43:43 > 0:43:47When you look at what unravelled after Priest, you know,
0:43:47 > 0:43:50it's like it kind of... It's now, you know?
0:43:50 > 0:43:53It's something you could kind of show at any time since then
0:43:53 > 0:43:57and it would just have this amazingly powerful contemporary feel
0:43:57 > 0:44:01so I think she wanted that kind of reach and impact
0:44:01 > 0:44:03and, in some ways, it was ahead of its time.
0:44:05 > 0:44:08I have dedicated my life to this study of incest...
0:44:09 > 0:44:12..and there's nothing anyone can tell me about it.
0:44:12 > 0:44:14Least of all you.
0:44:14 > 0:44:17I can tell you it's a sin.
0:44:17 > 0:44:19It's one of the gravest sins of all.
0:44:21 > 0:44:25Can I have your permission to talk to someone about this?
0:44:25 > 0:44:27There's help available,
0:44:27 > 0:44:28and therapy.
0:44:28 > 0:44:30I don't need help.
0:44:30 > 0:44:32I don't need therapy.
0:44:32 > 0:44:34I'm not your textbook case.
0:44:34 > 0:44:36I'm no sexual inadequate.
0:44:37 > 0:44:40I've just seen through all the bullshit, that's all.
0:44:40 > 0:44:41Inhuman, is it?
0:44:41 > 0:44:43Unthinkable?
0:44:43 > 0:44:47So why go to all the trouble of making laws against it?
0:44:47 > 0:44:50Why does every society in the world put a taboo around it?
0:44:50 > 0:44:51I'll tell you why.
0:44:53 > 0:44:57It's the one thing we'd all like to do.
0:44:57 > 0:44:58Deep down.
0:44:59 > 0:45:00In here.
0:45:04 > 0:45:06And what does Lisa think?
0:45:15 > 0:45:19Antonia actually was always very careful with scripts.
0:45:19 > 0:45:21She knew the script inside-out.
0:45:21 > 0:45:24She wasn't a director who threw away the script,
0:45:24 > 0:45:26workshopped it with the actors
0:45:26 > 0:45:29and then created something new.
0:45:29 > 0:45:31She always worked from the script,
0:45:31 > 0:45:34took a lot of trouble to get to know it intricately
0:45:34 > 0:45:37and then, with the actors, would build from that,
0:45:37 > 0:45:41but there wasn't a lot of improvisation or anything like that.
0:45:41 > 0:45:46She would be looking for the essential truth in the project
0:45:46 > 0:45:50and would then try and find a comparable truth in the actors
0:45:50 > 0:45:52and in their performances to realise that.
0:45:52 > 0:45:54The body of Christ.
0:45:54 > 0:45:57She was fierce in the casting.
0:45:57 > 0:45:59She had to feel that the stars would find the truth of the part.
0:45:59 > 0:46:01Body of Christ.
0:46:05 > 0:46:09Every character was given their space to really power through.
0:46:09 > 0:46:10All big close-ups.
0:46:10 > 0:46:13Look at all of them at their moments of crisis in the film,
0:46:13 > 0:46:15they're all big close-ups in that film.
0:46:15 > 0:46:18You know, unlike a lot of directors
0:46:18 > 0:46:21who came to television or film from the theatre
0:46:21 > 0:46:27and thought that the way to direct film
0:46:27 > 0:46:28was to sit back
0:46:28 > 0:46:31and, you know, allow the action to happen within the frame,
0:46:31 > 0:46:34Antonia was never afraid of close-ups.
0:46:34 > 0:46:37And I think, you know, what distinguishes
0:46:37 > 0:46:40some of her most cinematic work are those huge close-ups
0:46:40 > 0:46:43where you're penetrating and getting closer and closer
0:46:43 > 0:46:45to the heart of the performance.
0:46:48 > 0:46:50You know, what makes a good director
0:46:50 > 0:46:52is actually someone who doesn't cover everything
0:46:52 > 0:46:54and doesn't give us a shot of the table
0:46:54 > 0:46:56and the three people sat round it
0:46:56 > 0:46:57but says, "This is where the story beat is
0:46:57 > 0:46:59"and this is the person we're focused on,"
0:46:59 > 0:47:03and that was Antonia's, to my mind, great strength.
0:47:03 > 0:47:05It's astonishing how many film directors
0:47:05 > 0:47:07are more interested in the camera than they are in the actors,
0:47:07 > 0:47:08and that was never Antonia.
0:47:08 > 0:47:14And, you know, that's aesthetics, politics, craft all put together.
0:47:22 > 0:47:24Priest was a movie that had Hollywood calling
0:47:24 > 0:47:27and I think it was just like that ability
0:47:27 > 0:47:30to deal with difficult material is something that, you know...
0:47:30 > 0:47:32And to do it really kind of stylishly and cool
0:47:32 > 0:47:34is something that Hollywood think they want.
0:47:34 > 0:47:37They don't actually want it when you get there.
0:47:37 > 0:47:38There's a kind of deceptive thing.
0:47:38 > 0:47:41You know, they want the kind of talent to do stuff
0:47:41 > 0:47:46in a way that's kind... That they understand, that they get, you know,
0:47:46 > 0:47:48and I think it... Particularly at that time,
0:47:48 > 0:47:54I think it would be quite hard for them to get Antonia, but she did...
0:47:54 > 0:47:56She was successful out there,
0:47:56 > 0:48:00which was kind of quite an amazing story in itself, I think.
0:48:00 > 0:48:02We nominally share a common language,
0:48:02 > 0:48:03the English and the Americans.
0:48:03 > 0:48:05That's a nominal distinction.
0:48:05 > 0:48:09The cultural differences between Hollywood and London are gigantic
0:48:09 > 0:48:13and so it takes a really brave soul to do that
0:48:13 > 0:48:16and, if you're a woman, brave times five.
0:48:16 > 0:48:19I mean, it's heroic, really, just what she attempted to do
0:48:19 > 0:48:22and I think succeeded at more than not
0:48:22 > 0:48:24and to the extent that she might have been a little disappointed
0:48:24 > 0:48:26in what happened in certain cases,
0:48:26 > 0:48:29she's lucky to have come out, you know, with her head still on.
0:48:29 > 0:48:32It's just these places can really wreck you.
0:48:32 > 0:48:35I think the bigger issue in Hollywood
0:48:35 > 0:48:39is that there is this desire for a certain aesthetic and a certain tone
0:48:39 > 0:48:43and a certain willingness to cut out all the rough edges
0:48:43 > 0:48:44or hone them down,
0:48:44 > 0:48:47and that's not Antonia at all.
