:00:14. > :00:18.weapons. My guess today is one of the most
:00:18. > :00:22.successful film directors and the world. Responsible for box-office
:00:22. > :00:28.hits like Four Weddings And A Funeral, Harry Potter and the
:00:28. > :00:35.Goblet of Fire, Mike Newell could make almost any film he wants. So
:00:35. > :00:38.why did he choose his latest movie? It is the remake of the classic
:00:38. > :00:48.Charles Dickens's novel Great expectations. What more is there to
:00:48. > :01:05.
:01:05. > :01:11.add when they have been so many adaptations?
:01:11. > :01:14.Mike Newell, welcome to HARDtalk. It does seem odd that you choose
:01:14. > :01:22.Great Expectations and there have been already more than a dozen
:01:22. > :01:30.adaptations. What are you adding with this one? That one Mac had a
:01:30. > :01:39.particular love of as a student. I was a great Charles Dickens. They
:01:39. > :01:48.redefine themselves. If it their age. On a regular basis. How many
:01:48. > :01:55.years can you do in the year? Each time you go and find the big
:01:55. > :02:03.stories. They will all reveal something different. This story was
:02:03. > :02:13.a lens on at least two things. There was money and there was
:02:13. > :02:13.
:02:13. > :02:16.passing drug. Down from generation to generation. One man said it is
:02:16. > :02:26.one of the most faithful adaptations to the book. It seems
:02:26. > :02:31.to be trying to go back. You might say that. That is almost impossible.
:02:31. > :02:38.He also says that this particular novel is told in the first person,
:02:38. > :02:44.so that is removed. A movie is going to be in the third person.
:02:44. > :02:51.That massive sense of the force of the book belonging to what you're
:02:51. > :02:59.seeing on the screen is taking away. You have to find other handles on
:02:59. > :03:09.the story. So what have you added? I think perhaps what to do is to re
:03:09. > :03:10.
:03:10. > :03:19.calibrate. You emphasise. I think that what we have looked at very
:03:19. > :03:29.carefully is what money does. That is a very contemporary team. -- and
:03:29. > :03:29.
:03:29. > :03:37.Dean. What we have also looked at is how charred wood is passed on to
:03:37. > :03:42.adult could with disastrous effects. They are featured very largely.
:03:42. > :03:46.the centre of the story we have this character who, from nothing,
:03:46. > :03:56.suddenly comes into a lot of money. He presumes it is coming from
:03:56. > :04:01.
:04:01. > :04:11.somewhere. Let us have a taste of him. Well you never take women?
:04:11. > :04:20.Give your affections of that man. Can you help it? No, but you can.
:04:20. > :04:27.But you must care! As worthy and boorish. This is a man who has
:04:27. > :04:35.nothing to recommend an except money. I cannot help him. To give
:04:35. > :04:45.that man the looks and smells that to give to me. Yes. Yes. Him and
:04:45. > :05:04.
:05:04. > :05:14.many other men. All men except for you. How one did to him to the
:05:14. > :05:16.
:05:16. > :05:26.demand for the Karel that he would just stir around what it is luck to
:05:26. > :05:30.
:05:30. > :05:37.be 18, 19 years old. And of course, the erotic charge
:05:37. > :05:44.was enormous. It is not the same for her. I think what happens is
:05:44. > :05:49.that the story teases you with the notion that it may become so.
:05:49. > :05:58.Perhaps you might feel that it may become so for her. She has perhaps
:05:58. > :06:04.been worse spoiled and used, more or messed up. We have talked about
:06:04. > :06:08.the things to try to add to this. The reviews have not been great.
:06:08. > :06:14.The Telegraph says that at best it is a middle of the road cover
:06:14. > :06:23.version it never threatens to eclipse it and sister. -- its
:06:23. > :06:31.ancestor. You harkened back to that. Is it better than yours? It is a
:06:31. > :06:36.sacred text. I will not get in the way of a sacred text. It is also a
:06:36. > :06:46.sacred text? It is. And she couldn't bear to read? I tried very
:06:46. > :06:47.
:06:47. > :06:51.hard. D du? I did. Have you made a better move the? I feel that I have.
