Four Films

Next week I'm filming an actor friend reading another friend's poetry so we can make four short films. Even though I'll be doing this in (yet another) friend's kitchen on a DV camera that cost me £100 and I'll be editing it myself, I am to all intents and purposes 'the director' and the thought of it has filled me with dread because I've been a bit stuck for inspiration about how to do the filming.

But this morning I spent a very pleasant hour translating Percy Shelley's poem Ozymandias into modern English for a group of exiled writers I work with, and a search for a recording of the poem to link to in my email* led me to the UBS adverts on YouTube with poetry read by famous actors including Harvey Keitel, John Gielgud, Maggie Smith and Paul Scofield.

Apart from the music under the readings (too intrusive), the blue tint on the film (too Avatar) and the tendency of the camera to pan and peep at the actors from behind a pillar, I'm definitely going to be stealing drawing inspiration from this look for my films. I just wish we had some boulders.


* isn't email great? It means I can only guess at the expression on the face of the lovely prize-winning poet who also works with the exiled writers as he read my 'there, that's better' version of Ozymandias.