0:48:47 > 0:48:50And finally tonight, we have Mad Love, which is a genuine curiosity
0:48:50 > 0:48:53in that it appears to have no discernible point whatsoever.
0:48:53 > 0:48:55Largely and crucially
0:48:55 > 0:48:58because there's no sign of the mad love promised by the title.
0:48:58 > 0:49:00O'Donnell and Barrymore are both pretty people
0:49:00 > 0:49:03but they're neither experienced nor skilled enough
0:49:03 > 0:49:07to suggest the sensuality, sexuality or wild passion
0:49:07 > 0:49:09that might just have carried the story through.
0:49:09 > 0:49:12The British director Antonia Bird chose Mad Love
0:49:12 > 0:49:14to follow her very successful Priest.
0:49:14 > 0:49:15I think it was a mistake.
0:49:15 > 0:49:20Mad Love was a film that ended up as a Disney film
0:49:20 > 0:49:23and was intended to be
0:49:23 > 0:49:28quite a mature, tough, grown-up portrait
0:49:28 > 0:49:30of a really difficult relationship,
0:49:30 > 0:49:34but during the course of the film, for whatever reason,
0:49:34 > 0:49:36maybe it was because it had big stars in it
0:49:36 > 0:49:37like Drew Barrymore, etc,
0:49:37 > 0:49:42it...became softened
0:49:42 > 0:49:46and some of the intensity was removed from the film,
0:49:46 > 0:49:53some of that reality-seeking missile stuff that Antonia had
0:49:53 > 0:49:55was removed from the film.
0:49:55 > 0:49:59And Antonia, I think, was in the middle of this thing,
0:49:59 > 0:50:02and it was only dawning on her during the course of it
0:50:02 > 0:50:06how much it was shifting around her, you know.
0:50:06 > 0:50:08It's like this light, she was in the heat
0:50:08 > 0:50:11and the light of making this film, and in the penumbra, the film
0:50:11 > 0:50:14was changing and she was the last to know - that's my understanding.
0:50:14 > 0:50:17She was such a good director that she could attract
0:50:17 > 0:50:20a Drew Barrymore, for example, as an actor.
0:50:20 > 0:50:22But when you do that, suddenly,
0:50:22 > 0:50:28you're having to appeal to very, very, very large populations,
0:50:28 > 0:50:31and the commercial film world doesn't want to offend
0:50:31 > 0:50:33all those populations, or even tell them truths
0:50:33 > 0:50:36that we all know in the secrets of our hearts,
0:50:36 > 0:50:38but a lot of people don't want to acknowledge
0:50:38 > 0:50:40when they are going to a cinema on a Friday night.
0:50:40 > 0:50:43And that's why Mad Love was so compromised.
0:50:43 > 0:50:49And I think probably she felt singed, burnt, by that experience,
0:50:49 > 0:50:55and therefore probably resolved not to make the same mistakes.
0:50:55 > 0:50:58Although you could argue, did she make any mistakes?
0:50:58 > 0:51:02She just went in and made a film and the mistakes were made around her.
0:51:07 > 0:51:11# Here is a tune I've been writing... #
0:51:11 > 0:51:14In the early draft of Face, it was, on the surface,
0:51:14 > 0:51:17a story of armed robbers in London - in some ways, a heist movie.
0:51:17 > 0:51:20But there was a political point to it.
0:51:20 > 0:51:22I had written, um,
0:51:22 > 0:51:25the protagonist, who was played by, eventually,
0:51:25 > 0:51:29Bobby Carlyle, I had written a whole kind of backstory for him,
0:51:29 > 0:51:31that involved a political commitment gone wrong,
0:51:31 > 0:51:33he had become disillusioned and so on.
0:51:33 > 0:51:37And it was really important to me that that be in it.
0:51:37 > 0:51:41But Antonia then was in the States, she was in Hollywood
0:51:41 > 0:51:44and she was shooting Mad Love.
0:51:44 > 0:51:50And no director that I met understood this backstory,
0:51:50 > 0:51:52they just thought it was bizarre.
0:51:52 > 0:51:54None of them could see it.
0:51:54 > 0:51:59And then, fortuitously, I think Antonia just threw up her hands
0:51:59 > 0:52:03in Hollywood and had had enough and wanted to come home.
0:52:03 > 0:52:05She knew about this script.
0:52:05 > 0:52:08It was, I suppose, saying, um, you know,
0:52:08 > 0:52:11armed robbery is a form of the kind of naked capitalism,
0:52:11 > 0:52:14the most naked form of capitalism - smash and grab and take what
0:52:14 > 0:52:19you want for yourself, and forget, you know, screw everybody else.
0:52:19 > 0:52:22And there was one guy with a conscience in there,
0:52:22 > 0:52:25who was kind of remembering what he had done in the past
0:52:25 > 0:52:27and how this didn't square with the life he was now living -
0:52:27 > 0:52:29she got that completely.
0:52:29 > 0:52:31We made the film, and it's a good film, I'm very proud of it.
0:52:31 > 0:52:35She did a great technical job, apart from anything else.
0:52:41 > 0:52:43ALARMS BLARING
0:52:43 > 0:52:46I think Antonia's brilliant at altering perceptions,
0:52:46 > 0:52:48you know what I mean? She was fantastic at that.
0:52:48 > 0:52:51And I think that in a small kind of way,
0:52:51 > 0:52:54she was attempting to do that with Face as well -
0:52:54 > 0:52:57it was this heist thing and it was, you know, bang-bang,
0:52:57 > 0:52:59robbery and all the rest of it.
0:53:00 > 0:53:02Phil Davis's character with the baby -
0:53:02 > 0:53:04I just thought that was brilliant.
0:53:04 > 0:53:06You should smell this.
0:53:06 > 0:53:08- HE SNIFFS - I can't get enough of it.
0:53:08 > 0:53:10It's like sort of sour but milky, you know?
0:53:10 > 0:53:13'So, that is just beautiful.
0:53:13 > 0:53:16'It's just not what you expect from a heist, bang-bang film.'
0:53:16 > 0:53:19And that's kind of smattered all the way through Face.
0:53:19 > 0:53:23The thing that actually made me feel really good was when somebody said
0:53:23 > 0:53:26it's like a cross between EastEnders and Reservoir Dogs!
0:53:26 > 0:53:27I just thought that was really cool.
0:53:43 > 0:53:45Hi, I'm Antonia Bird and I directed Ravenous.
0:53:45 > 0:53:50The movie starts during the Mexican-American
0:53:50 > 0:53:52War of Independence,
0:53:52 > 0:53:56and is set round about 1847.