:06:51. > :06:58.I feel very strongly that I have. One of the things that is not in
:06:58. > :07:08.that movie is any form of sexual charge between the characters. That
:07:08. > :07:14.is very important. There is a kind of niceness to the character. He
:07:14. > :07:22.does not take a lot of emotional or psychological damage. I think he
:07:22. > :07:27.should. And yet there are other things that you have done. You
:07:27. > :07:33.basically still some things from the old movie. Why not? It is
:07:34. > :07:41.wonderfully done. It is a great sequence. It is a lot longer than
:07:41. > :07:47.the sequence in my tongue. -- film. It was not just because it was
:07:47. > :07:57.cheaper? Go cheaper? Gos of doing it cheaper. But we do not do
:07:57. > :07:57.
:07:57. > :08:07.that. He is a great editor. It is a simple sequence. Everything is in
:08:07. > :08:08.
:08:08. > :08:15.the right place. You feel the steam reproach and, you feel the peril. -
:08:15. > :08:19.- steam were approaching. It is wonderfully done. One thing you did
:08:19. > :08:29.changes the ending. You would have loved to search set it somewhere
:08:29. > :08:36.like Harrow. -- set it somewhere like Cairo. You believe it should
:08:36. > :08:44.have been in Cairo. I did. I believe the last ten minutes suffer
:08:44. > :08:52.from a lack of money. I do not believe otherwise that it does. But
:08:52. > :08:56.it is difficult to get past. It is versions and a year. It is
:08:56. > :09:03.difficult to get past a version that has an hour screen time more
:09:03. > :09:11.of them a feature film would be allowed. You have been doing this
:09:11. > :09:21.eight awful long time. Will it be a success? Not ever. At any rate, not
:09:21. > :09:22.
:09:22. > :09:32.me. I'll be sitting and watching and thinking this is the most
:09:32. > :09:32.
:09:32. > :09:38.dreadful storytelling that I have ever seen. Once you saw the
:09:38. > :09:45.finished film, you thought it was rubbish. If I did no I did no
:09:45. > :09:50.rubbish. I thought it was boring and flat. You're supposed to see it
:09:50. > :09:56.commit laughed
:09:56. > :10:04.laughed for the first 30 seconds and they did not stop. There you
:10:04. > :10:11.have something. The way there to watch a movie, much longer than you
:10:11. > :10:16.think you can bear to, you see these tiny changes happening. You
:10:16. > :10:25.do not know if you are making any real difference. After a while it
:10:25. > :10:27.becomes a very technical thing. When you watch four Weddings And A
:10:28. > :10:37.Funeral with an audience for the first time, did you know it was a
:10:38. > :10:39.
:10:39. > :10:46.success? It was an American audience. I found it funny, but did
:10:46. > :10:54.not think they would ever pick it said that if I was ever to be loved,
:10:54. > :11:01.it would not be for four Weddings And A Funeral. Did I say that?
:11:02. > :11:10.is why I am curious. Do you think it was not a good movie? It is
:11:11. > :11:20.probably something very odd indeed. It is a very good movie. I will
:11:20. > :11:24.tell you what it absolutely is. It is the most wonderful script.
:11:24. > :11:29.Cameron said, of the industry, and we're talking about the British
:11:29. > :11:35.film industry, that it needs to aim higher and support commercially
:11:35. > :11:42.successful films. You are one of the most successful, commercially
:11:42. > :11:52.successful British directors ever. I wonder if he is right. I think it
:11:52. > :12:02.is nonsense. I think that, does he suppose that we set out not to be
:12:02. > :12:06.
:12:06. > :12:09.successful? Everybody sets out to be successful. Even the toughest,
:12:09. > :12:16.they aim to make films that people will come and see in great numbers
:12:16. > :12:22.as they can. It is not an exact science. The only thing that was
:12:22. > :12:27.ever written better make sense about the making of this particular
:12:27. > :12:34.article was an American book in which it was said of producers,
:12:34. > :12:44.nobody knows anything. But it is not just luck. There is a formula
:12:44. > :12:45.
:12:45. > :12:49.that we know that works. Hollywood is very good at it. Yes, of course.
:12:49. > :12:56.Hollywood does not produce surprises. Here is how it works. In
:12:56. > :13:05.this country, what to do is you make a film with a very meagre
:13:05. > :13:12.resources. You develop a belief in it. You can say to the audience, I
:13:12. > :13:19.made this, I very much hope they to do, here it is. If it makes an
:13:19. > :13:24.impact on them, fine. Hollywood takes out that insecurity.
