Eloquence in The King's Speech, POV on commercials
By Robert Goldrich
Based on its recent screenings at the Telluride Film Festival and the Toronto International Film Festival, The King’s Speech directed by Tom Hooper has emerged as an early leading Oscar contender spanning best picture, actor (Colin Firth) and director, among other categories.
The King’s Speech tells the story of King George VI (Firth stars as the World War II monarch) whose stammering is treated by a speech therapist (portrayed by Geoffrey Rush). While a period piece, the film centers primarily on the friendship that develops between the two characters and the life’s lessons that come from confronting and overcoming obstacles. The therapist gets to the psychological roots of the stuttering as we ultimately see King George VI put his fears aside to formally address the U.K. people, informing them of the nation’s declaration of war against Germany.
In-between the screenings of the film at Telluride and Toronto came the announcement that Hooper had signed with Smuggler for U.S. representation in commercials. Just as The King’s Speech is marked by eloquence, so too is the director’s explanation for the appeal of spotmaking to him and his decision to join Smuggler.
Hooper–who helmed some ad work years ago, including for John Hegarty of Bartle Bogle Hegarty in London–related, “The more I work on feature films, I find myself on a scene-by-scene basis exploring the best way to express the DNA of a story through almost the simplest possible execution of a shot. Sometimes you can fall into the trap of trying to be so visually interesting that you don’t express the DNA of the moment–and that’s the kind of work that ends up on the cutting room floor. I am constantly working at distilling into compositional framing all the information I need to express the moment, to capture the performance of the actors and use their space to do justice to the story. I am constantly asking myself, ‘What’s the one shot that can give you the right information in a simple way?’
“Because I’ve gone on that journey of trying to find a really pure way to encode the story and the movie in each frame, I’m very much intrigued with how to accomplish that within 30 or 60 seconds,” continued Hooper. “With fewer shots, each image in a commercial must work efficiently to tell the story, to develop the character. It’s all about stripping out the waste. Commercials are a very pure form of communication. Commercials are like poems–the purest form of short form at their best. I’m interested in commercials that tell stories.”
As for Smuggler, Hooper noted that several factors led him to the production house. “John Hart who produced Revolutionary Road is on the film side at Smuggler. John is an eminent producer and his choice to be with Smuggler means a lot to me. There’s a synergy in the company that has an understanding of film, and the demands of the film and advertising worlds. I also like what they’ve done for [director] Bennett Miller. Coming back from Capote, Miller has done well in commercials. Smuggler seems interested in the challenges of directors who aren’t always available but hunger to do great work when they are available. Additionally, I have a great respect for [Smuggler executive producers/partners] Patrick [Milling Smith] and Brian [Carmody].”
History buff
Hooper has a penchant for history as reflected in a filmography that includes not only The King’s Speech but the HBO miniseries John Adams which won a record high 13 Emmy Awards in a single year, including for best miniseries and outstanding directorial achievement in movies for TV or miniseries. Hooper also earned a DGA Award nomination for John Adams.
Hooper described part of his approach to The King’s Speech and period pieces in general as using historical accuracy to dispel viewers’ preconceived notions of what a particular era was like. He cited a speech at Wembley Stadium made when Firth’s character was a prince, not yet a king. The popular notion today might picture the prince decked out in sartorial splendor, replete with royal family trappings, separating him from those who surround him. But the historical record shows that the prince wore a black suit, black tie and black hat, as did those in the stadium audience. “The scene looks like he’s going to a funeral,” related Hooper. “So the film starts out by subverting the idea of what a movie about the royal family should be. I’m not a subversive person. But subversion is in my work.”
The director explained that this subversion can become a critical dynamic to building drama. “How do you create suspense over who is going to win the Revolutionary War?” he asked regarding his John Adams miniseries. “Viewers know the outcome. But if you can show historically how that world, that period, actually was–making it quite different from cliches envisioned by the audience–you create an unfamiliarity that is more helpful to generating a viewer’s sense that he or she doesn’t quite know where the story is going.”
Hooper noted that for The King’s Speech he began to start his closeups on wider lenses to center on “the central spine of the film–the relationship between the speech therapist and the King. I didn’t want to go with the conventional closeup shot with an out of focus background and not being able to use the space the two characters are in to help tell the story.”
Additionally for Firth as King George VI, Hooper continued to strive for the perfect storytelling shot.
“I almost exclusively put him against negative space when the camera was focused on him–big distressed walls where the wallpaper was almost falling apart. His face was floating in negative space, much like stammering can cast a person into isolation and a world of nothingness.”
Among Hooper’s other notable credits was his first collaboration with Academy Award-nominated screenwriter Peter Morgan in 2005: Longford, a drama charting Lord Longford’s attempts to secure the release of convicted serial killer Myra Hindley. Longford won Golden Globes for Jim Broadbent (who portrayed Longford), Samantha Morton (who played Hindley) and for best TV film.
After John Adams, Hooper then collaborated again with screenwriter Morgan on The Damned United, the film adaptation of David Peace’s bestselling novel about football manager Brian Clough and his turbulent tenure in charge of the 1970’s Leeds United team.
Review: Malcolm Washington Makes His Feature Directing Debut With “The Piano Lesson”
An heirloom piano takes on immense significance for one family in 1936 Pittsburgh in August Wilson's "The Piano Lesson." Generational ties also permeate the film adaptation, in which Malcolm Washington follows in his father Denzel Washington's footsteps in helping to bring the entirety of The Pittsburgh Cycle — a series of 10 plays — to the screen.
Malcolm Washington did not start from scratch in his accomplished feature filmmaking debut. He enlisted much of the cast from the recent Broadway revival with Samuel L. Jackson (Doaker Charles), his brother, John David Washington (Boy Willie), Ray Fisher (Lymon) and Michael Potts (Whining Boy). Berniece, played by Danielle Brooks in the play, is now beautifully portrayed by Danielle Deadwyler. With such rich material and a cast for whom it's second nature, it would be hard, one imagines, to go wrong. Jackson's own history with the play goes back to its original run in 1987 when he was Boy Willie.
It's not the simplest thing to make a play feel cinematic, but Malcolm Washington was up to the task. His film opens up the world of the Charles family beyond the living room. In fact, this adaptation, which Washington co-wrote with "Mudbound" screenwriter Virgil Williams, goes beyond Wilson's text and shows us the past and the origins of the intricately engraved piano that's central to all the fuss. It even opens on a big, action-filled set piece in 1911, during which the piano is stolen from a white family's home. Another fleshes out Doaker's monologue in which he explains to the uninitiated, Fisher's Lymon, and the audience, the tortured history of the thing. While it might have been nice to keep the camera on Jackson, such a great, grounding presence throughout, the good news is that he really makes... Read More