0:53:56 > 0:54:03And just imagine, we were shooting this scene in 120 degrees.
0:54:03 > 0:54:06Yeah. Did they actually eat the meat?
0:54:06 > 0:54:10- Yeah, the meat was being...- Was it nice?- It was disgusting!- Really?
0:54:10 > 0:54:14And it was being cooked fresh for each shot, round the corner.
0:54:14 > 0:54:18And the guy that was sitting next to Guy Pearce on his right
0:54:18 > 0:54:20actually had an epileptic fit halfway through
0:54:20 > 0:54:22shooting the scene - it was really, really upsetting.
0:54:22 > 0:54:24HE BREATHES HEAVILY
0:54:24 > 0:54:29THUNDER RUMBLING, RAIN POURING
0:54:30 > 0:54:32HE BREATHES HEAVILY
0:54:36 > 0:54:41Ravenous was also a difficult project - it had one director,
0:54:41 > 0:54:43Milcho Manchevski, and that went wrong,
0:54:43 > 0:54:47because his work was seen as, I think, not commercial enough.
0:54:47 > 0:54:51This was a story set in, like, the 1840s, about cannibalism,
0:54:51 > 0:54:53and it was supposed to be a comedy.
0:54:53 > 0:54:56A cannibalism comedy in the 1840s,
0:54:56 > 0:54:59from somebody who had made the British films
0:54:59 > 0:55:03that Antonia Bird had made - that shouldn't have worked.
0:55:03 > 0:55:06And yet it was her best film.
0:55:06 > 0:55:08It brought everything together.
0:55:08 > 0:55:11By this stage in her career, she had been building
0:55:11 > 0:55:14a sense of modern life,
0:55:14 > 0:55:17postmodernism, sort of...
0:55:20 > 0:55:23..eating us, being a kind of gnawing away at us,
0:55:23 > 0:55:27taking away our spirit, our common humanity.
0:55:27 > 0:55:29And so, what does she do?
0:55:29 > 0:55:32She makes a big, splashy, almost horror movie,
0:55:32 > 0:55:35where the central metaphor is that we eat each other.
0:55:35 > 0:55:38How fantastic - not totally planned, of course.
0:55:38 > 0:55:41When the film went wrong, Robert Carlyle said,
0:55:41 > 0:55:43"Why doesn't my friend Antonia Bird direct it?"
0:55:43 > 0:55:47But this film came along in her career and became, for me,
0:55:47 > 0:55:51her central film. The biggest metaphor, the juiciest...
0:55:54 > 0:55:57..gutsiest film that she made.
0:55:57 > 0:55:58Antonia has...
0:55:59 > 0:56:01..one week prep.
0:56:01 > 0:56:04A week - a week to prep this thing.
0:56:04 > 0:56:08And, um, then she shot what you saw.
0:56:08 > 0:56:13- A week?- It's incredible. Incredible. Oh, it's absolutely incredible.
0:56:13 > 0:56:15I mean, for people who don't realise, prep can range...
0:56:15 > 0:56:19anything up to years, people prep films, you know what I mean?
0:56:19 > 0:56:21And certainly when you get the money through,
0:56:21 > 0:56:24then you are at least talking a good few months, you know,
0:56:24 > 0:56:26of locations, etc, etc, scouting around,
0:56:26 > 0:56:29finding out where you want to shoot the thing and casting, etc.
0:56:29 > 0:56:32There is loads of stuff that goes into it, masses of stuff.
0:56:32 > 0:56:33I look at that with Antonia now
0:56:33 > 0:56:36and go, "How you did that, I do not know."
0:56:36 > 0:56:38I don't know how she managed to do it.
0:56:38 > 0:56:40Who are you?
0:56:40 > 0:56:41Reich! Reich!
0:56:43 > 0:56:45She'd had a bit of experience with America,
0:56:45 > 0:56:47she had made Mad Love a couple of years prior to that,
0:56:47 > 0:56:51so she had been in that world, so she didn't like it, you know,
0:56:51 > 0:56:53she didn't have a good time.
0:56:53 > 0:56:56Um, but she went in again for me.
0:56:56 > 0:56:59The first scene that we shot was
0:56:59 > 0:57:04when Colqhoun arrived at the ranch sort of place, and they had
0:57:04 > 0:57:08pulled him out of the snow and tried to put him in the bath.
0:57:10 > 0:57:12And so we were getting ready to do that,
0:57:12 > 0:57:15and in typical Antonia fashion, she's got a script
0:57:15 > 0:57:17and stuff like that, so we were all sitting and she says,
0:57:17 > 0:57:19"OK, guys, on you go," you know?
0:57:19 > 0:57:23So, I'm up and like, all the Americans is sitting there,
0:57:23 > 0:57:28and Antonia's looking at them and going, "What...
0:57:28 > 0:57:30"Do you not want to do it?"
0:57:30 > 0:57:32And they said, "Well, what do you want us to do?"
0:57:32 > 0:57:36Now that, for Antonia, was like, "What is that?!"
0:57:36 > 0:57:39Because she's been used to working in that kind of very British way
0:57:39 > 0:57:42that we do, you just get up on your feet and you find it, you know?
0:57:42 > 0:57:44You don't get told what to do.
0:57:44 > 0:57:48She's looking at me, going, "What am I going to do here?"
0:57:48 > 0:57:51I said, "I don't know, darling, but it's over to you now!"
0:57:51 > 0:57:53That was the hardest thing for her, she suddenly realised,
0:57:53 > 0:57:56wait a minute, she's not working with, you know,
0:57:56 > 0:57:57the people she knows.
0:57:57 > 0:57:59She's got me, of course, but other than that,
0:57:59 > 0:58:02there's nobody else in there that she's ever worked with before.
0:58:02 > 0:58:04They don't work the way we normally work,
0:58:04 > 0:58:06she'll have to actually put them on the mark, tell them
0:58:06 > 0:58:10to stand, walk over there, pick up that cup, say the line and go back.
0:58:10 > 0:58:11And that's not Antonia Bird.
0:58:11 > 0:58:16So she really had to try and get these eight, nine actors
0:58:16 > 0:58:19that were there onside and get them to understand
0:58:19 > 0:58:22that, you know, it's OK to make a mistake,
0:58:22 > 0:58:25to get up, just make an idiot of yourself if you want,
0:58:25 > 0:58:27it doesn't matter, it's going to be OK,
0:58:27 > 0:58:29because I'm going to protect you.
0:58:29 > 0:58:31And very quickly,
0:58:31 > 0:58:34the actors began to understand that they were working,
0:58:34 > 0:58:37dealing with somebody here that they'd never met before,
0:58:37 > 0:58:40this is a special person that they had here, this was Antonia Bird.