:13:24. > :13:29.Hollywood says, here is the film that we're thinking of shelling. We
:13:29. > :13:35.are now going to give you formulas to fill up. We're going to have
:13:35. > :13:43.focus groups. They give the public what they want. What is wrong with
:13:43. > :13:53.that? Nothing whatsoever. But you will not get surprises that way. He
:13:53. > :14:00.should be able to for a Brit tracks. Hollywood does that as well. A
:14:00. > :14:09.There are some very eccentric Hollywood movies. I am sure that
:14:09. > :14:15.they would police the producers. The ad that we set out to not make
:14:15. > :14:19.success, to not attract audience, is nonsense. A for to sit back in
:14:19. > :14:24.1995 that the British film industry would be better without subsidies
:14:24. > :14:28.and to make a comparison with the Americans saying that we are more
:14:28. > :14:33.hit and miss. But now we are learning the hard way that there
:14:33. > :14:38.are movies that people want to see, rather than self-indulgence stop.
:14:38. > :14:48.Do you want to know if I still believe that? I presume you do.
:14:48. > :14:52.The self-indulgent stuff can produce some gems? Of course it can.
:14:52. > :14:59.It sounds like a skewed question to me, but there we are. It goes to
:14:59. > :15:03.the question about her youth and the industry. Or not. -- how you
:15:03. > :15:07.find the industry. The argument that you're making is to remove the
:15:07. > :15:10.subsidies and gaining market. talking about a time when the
:15:10. > :15:17.subsidies had been removed and therefore we had to live in a
:15:17. > :15:22.different way. Subsidy can, perhaps once was, in invitation to
:15:22. > :15:31.indulgence. It is not any longer. There are not as many subsidies as
:15:31. > :15:39.they were. That was all to do with... You saying that a film like
:15:39. > :15:43.Great expectations, would ever No. We Make by a very, very successful
:15:43. > :15:49.director with a very successful cast, should that get a subsidy?
:15:49. > :15:53.do not think I should get subsidy, known. So you end up in a Berkshire
:15:53. > :15:57.field. I know you are dissatisfied by that when you watch it for the
:15:57. > :16:02.final ten minutes. Yes, but I do not think I deserve subsidy. I do
:16:02. > :16:05.believe the people are -- there are people who do and should be helped.
:16:05. > :16:12.You have thought about the difference between making films -
:16:12. > :16:20.the Casula history, you started out in British television and you sound
:16:20. > :16:25.like there are bits that you love and hate about birth. The parts
:16:25. > :16:35.that you hate is that you hate being told what to do. Yes,
:16:35. > :16:38.
:16:38. > :16:43.absolutely. Is that what it boils down to? Partly. But I also hate
:16:43. > :16:51.playing to somebody else's average. And what that process, the big
:16:51. > :16:57.screen, the $250 million budget route, what that does is to say
:16:57. > :17:02.that if we are going to get out $250 million back, we have to find
:17:02. > :17:06.out what the average audience wants because only by a attracting an
:17:06. > :17:14.average audience will you get the kind of numbers and everything
:17:14. > :17:19.follows from that. Did this happen to you on Prince of Persia or?
:17:19. > :17:24.It happens to you on every Hollywood movie. It will have that
:17:24. > :17:31.pressure on it. The only time that he did not happen to me was Harry
:17:31. > :17:37.Potter, when the man running Warner Brothers was so relaxed about what
:17:37. > :17:45.he was producing, it was number four and he knew he had an audience,
:17:45. > :17:48.that he acknowledged that it was a little too violent and a little too
:17:48. > :17:54.long, none of which he cared about. He was prepared to let it all
:17:54. > :18:01.happen because he had an audience. If you said about that film that
:18:01. > :18:05.making a pot film was like fighting the Battle of Stalingrad. It is a
:18:05. > :18:09.huge thing. Because you're constrained you are battling --
:18:09. > :18:15.constrained. You are battling against what other people want.
:18:15. > :18:19.is Stalingrad because it takes a long, because by the end of it all
:18:19. > :18:26.of your personal reverts are popping and probably the
:18:26. > :18:31.production's reverts as well. Anything as large as that is going
:18:31. > :18:40.to be a severe test. I think that's all that meant. A Test there you
:18:40. > :18:47.alternately enjoyed... I did enjoy it... But not in the making of it?
