‘1917’ personal story for director Sam Mendes
At 54, Sam Mendes is having a phenomenally good time.
Last June, he won the best director Tony for the smash West End import “The Ferryman.” That coincided with an off-Broadway engagement of his other red-hot London production, “The Lehman Brothers,” about the fabled brokerage house’s collapse. Tickets were scalped for a thousand bucks and “Lehman” returns to Broadway this spring, making another Tony possible.
And then there’s next Friday’s “1917,” Mendes’ most personal picture yet, already nominated for Golden Globes as Best Picture, Best Director, eight Critics Choice Awards and a shoo-in for upcoming Oscar nominations.
Does he worry this is all too much good fortune? That it can’t last?
“Not at all,” he answered, laughing heartily. “I’ve been around long enough to have years where it’s the opposite — nothing has been recognized at all.
“So to not embrace it when nice things happen? I mean it’s lovely. It’s a nice time.”
Mendes, whose two previous movies were James Bond blockbusters, is the motor behind “1917,” a WWI thriller that unreels in two hours’ real time as one long take.
Inspired by stories his WWI veteran grandfather told, Mendes shares screenplay credit for the first time
The premise is simple: Two British soldiers must survive No Man’s Land, rat-infested tunnels and booby traps to deliver a message by sunrise that will save hundreds of troops from being slaughtered by the Germans.
“The moment I decided that the story I was going to tell took two hours of real time, I knew I wanted, as much as anything else, for the audience to experience every second. In that sense the movie is a ticking clock thriller,” he said.
“With the audience feeling the physical reality of the distance and the difficulty of the journey, I felt the best way for the audience to connect to that was to make it an unbroken experience.
“It was two things that happened at the same time: Unwinds in real time and one shot.”
Having co-written, “It does make you feel a bit more vulnerable, like a little bit of my family history.
“It’s very moving, he added, “to sit in an empty room with a blank piece of paper and months later see people turning up whom you admire to work on it. That is a feeling I’ve never had before really.”
(“1917” opens Friday.)
from Boston Herald https://ift.tt/2QkDLpY
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