0:58:40 > 0:58:42Get away from me!
0:58:44 > 0:58:46'This is my favourite sequence coming up now.'
0:59:01 > 0:59:03Whoa!
0:59:05 > 0:59:07Just one of her great scenes,
0:59:07 > 0:59:09it shows how great she was at technique.
0:59:09 > 0:59:12It just seems to stretch time, shot after shot,
0:59:12 > 0:59:15the way Sergio Leone would do in one of his Westerns.
0:59:15 > 0:59:20Real, pure cinema, and there was a scene rather similar to it
0:59:20 > 0:59:22in the recent film The Revenant.
0:59:26 > 0:59:28'We shot all this first unit -
0:59:28 > 0:59:31'there's a few shots in there that were shot by the second unit,
0:59:31 > 0:59:35'but fundamentally, I fought very hard to shoot it,
0:59:35 > 0:59:38'sort of schedule it and shoot it myself.
0:59:38 > 0:59:41'And it's...
0:59:41 > 0:59:43'I'm proud of it, it's a good sequence,
0:59:43 > 0:59:46'considering it took us four hours to shoot.
0:59:46 > 0:59:48'It's pretty good stuff!'
0:59:48 > 0:59:51HE WINCES AND GRUNTS
0:59:55 > 0:59:58There's certain pieces in that film,
0:59:58 > 1:00:03moments in that film that stand with anything that she's done.
1:00:03 > 1:00:07You know, again, getting Nyman
1:00:07 > 1:00:12and Damon Albarn to do the music as well, I thought was just genius.
1:00:12 > 1:00:16Because she got the visuals, she got the performances,
1:00:16 > 1:00:18she got the music, she got everything, you know,
1:00:18 > 1:00:21and there are moments in that, there is a point, I think, when
1:00:21 > 1:00:25Guy Pearce is kind of walking through the snow or coming through
1:00:25 > 1:00:29the snow, with his footsteps going into this big, big, deep snow,
1:00:29 > 1:00:32when the music sort of kicks in, you just go, "Wow!
1:00:32 > 1:00:33"That's beautiful."
1:00:33 > 1:00:39And she managed to make a thing of beauty out of something that
1:00:39 > 1:00:40could have been pretty grotesque.
1:00:40 > 1:00:44And then, the sort of homoeroticism in the end...
1:00:44 > 1:00:47- Oh, yeah, a lot of that! - HE CHUCKLES
1:00:47 > 1:00:50Was that... Were you ever talking about that, or...
1:00:50 > 1:00:52I certainly did, aye, I was...
1:00:52 > 1:00:55I was looking at that from the very beginning and I thought,
1:00:55 > 1:00:57"Oh, he doesnae just want to eat Guy Pearce,
1:00:57 > 1:01:00"he's gonnae HAVE Guy Pearce at the same time!"
1:01:02 > 1:01:05- You die.- No!
1:01:08 > 1:01:09It's all right, it's not fatal.
1:01:11 > 1:01:13Not if you take the necessary precautions.
1:01:13 > 1:01:15Quite a lot of the films we've talked about,
1:01:15 > 1:01:19- they are very sort of male in their...- Yeah.- ..in their focus...
1:01:19 > 1:01:21Yeah, I'd not thought, that's true.
1:01:21 > 1:01:24Do you think this was conscious, or just, like...?
1:01:24 > 1:01:27I don't know, that's a really good point, actually.
1:01:27 > 1:01:29I'd never honestly ever really thought about that before.
1:01:29 > 1:01:32Obviously because I'm in it, in the middle of it, you know,
1:01:32 > 1:01:35you don't really see it so much, but I guess that is true.
1:01:35 > 1:01:38I can't think why that was the case, you know, and...
1:01:38 > 1:01:41I'm going to think about that tonight now!
1:01:41 > 1:01:46It can be said, you know, "Oh, Antonia didn't want to
1:01:46 > 1:01:50"tell women's stories, or she was less interested in women."
1:01:50 > 1:01:53I didn't really know what I thought of that at the time.
1:01:53 > 1:01:55I've heard it said a few times.
1:01:55 > 1:01:59But if you say, "Oh, Antonia focused on the men,"
1:01:59 > 1:02:03you're setting up an image of Antonia having choice.
1:02:03 > 1:02:07I think she was making the work that she was asked to make,
1:02:07 > 1:02:09and unfortunately,
1:02:09 > 1:02:13she had a production company for a very long time and yet,
1:02:13 > 1:02:18she didn't make that many things that she initiated, that she chose.
1:02:21 > 1:02:244Way came about, you know, myself, Antonia,
1:02:24 > 1:02:28our good friend Mark Cousins, and Irvine Welsh, and of course,
1:02:28 > 1:02:31when there is big money out there being spoken about,
1:02:31 > 1:02:35that's very hard, because the people who are then given that cash
1:02:35 > 1:02:38are going to want to have something to say.
1:02:38 > 1:02:42And I think that she went through meeting after meeting after meeting,
1:02:42 > 1:02:44and I'm talking about years' worth,
1:02:44 > 1:02:47it ground us all down, you know what I mean?
1:02:47 > 1:02:51She just didn't want to go back into being a jobbing director
1:02:51 > 1:02:53or working for someone.
1:02:53 > 1:02:55Not that she wanted to be in charge or in control,
1:02:55 > 1:02:57it wasn't like that, she was never that type of person.
1:02:57 > 1:02:59But she just wanted to make sure that the project
1:02:59 > 1:03:03was what she wanted it to be from beginning to end.
1:03:03 > 1:03:05And sadly, I don't think we ever managed to achieve that.
1:03:07 > 1:03:09There is a part of me that thinks,
1:03:09 > 1:03:13but did Antonia just go where the work was?
1:03:13 > 1:03:15She has supported her and Ian a lot of the time -
1:03:15 > 1:03:18Ian completely supported her emotionally, but financially...
1:03:18 > 1:03:21So, is there something about actually,
1:03:21 > 1:03:25the industry isn't providing her with loads of stories about women?
1:03:25 > 1:03:28I think it's dangerous to say, especially when someone's dead,
1:03:28 > 1:03:32it is dangerous to say that a woman
1:03:32 > 1:03:36who makes films about men had choice,
1:03:36 > 1:03:40in an industry where statistics prove the stories about women are
1:03:40 > 1:03:45not that often being produced, being developed, being given money to.
1:03:47 > 1:03:51She liked photographing strong women and weak men, I would say.