:18:47. > :18:57.No, there was some sequences that I absolutely loved. I loved them. I
:18:57. > :18:57.
:18:57. > :19:07.loved the kids. I adored the children. I had this theory that
:19:07. > :19:07.
:19:07. > :19:12.children are anarchists. They are seen whether their anarchy can in
:19:12. > :19:19.fact... They are anarchists and they are seen whether there and 80
:19:19. > :19:23.billion fact breakdown the authority that is set against him.
:19:23. > :19:28.-- whether there and a key can in fact. The bit that I do not like
:19:28. > :19:31.his, you have described the Hollywood boss - the temptation to
:19:31. > :19:40.go back and making programmes from television because you do not get
:19:40. > :19:45.that thing from television -- film producers. There is a pressure
:19:45. > :19:49.there and you can get a certain - there are films that I have wanted
:19:49. > :19:54.to make in the past couple of years that have been constrained by
:19:54. > :19:59.casting. They have been put out of business by casting. The budget was
:19:59. > :20:02.just too large and that means that the people who will put the money
:20:02. > :20:09.up - and remember this is commercial money, this is people
:20:09. > :20:13.expect to have it back - they want a certain kind of cast, which
:20:13. > :20:19.seemed to me to be disastrous and so in the end I did not make the
:20:19. > :20:28.film. But there was a film that you wanted to make, the story of
:20:28. > :20:33.Alexander vinegar, who was poisoned. What happened to that it was that...
:20:33. > :20:37.Be it was a true story of a Russian spy who was poisoned in London.
:20:37. > :20:44.was murdered for all sorts of reasons, which the script
:20:45. > :20:49.speculated about. I think a very large part of the reason that that
:20:49. > :20:53.did not get made was that people were frightened of it. It was a
:20:53. > :20:58.scary story and it might have been a very troublesome story. But he
:20:58. > :21:04.you're, you have had tremendous commercial success and have made a
:21:04. > :21:08.film set have been big of Box Office fits -- box office hits, can
:21:08. > :21:13.you not choose what you want to make now? And no, I do not think
:21:13. > :21:19.you can. When you get a rush of blood to the head, when you get
:21:19. > :21:21.something that you really love, then what you do is you put
:21:21. > :21:30.yourself on to that particular market. You put yourself up for
:21:30. > :21:35.something like that. And you simply take away any barrier that your
:21:35. > :21:44.presence might present to the project. You do not need to pay me
:21:44. > :21:49.or pay me very much. Yes, I will work out of a shoebox in a rat hole
:21:49. > :21:53.in solo. I didn't care about any of that stuff, but I would love to
:21:53. > :22:01.make the movie. You can open doors on the Rhone... And are you doing
:22:01. > :22:10.that now? Are IBM. What is the project? It is about Reagan against
:22:10. > :22:13.Gorbachev in Reykjavik in 1986. Here are at around 70 and a saying
:22:13. > :22:17.you're not get paid and living in a shoebox. I am not have not going to
:22:17. > :22:24.get paid, but I'm not going to get paid the Collingwood pays. Purely
:22:24. > :22:31.because this film is worth it? is tremendous. It is fun and it is
:22:31. > :22:38.exciting. You thought you knew the story and you didn't. In the end
:22:38. > :22:43.you say, why do we need another great expectations? Well, I needed
:22:43. > :22:50.it because I wanted to come home. I wanted to be back where scripts
:22:50. > :22:59.like this get written. Scripts like Great expectations? But also rated
:22:59. > :23:03.it. Scripts like Quaker Beck and scripts like, for instance, an
:23:03. > :23:08.American writer who wrote the story about the poise and Russian.
:23:08. > :23:12.there are plenty more film so you want to make? Yes. The one that I
:23:12. > :23:20.couldn't make because the casting just didn't quite come up to
:23:20. > :23:29.scratch was a British film by a British writer. That will yet be
:23:29. > :23:34.made? It could be. Difficult. Because of what - it is beginning
:23:34. > :23:39.to become difficult to shake many of the Budget to get it down to a
:23:39. > :23:46.point where... He began to this question of the budget and whether
:23:46. > :23:53.you are getting new creative and inspiring ideas. But it is the case.
:23:53. > :24:01.I cannot do it because I am too old and I am too stiff. But you can
:24:01. > :24:07.make a film on your-and lots of people do. -- iPhone and lots of