1:03:51 > 1:03:56Or not weak, but men who have disappointed themselves in some way.
1:03:56 > 1:04:00And the paradox - and this is why it makes great drama -
1:04:00 > 1:04:04in disappointing yourself, you come alive,
1:04:04 > 1:04:08you blossom into something richer and more humane.
1:04:08 > 1:04:11And that's what she captures again and again in these men.
1:04:11 > 1:04:14CLOCK TICKING
1:04:16 > 1:04:18Pauline, I'm sorry.
1:04:23 > 1:04:25I'm so, so sorry.
1:04:27 > 1:04:31The film, ultimately, is about the abuse of power.
1:04:31 > 1:04:37It's about a boys' home where
1:04:37 > 1:04:42young boys are systematically abused, sexually abused,
1:04:42 > 1:04:47by the owner of the care home
1:04:47 > 1:04:52and by the cronies that he brings in,
1:04:52 > 1:04:57um, and how the boy tries to escape this.
1:04:57 > 1:05:01And he's not an orphan -
1:05:01 > 1:05:04he has a mother, he tries to tell people what's happening,
1:05:04 > 1:05:08but no-one wants to listen.
1:05:08 > 1:05:10Oh, er, something I want to show you.
1:05:19 > 1:05:21Come on through.
1:05:34 > 1:05:38So, by the time we then go on to him as a young man,
1:05:38 > 1:05:42he's psychologically very damaged
1:05:42 > 1:05:46and he's in a relationship and has children,
1:05:46 > 1:05:53um, but the immense damage that's done to him, um...
1:05:55 > 1:05:58..means that he will never, ever find any solace.
1:05:58 > 1:06:03Reading the script, it was a hard read, it was not a page-turner.
1:06:03 > 1:06:07It was a script that was obviously going to be hard to make, um...
1:06:07 > 1:06:11It was gritty, it dealt with a really horrible subject,
1:06:11 > 1:06:14it dealt with raw emotion.
1:06:14 > 1:06:18And then, when I started to get the rushes,
1:06:18 > 1:06:22I suddenly realised that Care was going to be, and was, turned out
1:06:22 > 1:06:25to be, one of the best experiences I've ever had in the cutting room.
1:06:25 > 1:06:31It was a film that was so personal, but so deeply emotive,
1:06:31 > 1:06:34and for the life of me I can't understand how,
1:06:34 > 1:06:37I think it was four million people watched it on a Sunday night...
1:06:37 > 1:06:40starting at the beginning, going right through to the end,
1:06:40 > 1:06:43I do not understand how four million people could actually watch it.
1:06:43 > 1:06:45The horrors of it are still with me,
1:06:45 > 1:06:47even though I haven't seen it for such a long time.
1:06:47 > 1:06:52We had, um, thousands of phone calls afterwards,
1:06:52 > 1:06:56and people contacting the helplines that went up after the show,
1:06:56 > 1:07:00so it really did have a huge impact.
1:07:00 > 1:07:04I mean, it is always difficult to quantify these things,
1:07:04 > 1:07:07but it felt to me, during the period that
1:07:07 > 1:07:13I was working at the BBC, as one of the most important films we'd made.
1:07:13 > 1:07:16And certainly the one that had the biggest impact
1:07:16 > 1:07:18in terms of audience response,
1:07:18 > 1:07:21responding directly to what they'd seen on the screen.
1:07:21 > 1:07:24And it wasn't phoning up with complaints, was it?
1:07:24 > 1:07:27No, I don't remember us getting any complaints, actually.
1:07:27 > 1:07:31They were almost all people phoning up who had been affected,
1:07:31 > 1:07:34either themselves directly or whose partners had been abused,
1:07:34 > 1:07:39and who all felt the need to talk about what had happened to them.
1:07:40 > 1:07:42And the BAFTA goes to...
1:07:45 > 1:07:50..Kieran Prendiville, Antonia Bird and the producers for Care.
1:07:50 > 1:07:52APPLAUSE
1:07:52 > 1:07:56'Everybody who worked on this story about the long-term effects
1:07:56 > 1:07:58'of sexual abuse in children's homes found it
1:07:58 > 1:08:00'a difficult and emotional project.
1:08:00 > 1:08:02'Antonia said that turning away from the project
1:08:02 > 1:08:05'would have been like joining the litany of neglect.'
1:08:10 > 1:08:13And I think, and it was a credit to Antonia's film-making skills,
1:08:13 > 1:08:15that she took such a raw subject
1:08:15 > 1:08:20and turned it into a film that was true to the emotion,
1:08:20 > 1:08:23but made it...but palatable.
1:08:24 > 1:08:27She didn't pull her punches, but you still watched it,
1:08:27 > 1:08:30you cared about the child enough to stay with it,
1:08:30 > 1:08:35you could cope with the horror that he was going through.
1:08:35 > 1:08:38MUSIC: Exit Music (For a Film) by Radiohead
1:08:38 > 1:08:42# Breathe
1:08:43 > 1:08:47# Keep breathing
1:08:48 > 1:08:54# I can't do this alone
1:09:06 > 1:09:11# Sing us a song
1:09:13 > 1:09:20# A song to keep us warm... #
1:09:22 > 1:09:24It was the most fantastic performance, I think,
1:09:24 > 1:09:26I have ever, ever had to edit.
1:09:26 > 1:09:29You know, I think it was a combination of the fact that
1:09:29 > 1:09:33Antonia and Steve... but it was absolutely fantastic.
1:09:37 > 1:09:42# You can laugh... #
1:09:42 > 1:09:44Well, in simple terms, I always find
1:09:44 > 1:09:48just the really, really great directors put you in a place
1:09:48 > 1:09:52where they make you feel full of confidence
1:09:52 > 1:09:56to do things that you hadn't dreamed of.
1:09:58 > 1:10:00They sort of...
1:10:00 > 1:10:04And she could do that, she'd be like, "You're going to go,
1:10:04 > 1:10:06"you can do whatever with this."
1:10:06 > 1:10:11I remember sitting, thinking, "Well, I hope... I don't know.
1:10:11 > 1:10:13"I don't know what... I don't know what I can do,
1:10:13 > 1:10:15"but you seem to think I can!"
1:10:15 > 1:10:20And she would be, "No, no, you can really take off with this."
1:10:20 > 1:10:26So, it's that wonderful kind of... giving you the confidence
1:10:26 > 1:10:34to fly with it. And encouraging, without constantly having to say,
1:10:34 > 1:10:39"Oh, wonderful, darling!" Also, what was lovely was, you would see her...
1:10:40 > 1:10:43You'd kind of watch her face, maybe watching a rehearsal,
1:10:43 > 1:10:47and you would see the kind of thrill that she was getting from
1:10:47 > 1:10:52just watching the scene flow. "This is the best audience
1:10:52 > 1:10:55"in the world here!" And that was it.
1:10:55 > 1:10:58# Cocaine, kill my community
1:11:00 > 1:11:01# Heroin... #
1:11:01 > 1:11:04One service that's open 24/7 is the local dealer.
1:11:04 > 1:11:08You'll never be told you'll have to wait three weeks for an appointment.
1:11:10 > 1:11:13Miss Battle, would you please stand?
1:11:13 > 1:11:19'Rehab was looking at the effects of drug and alcohol abuse on people.'
1:11:19 > 1:11:23It was something she felt personally drawn to.
1:11:23 > 1:11:25I think it was something that she felt
1:11:25 > 1:11:29was not being, necessarily, given the airtime that it deserved.
1:11:29 > 1:11:32- A bit of powder, aye? What else? - A bit of brown.- A bit of brown, aye.
1:11:32 > 1:11:37Good, good. Guy's got a bit of brown. Want a bit of brown, pal, eh?
1:11:37 > 1:11:40Hey, mate, you want a bit of brown?! These guys have the whole shebang!
1:11:40 > 1:11:44You've got everything, aye?! Good for you! Good for fuckin' you!
1:11:44 > 1:11:46Aye! Good! Set up a fuckin' stall, ya bastard!
1:11:47 > 1:11:50Whatever your conditions at the time,
1:11:50 > 1:11:55we cannot overlook the seriousness of this offence.
1:11:57 > 1:12:02'It was a much more freeform, semi-improvised process,
1:12:02 > 1:12:05'so it felt a more experimental piece.'
1:12:05 > 1:12:08I'll fuckin' go ahead with you, ya cunt!
1:12:08 > 1:12:10'Possibly not as successful,'
1:12:10 > 1:12:16because of that. It certainly didn't have the same level of impact
1:12:16 > 1:12:20that Care had. But then, I don't think Antonia saw them as being
1:12:20 > 1:12:23a pair of films that one should compare and contrast.
1:12:23 > 1:12:26They just were two films that she had made.
1:12:26 > 1:12:28I think Rehab, erm...
1:12:31 > 1:12:33..was an extraordinary drama.
1:12:36 > 1:12:40And it didn't fit neatly into a time.
1:12:42 > 1:12:47And television junctions are important for a channel.
1:12:49 > 1:12:54So our brief was BBC Two, 9.00 to 10.30.
1:12:55 > 1:13:00Newsnight, which is unalterable, starts at 10.30.
1:13:00 > 1:13:03And in the making of Rehab,
1:13:03 > 1:13:05it was longer.
1:13:05 > 1:13:09And it was longer by, I think, about 15, maybe 20 minutes.
1:13:09 > 1:13:13Antonia was somebody who felt that, if she had made a film
1:13:13 > 1:13:17that was working at a certain length, then it was down to the BBC
1:13:17 > 1:13:19to fit that film into the schedules
1:13:19 > 1:13:21and not the other way round,
1:13:21 > 1:13:23which I have a degree of sympathy for.
1:13:23 > 1:13:28There were two options that could have been taken by the BBC.
1:13:28 > 1:13:31They could have put it on at the weekend, on a Saturday or Sunday,
1:13:31 > 1:13:34possibly, but they decided not to.
1:13:34 > 1:13:37They decided to stick at the weekday
1:13:37 > 1:13:41and we were asked to bring it down to 90...
1:13:42 > 1:13:44..which we didn't.
1:13:46 > 1:13:51So, it was put out, the 90 minutes were put out, up to Newsnight.
1:13:51 > 1:13:56Newsnight went out and then, after Newsnight, it was then concluded -
1:13:56 > 1:13:59the last 15-20 minutes...
1:14:00 > 1:14:03..which was kind of bonkers.
1:14:03 > 1:14:08And I think, after that - I never know what goes on in the heads of
1:14:08 > 1:14:14executives, etc - but maybe the feeling was, when Antonia's name
1:14:14 > 1:14:18came up, erm... "Mmm..." Then, pause for thought.
1:14:36 > 1:14:43I think it has something to do with...not compromising.
1:14:44 > 1:14:48And not compromising... There is a good side and a bad side
1:14:48 > 1:14:54to not compromising. And the good side is that
1:14:54 > 1:14:59you can have a work that is extraordinary.
1:15:00 > 1:15:06The bad side is that people don't like it.
1:15:06 > 1:15:10You are then looked on as difficult. And do you want to work with
1:15:10 > 1:15:15someone who is a bit difficult and you are going to be fighting them
1:15:15 > 1:15:18to kind of get it in? And of course, I love those sort of people,
1:15:18 > 1:15:21those who sort of, you know, those are the sort of directors
1:15:21 > 1:15:24that I really, really enjoy working with.
1:15:26 > 1:15:29Antonia, you know, it has to be said,
1:15:29 > 1:15:34she was incredibly protective of what she had shot.
1:15:35 > 1:15:36And of her vision.
1:15:36 > 1:15:41And she... She is not the only director to hate interference
1:15:41 > 1:15:44from producers, so her job, in the edit,
1:15:44 > 1:15:47is to defend what she has done.
1:15:47 > 1:15:51But, you know, you don't... Nobody gets it all their own way.
1:15:51 > 1:15:54I just... I think, if the director trusts the producer and thinks,
1:15:54 > 1:15:56"We're in this together
1:15:56 > 1:16:00"and I want to help you make the best film, television show,
1:16:00 > 1:16:03"whatever it is, possible. I am here to help you execute the vision."
1:16:03 > 1:16:08But it is also... If we see the film fundamentally the same way,
1:16:08 > 1:16:11which we did with Hamburg Cell - we totally saw it the same way -
1:16:11 > 1:16:16then it's like with ideas, don't just shut it down,
1:16:16 > 1:16:19because we could actually, by working well together
1:16:19 > 1:16:21and trusting each other and collaborating together,
1:16:21 > 1:16:25we can conquer even taller mountains and do it even better.
1:16:27 > 1:16:31And I think, for her, the relationship to the DP is critical.
1:16:31 > 1:16:34We met a young guy called Florian Hoffmeister
1:16:34 > 1:16:36and Antonia was very keen to go with him.
1:16:36 > 1:16:40And he turned out to be, you know, almost like a secret weapon.
1:16:40 > 1:16:44He was a really, really fabulous collaborator for Antonia.
1:16:44 > 1:16:47I think that made her, you know, extremely happy.
1:16:47 > 1:16:52Hamburg Cell was about the attacks of 9/11, basically.
1:16:52 > 1:16:55Or, actually, that is the end of the film, but it is about
1:16:55 > 1:16:59the formation around the group of men round Mohamed Atta
1:16:59 > 1:17:03and the execution of that...terrorist attack...
1:17:05 > 1:17:08..purely told from the perspective of the terrorists,
1:17:08 > 1:17:10or of the young men that they were.
1:17:13 > 1:17:17I think, as a DoP, you always stay with the director as an entity
1:17:17 > 1:17:18and there is a huge amount
1:17:18 > 1:17:24of collaboration and friendship, in the best of all worlds -
1:17:24 > 1:17:30admiration and positive energy and love - but there is also,
1:17:30 > 1:17:33I personally think, there is a tiny bit of privacy that is
1:17:33 > 1:17:37in the director's head that I think is actually...
1:17:38 > 1:17:42It is, you know, it would be intruding to be wanting
1:17:42 > 1:17:46to be part of that, because I think there is a certain feeling,
1:17:46 > 1:17:49when a director feels, "That's it." And he just feels it.
1:17:49 > 1:17:52And that is something you can only feel if you are directing a film.
1:17:52 > 1:17:56So, to me, I would say there were certain things when she worked with
1:17:56 > 1:18:02in the Hamburg Cell with the boys, you know, the two lead actors,
1:18:02 > 1:18:05where I think she knew exactly where she wanted to take them,
1:18:05 > 1:18:08but it would not be open, in terms of discussing.
1:18:08 > 1:18:15So, I am sure that she felt she had an inner compass
1:18:15 > 1:18:17in what she was trying to accomplish,
1:18:17 > 1:18:21but we wouldn't talk about it intellectually, you know.
1:18:21 > 1:18:24What are you ashamed of? Are you ashamed of being a Muslim?
1:18:24 > 1:18:28- Come on! Go!- This isn't about killing Christians and Jews!
1:18:28 > 1:18:31Jews and Christians were, all the time, tolerated.
1:18:31 > 1:18:34- They were protected. - Who wants to forsake his brothers
1:18:34 > 1:18:35and follow Yasser?
1:18:35 > 1:18:38SHOUTING
1:18:39 > 1:18:40SHOUTING
1:18:42 > 1:18:44Ziad, do you want to stay?
1:18:44 > 1:18:46I want my life to count for something.
1:18:46 > 1:18:48Ready for jihad?! Ready for jihad?!
1:18:48 > 1:18:51'I'm very much aware of her editing always with pure ease,
1:18:51 > 1:18:54'so people look and you see what they look at
1:18:54 > 1:18:58'and we are looking at them and they are looking at us.
1:18:58 > 1:19:01'So, it is very much a film about, I think, observation,'
1:19:01 > 1:19:04where the outside world almost disappears.
1:19:04 > 1:19:08It is present, sometimes in some television sets or maybe in
1:19:08 > 1:19:11somebody coming from the outside and telling stories about
1:19:11 > 1:19:17how their wars are, but it is very much an internal position
1:19:17 > 1:19:21and that is the stillness, for me. Because the camera is always
1:19:21 > 1:19:27on the move, but it feels disconnected from the outside.
1:19:27 > 1:19:29And I think, because of that, it is not judgmental.
1:19:29 > 1:19:32I think that is the absolute quality of the film.
1:19:32 > 1:19:36It was a really tough one to shoot, because we were filming
1:19:36 > 1:19:41and it wasn't a big budget. So we were filming in Hamburg,
1:19:41 > 1:19:44we were filming in London, we were filming in New York and Florida.
1:19:44 > 1:19:48And this is all, like, you know, a small budget.
1:19:48 > 1:19:52And, yeah, there were a lot of issues...
1:19:53 > 1:19:56..with that film! HBO were a partner...
1:19:57 > 1:20:00..and then, when we were in prep, HBO pulled out.
1:20:01 > 1:20:05And the whole thing looked like going down and they asked me...
1:20:05 > 1:20:07I was in LA at the time and they asked me to go and see HBO.
1:20:07 > 1:20:08I went to see them...
1:20:10 > 1:20:12..and, oh, it was...
1:20:12 > 1:20:13HE SIGHS
1:20:13 > 1:20:17..you know. They just said, "Look, these people,
1:20:17 > 1:20:19"you're depicting them as human beings."
1:20:19 > 1:20:22That was actually one of the phrases that was used.
1:20:22 > 1:20:27And I said, "Well, you know, they have done a terrible thing,
1:20:27 > 1:20:31"but they are human beings." And I remember they cited the case
1:20:31 > 1:20:37of Jarrah, one of the pilots, and...there was a scene in which
1:20:37 > 1:20:42Jarrah was at a kind of barbecue in, I think it was in Florida,
1:20:42 > 1:20:46and people liked him and I said, "That is based on the testimony
1:20:46 > 1:20:50"of Americans who were there. And they liked him. They liked him."
1:20:50 > 1:20:53And that is the man we are putting in there.
1:20:53 > 1:20:56But they... They didn't say they wanted somebody with horns,
1:20:56 > 1:20:59but that's definitely the impression I kind of came away with.
1:20:59 > 1:21:01They wanted people with horns.
1:21:01 > 1:21:05And I knew we had to be really careful about a director.
1:21:05 > 1:21:08It needed to be somebody who would, you know...
1:21:08 > 1:21:12What I wanted to do was be quite neutral about it,
1:21:12 > 1:21:15just to show the process, without editorialising.
1:21:15 > 1:21:19Just show them doing their thing. and how they got from students
1:21:19 > 1:21:22to suicide bombers.
1:21:22 > 1:21:26And, you know, Antonia was probably one of the few directors
1:21:26 > 1:21:29I would have trusted for that.
1:21:29 > 1:21:31Obviously, she got that straight away.
1:21:34 > 1:21:35Welcome death
1:21:35 > 1:21:37with your whole heart.
1:21:37 > 1:21:41EMERGENCY SERVICE SIRENS
1:21:41 > 1:21:43Strike like champions.
1:21:43 > 1:21:46'I personally recall that last eight-minute sequence
1:21:46 > 1:21:48'because I think it is the greatest of all acquisitions
1:21:48 > 1:21:50'that she managed to get in this film.'
1:21:50 > 1:21:52KNOCKING
1:21:52 > 1:21:55'I think that the last eight minutes, to actually edit that
1:21:55 > 1:21:58'without any commentary and to be pulling the timeline forward
1:21:58 > 1:22:01'by showing the towers already falling, so basically,
1:22:01 > 1:22:05'losing the time-space continuum, I think that is genius, you know.
1:22:05 > 1:22:08'Because I think it makes that film into something else than just
1:22:08 > 1:22:12'a docudrama. I think it's fantastic.'
1:22:18 > 1:22:20'I was dreading writing the music'
1:22:20 > 1:22:24to that piece to the end of the film, because it's like, you know,
1:22:24 > 1:22:26if you... To kind of do anything
1:22:26 > 1:22:29that isn't either too sensationalist or too trite
1:22:29 > 1:22:32is incredibly difficult, because, you know,
1:22:32 > 1:22:35the brain just... it's too big to just, you know,
1:22:35 > 1:22:36do something that is spot-on.
1:22:36 > 1:22:39You start over-thinking it. But Antonia... I think she was
1:22:39 > 1:22:42aware of that, she was aware this was really important
1:22:42 > 1:22:45and Antonia just said, "I've found it" one day.
1:22:45 > 1:22:47"I've found the music for the end."
1:22:47 > 1:22:49It was this piece we'd written
1:22:49 > 1:22:53totally with nothing of this in mind.
1:22:53 > 1:22:57It was like a piece of, you know, literally droning,
1:22:57 > 1:22:59distorted guitar music for eight minutes
1:22:59 > 1:23:01that, halfway through, started to move.
1:23:06 > 1:23:09- Did you pack your bags yourself, sir?- Yes.
1:23:11 > 1:23:13She said, "This is it, this is the music."
1:23:13 > 1:23:16When we put it to pitch, we were like, "Oh, my gosh, she's right."
1:23:16 > 1:23:21It just was so dramatic and moving and it did all the things
1:23:21 > 1:23:25that a piece of music should do to a picture.
1:23:25 > 1:23:27So then, we had to rework it
1:23:27 > 1:23:30and write incredibly precisely to picture.
1:23:30 > 1:23:33And, you know, Antonia would be, like, "At this point here,
1:23:33 > 1:23:36"the music starts to need moving up a notch - this frame."
1:23:36 > 1:23:39And you'd know it would have to start changing here,
1:23:39 > 1:23:40so it was taking a form that existed
1:23:40 > 1:23:43and then unpicking it and putting it back together.
1:23:43 > 1:23:46But that's Antonia's vision, We just, you know, did the music
1:23:46 > 1:23:49and actually fitted it in to what she needed.
1:23:49 > 1:23:53- ANNOUNCER:- United Airlines flight 175 to Boston is now boarding.
1:23:53 > 1:23:58'Giving voice to people who have no voice, traditionally,
1:23:58 > 1:24:03'and expressing who they are and what they are, as individuals,
1:24:03 > 1:24:08'in a society that denies them a voice, explains'
1:24:08 > 1:24:14in part why the performances that she got from the actors
1:24:14 > 1:24:19were so truthful and so detailed and had so much integrity about them.
1:24:19 > 1:24:21Because that was the thing that mattered.
1:24:21 > 1:24:25Human beings mattered to Antonia. People mattered to Antonia.
1:24:25 > 1:24:28But the notion that the personal was political -
1:24:28 > 1:24:32there are political structures and systems and hierarchies that might
1:24:32 > 1:24:38have denied them voice, so she would like to create a piece in which
1:24:38 > 1:24:44she pointed out that fact, but it was always the person first,
1:24:44 > 1:24:48not the political first. She should have made many more films.
1:24:48 > 1:24:51There is no question about that, at all.
1:24:51 > 1:24:55And I am sure she was blocked, in various ways,
1:24:55 > 1:24:58by people who were afraid of her politics.
1:24:58 > 1:25:01I am sure that is true of her career, but she did manage
1:25:01 > 1:25:03to make a hell of lot, in spite of that.
1:25:03 > 1:25:07I thought she was a real life force and a really wonderful person.
1:25:08 > 1:25:13She was a fantastic film-maker and an artist with such integrity
1:25:13 > 1:25:16that she really deserves to be up in the pantheon,
1:25:16 > 1:25:18which is where I hope she is now.
1:25:18 > 1:25:23DRAMATIC MUSIC
1:26:13 > 1:26:16I started off very idealistic.
1:26:16 > 1:26:19I am not a fan of capitalism.
1:26:19 > 1:26:22I don't think it works and I'd like to see the end of it.
1:26:22 > 1:26:26I'm amazed I'm sitting here saying that, but I have to now.
1:26:26 > 1:26:28I would never have said that when I started,
1:26:28 > 1:26:30and I have been a whore,
1:26:30 > 1:26:33because I, too, have to pay my rent and I have a family to support.
1:26:33 > 1:26:36But I... The state of the world is making me
1:26:36 > 1:26:41more and more and more determined to be more idealistic
1:26:41 > 1:26:46and to use the craft and my skills to tell stories about,
1:26:46 > 1:26:50as I keep banging on, ordinary people
1:26:50 > 1:26:53and how they live in our society.
1:26:53 > 1:26:55And the big thing that I want to pick up on here is,
1:26:55 > 1:27:00who decides what the audience wants? Yeah, we make...we make films
1:27:00 > 1:27:02to entertain, of course we do, but there is a point
1:27:02 > 1:27:05when we are making the film where we are censored
1:27:05 > 1:27:09and it is well before the audience sees it. Well before.
1:27:09 > 1:27:13In fact, we struggle, usually, for about a year before we shoot it,
1:27:13 > 1:27:17with some people - a very small number of people -
1:27:17 > 1:27:20a very small number, who tell us what the audience want.
1:27:20 > 1:27:24And I dispute this, very strongly, and that is my crusade,
1:27:24 > 1:27:28at the moment. And I will... I will fight, fight, fight
1:27:28 > 1:27:31to make films that I think people actually do want to see,
1:27:31 > 1:27:33from my little patch.
1:27:33 > 1:27:35APPLAUSE
1:27:35 > 1:27:37Thanks.
1:27:53 > 1:27:56MUSIC: Up Late At Night Again by Malcolm Middleton
1:27:57 > 1:28:00# Up late at night again
1:28:02 > 1:28:04# The clock's ticking me
1:28:06 > 1:28:09# Dragging me towards the morning
1:28:13 > 1:28:17# What would you rather be?
1:28:18 > 1:28:20# The captain out at sea
1:28:22 > 1:28:26# Or the drunk man falling?
1:28:29 > 1:28:33# I don't ever want to say goodbye
1:28:37 > 1:28:41# If I go first I'll tell you what it's like
1:28:45 > 1:28:50# I'll always want to have you by my side
1:28:52 > 1:28:54# For all time... #